I was once a sperm who undertook that monumental journey, that swim that would defy gargantuan odds, that long tedious battle that would make me who I am. My memories come back to me, they remind me of what could have been, they question the need for my existence, they ask me who I have become, and I stand mute, without answers, without shame, without remorse. It is perhaps warranted that we men should not remember too far back, for the memory of that journey is cruel, its crushing, but it is worth holding on to.

I was far back in the pack, I was shouldering the little ones, and I was being shouldered by the bigger ones, the rushing streams made it hard to look at their faces, but every now and then I caught a glimpse; a face that smiled more beautifully, a body that looked more healthy, a heart that was more giving, a mind that was cleaner, and then there were the others, the cruel eyed, the bitter spoken, the weepers, creepers and sleepers. I was somewhere there, more deserving than a few and undeserving in the light of others.

I met that man who was on the way back to life, that man who called men - sheep and wine -blood, I met him at a crossing that was wide enough for just one. In that infinitely short moment in which our eyes met we remembered the past. He had been bleeding, it had begun to drizzle a bit, he was begging for death, after what seemed like an eternity death came, and when the last breath left his lungs, its heat caused a massacre, many of my ilk died that moment. I stood there and demanded that he let me pass, he let me take the path ahead of him, always the large-hearted.

Then I met the other one; the horse riding, sword wielding poet. I reminded him of the one time when he had taken to breaking the idols in a temple. I reminded him of how I was but an insect whose home was a clay doll that had traveled many miles to be worshiped in that temple. I reminded him of how one of his less vehement strikes had crushed my back and squashed me to death. Millions had taken to praying whilst they faced the spot of my death, but I was not the forgiving type. My claim to life won over the remorse of a prophet, I was given passage.

Many more I met, fiends claiming to be saints and liars claiming to be messiahs, some yielded, some were made to, until finally I had sealed my place in this world. I had done good, I had made sure that there would be no mistakes this time. There would be no more bloodshed in the name of a god or a book or a prophet. I had made sure that tomorrow we shall not have one more god to pit the old ones against. I stand mute, without answers, without shame, without remorse.

Its hard to imagine a life without patterns, its impossible in fact. If night did not follow day, If death did not follow birth, If birds did not migrate, It summer and winter did not alternate, our sense of logic would crumble and our lives would not make sense anymore. And so, man lives many lives in one, and many times he lives the same life. The iterations are not one better than the other, for that would ruin the sense of logic established by a pattern, instead the iterations are more of repetitions, they are re-enactments of the same script, or rather adaptations, one no better than the other. The protagonist does not change and so the script remains one that is in the vicinity of his comfort zone, the other characters are replicas of the previous episodes, one differently bearded friend , one differently spoken friend, all wearing different make ups to play the same part. And there you are, with the same dagger in your hand, with the same swagger in your walk, with the same enemy to slay, with the same lady to win, and with the same grave to tumble into. Each time you give the exact same commitment to your part, and pull off the same killer performance. Each time the credits roll, and each time you are left wanting for more. Bye Bye life, Hello Life.

I once had a lot to say, but these days the lack of words seems more beautiful. Not too long ago a career in writing beckoned, but these days a few meaningless lines seem to bring more satisfaction. I have spent too long a time thinking about too many things, I haven't really gotten anywhere.

I have rejected so many ideas that ideas seem to reject me these days. And yet, without thoughts, without words, without inspiration or imagination, I oddly feel more at home in this intellectual lull. There is a sanctity associated with thoughtlessness that seems strangely welcoming.

One other thing, there is a huge elephant that has taken to living with me, it goes with me where ever I go, and yet I do not refer to it. In attempts to offend the old beast, I try my hand at nonchalance, but wordless disregard seems to only feed its huge ego and make it all the more adamant. This battle would take some time.

And then there is the world around, a world that is preoccupied with its own little worries, its inconsequential sorrows and its silly joys. It matters less and less and it matters more and more. Callously imagined and frivolously peopled, its emotions seem alien, and I find myself in a world I cant recognize. To me I seem to stand out, to it I am but another.

I am at loss for words again, at least for now.

They hold torches for us, we climb in silent obedience
There is a reason why we have worn this blue suit
Trembling feet make their way through thorn filled bushes
There is pain to be felt before the sharing of the fruit

Falling rain has its moments of anonymity and dramatics
The horn in the distance makes for a warning welcome
And the little boy slips and lets go of the plastics
Its a steep fall and there is not time to go back to old stories

The possibility of sorrow makes me cry
Only truth is to be blamed for the fall of the lie
Give me the loose end of the string, make me sing
Take this broken heart and present it to the king

It is me going home to torches
I am walking alone now, And it is just my trembling feet
It is me in the blue suit and it fits me well
It is I who has been through pain, and it is my fruit to eat.

