Look. Turn around. Take a step back and pause. Just for a moment.
I look for him every day. I search for him all day long. I try to pretend all day too so that they know I'm still searching. I try to pretend as if I found him for their comfort to remain unperturbed... But then how is it a 'he'? Who decided to associate the masculine to His name? I just capitalized the 'aich'. Does that mean I believe he is out there? Is there a difference; difference between the fact that I search for him and the belief I have that he is out there? Or is this temporary cynicism as I am told? Cynicism that will be swept away with one blow; a tragic blow, they said. It must be tragic, and full of regret and remorse. I don't believe it. But I have felt it. The fear of being completely and absolutely unaware of what may come. I am not ashamed of owning up to my fears and never was. It's my lack of ability to display it all too animatedly unlike the immaturity I put up on display every moment unabashedly. I am not afraid of being called shameless or immature. I am afraid that might be too right. Too much than I know it to be. And just like them, I fear too. Sometimes people are blind to the difference between unabashedness and fearlessness. You want know where I think the line is drawn? Perhaps, there is a transcendental quality to fear, that is unlike the very humane shade to shamelessness and unabashedness. I rarely feel shame. I do however fear if that's all right.
Not that I was forced to think today. In fact there isn't a moment my head stops talking these days. I don't think it stops talking even while I'm asleep. But here I lie, and here I sit. With my palms stretched out beneath my eyes and I simply stare and try to win the staring game with whoknowswhat. I barely stand. Here I sit, angry, unable to do, unable to stand. This ability to speak, write, type and express! Express this anger coupled with this inability to act. A disastrous pair. A situation sold to hopelessness. Anger for naught. Corrupted. Maybe he was just joking. But I know he's right. It did hit home when he told me to take a long look at my jokes. It was a stale joke too. Then again, I guess all those jokes always were. Maybe I'm just trying too hard to get a sense of humour about all of this. But I hear that tone every other day, that glare, that sigh that indicates a critical case of worthlessness. Their expressions that suggest and perhaps, just maybe even mock the dormancy and aimlessness of this time of my life. And I know there is truth in it. It's a little scarring.
Perhaps it's all right for us to carry scars. Shamelessly. At this point, when my friends' return to their moving lives, their lives that are much ahead with speed of purpose and momentum of cause