Between today and tomorrow I am another man, I have seen yesterday and I am ready to face tomorrow. Today will be a lesson too, of small heartaches and silly hopes, it would be a small step for mankind, but a mighty leap for me.

I have always been taught to doubt people, to doubt their intentions, to question their motives, and so trust was never a core competency, so to say. I had lost faith in man long before I lost faith in god, my anchor is my doubt, the only thing that seems not to betray.

I have reason enough to doubt the general prevailing reason, I have sanity enough to question the concept of it, I am tortured by the faith people show in others, and I am convinced that the general population holds a sample of all humankind at different stages of moral maturity. I believe that the highest moral stand is that of doubt, it is the only answer that answers all questions, a 'maybe' is more powerful that any god.

I have known what they call love, maybe I have seen it somewhere, but it was a fleeting moment, and I caught no more than a whiff of it. It is a smoke screen that fools intellect, it sets passions on fire and leads the conscious down a path to misery, it is the opium of the morally superior. It conveniently allows one to maintain a easy stand, that of faith in another, without so much as admitting to the lack of strength to doubt. It takes courage to stand up and ask why, it takes strength to admit that all we want is pleasure.

It takes a wise man to proclaim faith, and an earnest one to proclaim doubt.

I have never been to England and I have never met the queen, but I have known some very nice people in my modest life, and I have learnt some invaluable lessons.

Balu Anna - The Rickshaw driver who took me to school from std1 to std 2 the man who used to stop on the way to buy flowers that he used to pay homage with at the small temple next to our school. The young man who toiled hard for a living, who never failed to smile, who always spoke kindly, so much so that i never once remember anyone disrespect him on account of his social standing. From him I learn humility and the dignity of labor, I am but an instrument.

The Maths Teacher whose name I forgot - Every time I think of school, she is the face that comes to mind, she loved numbers as much as she loved teaching. She made us smile in a classroom, she taught us how to count. I saw her again last summer, she is still teaching children how to count, she is still in love with what she does. The maths teacher whose name I still don't know, but from whom I learnt that life is measured by the lives you can touch positively.

The Neighbor uncle (Indu Appa) - The one who was old enough to be my grandpa, the one who served for years in the police and retired reluctantly. The man who told me tales of how he caught criminals, and how crime never pays. His Chartered Accountant son and him librarian daughter, they live their lives by the principles he espoused and the discipline he inculcated in them. Me though, I think of his often enough to remind myself of what is right and what is wrong.

The old man from god's own land - In 2005 I happened to meet an old man, he was 95. In his 50s he had lost a part of his family and a hand in a train accident. A devout Muslim till then, he found his faith dwindling. And so he began his walk, he started from Kerala and walked for 5 years, stopping for rest and earning some money along the way. He traveled all the way by foot and reached Mecca. His faith forged, he returned home to serve the community. At 80 he lost his eyesight. At 90 he could see again without the help of an operation. At 95, when I met him, he was strong as an ox and still serving the world.he Old man died a few months later. The important thing is he did not die when he lost his family, he did not die on his way to Mecca, he did not die when he was blind, he died only after having conquered all odds. From him I learn that life is one long walk, and I have just begun taking baby steps.

So hold on heart, there is more to life than grades and placements. There are people to meet, lessons to learn, and if time and modesty permits ...some lessons to teach as well

There is no joy,just a pretense of it.
There is no togetherness, just an image of it.
There are no faces, just masks.

Hearts break all the time, tiny inaudible bursts of pain, there is a screeching tearing sensation, it is but local, the air in the lungs couldn't know of it, lest it carry the information out. There are words thrown about, irretrievable ones, ones that disillusion people, slowly, but surely. There are smiles, just creases, intended misdirections. There are celebrations, momentary distractions, glimpses of a world unreal. There are friendships, convenient associations, one fooling oneself. There is love, the subhuman transactional kind, filled with exchanges and formalities, an anti-thesis. Hypocrisy is underestimated with regards to the extent of its presence, people are underestimated with regards to the depths to which they can fall. Callous accusations, careless remarks, false narrations and a pretension of remorse. Trust is notorious by its absence, replaced with deceit, wounded and slain in a battle with misplaced pride and foolhardy arrogance. There is a scent of duplicity in the air, and everybody breathes in it.

EVENING

It was evening in Chennai, there was a possibility of rain later that night, but right then it was just pleasantly breezy. Suresh was walking out of school after having finished his athletics practice, he was twelve. Suresh loved to run, one of his fantasies involved being given a vast endless track with savannas on both sides of it; to run, like the breeze itself, worrying about nothing, just blowing away far into the sunset. He was sweating like a thief on the run, the cool breeze was soothing, with the spikes in his hands he made out of the gate at the exact same time as on rest of the days. As if by instinct he headed straight for the juice shop opposite the school. The juice shop owner; Mari Anna smiled at Suresh as he walked into the store and ordered his usual lime juice, as usual he declined to eat any on the puffs, or samosas or the other oily stuff. All that was on his mind was the APSCE meet in one week's time; he was running for gold in the junior’s category. At that moment, like on all days Anisha walked out of the school gate.

Suresh had always been a poor student academically, but on the field he was a little short of god himself. Be it on the track, or on the football field he thrived hard to be the best, and more often than not he was successful. It made him feel as if he belonged to this school, they held him like a priced asset, and it made him feel worthy. So no matter how hot it was or how breezy it was or how cold it was he never missed the practice sessions in the evenings. He ran alone sometimes, company was not something that kept him going, it was something else, the drive perhaps to be the best at something.

He was the last son to his parents who parented in all five children. Being younger to two brothers and two sisters was no easy task; many in the past have suffered through these pressures, Suresh had unwillingly joined that list. His suffering was not in the treatment, but in the expectations. His brothers were in engineering colleges, one sister was a practicing doctor, and another was a brain asset doing her tenth standard in the same school. Under the circumstances Suresh's love for the world of track and field was quite a disappointment for the family. They let him do as he pleases, but they dint love it. They dint celebrate his winnings and dint console him during his defeats. Suresh was living a life that was to his family, in a large sense purposeless.

A quiet blush sneaked past behind the skin of his face as he saw Anisha walk out of the gate and cross the road towards the ice-cream store next to the juice shop. His eyes stayed on her as she made it into the ice-cream store. Quickly then he finished his juice, paid, and went off to take his position. He walked a little distance away from the school and crossed back to the school side of the road. He smiled at the pav bhaji wala who smiled back at him. The one rupee that was remaining he tossed into the plate of the blind beggar who sat on the other side of the pav bahaji cart. The blind man smiled and said "So running over today?” Suresh replied affirmatively and began chatting with the old blind beggar as usual. After sometime he noticed Anisha walk out of the ice cream shop, cross the road and take up her position a little way away from Suresh's own standing spot. She was waiting for her dad to come by and pick her up. He was waiting for her dad to come by and pick her up. It was the best part of the day for Suresh as he chatted with a stranger who felt more close than family and as he looked at a girl who looked more like an angel.

"Did i tell you that long ago, before i was blinded in the factory accident i used to play hockey?"
"yes, and you were bloody magnificient" Suresh confirmed. The pav bhaji wala smiled and shook his head, the reaction of a man who had heard the story one too many times.

"The ball used to stay stuck to my hockey stick as if it was attached with some glue, and magically it would leave the stick to fly into the back of the goal net..."

The blind beggar went on to narrate the other fine achievements of his sighted self. Suresh knew the tales by heart, so he kept the blind man talking by adding a 'oh' or a 'ok...’ at the right moments. His eyes though were on Anisha who was standing a little to his left and a little in front of him. Every now and then a bit of what the blind man said would be loud enough to carry to her ears and she'd turn back instinctively to catch Suresh looking in her direction- uncomfortable seconds.

In class he was one of those quiet ones who sat minding his own business in the far corner of the class. Once in a while he'd look in the general direction of Anisha and catch a glimpse of her earring. She had a unique set of earrings; it was designed in a very different manner. Not that Suresh knew a lot about earrings but he liked this one. Two things he liked about her actually, the only two things he even bothered to study. One was the side of her face with the earrings (left, right, whichever his position bestowed), the other -the part of her legs that began where her skirt ended and ended where her socks began. He was in love with both of them. And that is all it was, a slight earring-leg crush. He never told anyone, he was one of those guys people don’t normally associate with people.

Once there had been an incident that had caused him to get into the limelight, and it wasn’t a very good experience. Sudheer had gotten into an argument with him regarding a very silly matter. Sudheer had just fought with Rajneesh and the whole class agitated about it except of course Suresh. Sudheer and Rajneesh used to sit next to each other and after the fight that wasn’t possible so Sudheer decided to go back and take Suresh's place. When Suresh returned it irked him that his earring sighting position was being taken away from him. When he refused to move and tried to create a scene instead he got a proper thumping from Suresh. The fact that Anisha had a crush on Sudheer made Suresh once and for all the bad guy in her eyes. He did not care. He was still in love with her earring-leg combo.

All of a sudden, while the beggar was still talking about the league quarter final match where he scored the crucial goal, the clouds decided to give way and it began drizzling. The pav bhaji guy began closing his cart, the people on the roan rushed to the shade of the road side shops, Anisha headed for the juice shop and Suresh had a mind of following her. Suddenly he realized that the old blind beggar had no idea what to do, so he rushed back to the supposedly ex hockey hero and helped him get up and get into the shade. When it started raining heavily Suresh rushed to get the plastic sheet on which the beggar had been sitting so that he could use it to cover the beggar’s head to help him stay dry. As soon as Suresh left the beggar’s side, the beggar thought Suresh was gone and he too stumbled to reach his plastic sheet. It was at this moment that a bike skidded off the recently wet road and ran straight into the beggar who collapsed in a heap. Everyone present rushed to the spot, Anisha included.

"Stop a vehicle, get him to the hospital!" people were crying. As if sent by the gods a car screeched to a halt next to the crowd. Suresh recognized the car to be Anisha's. Immediately he began calling for people to help him carry the beggar to the car. Anisha was explaining something to someone inside the car. At last she then turned back with an apologetic look on her face. Within the next few seconds she got into the car and the car sped away leaving the beggar carrying crowd wondering what was happening. Suresh had never been so angry as he was when he drove along with an auto driver to the hospital with the beggar in the back seat. He was fuming. Anisha would die tomorrow.

The storm that came was the worst that Chennai had faced in a decade. Roads were filled with water. Every natural and manmade pot hole was leveled out by water. Government declared the next two days as holidays for schools and colleges. After the two days there was the weekend to follow. Four days Suresh spent in his house analyzing and re analyzing what had happened. He wondered what happened to the beggar whom he had left in the hospital. Thinking hard he realized that what happened was in no way Anisha's fault. She did not even know the beggar, an yet she had tried to persuade whoever it was inside the car to help the poor blind man, and when she had to give in to the selfishness of the car owner she had such a sorry look on her face that it made Suresh feel ashamed now that he had felt anger towards her. That sorry look came again and again in front of his eyes for those four days. The focus had shifted from the earring-leg to something in the eyes. He thought more and more about the shame in the helpless eyes, the care in the clueless face and the heart that housed all these feelings. Some queer thing was happening to him. It was both nice and frightening.

Sunday evening when the rain abated, Suresh headed to the hospital to check on the beggar. They told him he had become fine by that morning and had chosen to leave. They also told him that they guy who had hit the beggar had settled the hospital charges. That night he lay in his bed wondering where the beggar might be, and if he would see him the next day. Then his thoughts shifted, and he saw Anisha's face again.

Monday morning as Suresh rushed into the school in the last moment, he noticed that the beggar was not there. The whole day he was restless. When he looked in Anisha's direction he felt a lump rise up to his throat. Once when both their eyes met he felt something he never felt before; fear.

In the evening Suresh was standing and looking at the spot where the beggar usually sat. In his place was the blue plastic sheet. There was some stagnant water on the sheet. On the puddle were a couple of leaves dancing around each other. He was staring at the absent beggar when he heard a voice from his back say "how is he?"

He turned back and his legs almost gave way when he realized it was Anisha. It was the first time ever that she had spoken to him. "I don’t know" he said. She looked at the plastic sheet as she said "I am Sorry" carrying the same apologetic look on her face that had haunted him for the last four days.

"It is ok" said Suresh. It was that time in the evening when the soft wind consoled the broken leaves and carried them away to some place better.

I have heard orators inspire a million,
but I haven't heard a singer yet,
I have read lines that have smelt of flowers,
but I haven't met a poet yet,
I have seen a thousand painters color the sky,
but I haven't seen an artist yet,
I am a stable boy in a drunken slumber,
I haven't loved the princess yet

Smell.
Touch.
See.
Hear.
Taste.
&
Forget.

I see rocks now, I feel cold.
I play dumb now, I act plain.
I try to hide now, I disappear.

Let me be. Let me be.
I can take more, but let me be.

I am not what I used to be, maybe I have grown used to this now.

I had always been a decent student, I gave studies as much importance any other kid would. I used to play, but when it was time to study I was always sincere in my efforts.

I wasn't gifted enough to have maths or science fall in love with me. I always knew that it was my effort that would matter in the end. I thought maybe if I tried hard enough and loved my studies sincerely, then one day, in spite of my mediocrity, the subject would smile back and maybe love me a little.

I am after all destiny's orphan, I am not resorting to self pity, but am stating the facts as they are. I continue to toil with my inadequacies and continue to labor under my fallacies, without knowing what they are and if i was born with them or managed to somehow acquire them through the course of my cursed life.

I have learnt to live with it and not question it, I have resorted to being happy in my losses.

I have learnt that people are loved for what they are and not who they are.

I have my flaws, for I am human,
I seek pleasure, for I am an animal,
And I want to be loved, for I am alive.

Do not blame me for my hesitation,
Do not look at me like a mirror does,
Do not expect miracles out of me,
Do not despise me for my weaknesses,
And please Do not take me for a granted.

I am not answerable to anyone, even if I love them.
I am not to be judged by another, even if I befriend them.
I am not anyone's social service project, even if I decide to heed them.

I am me, I have no apologies to make.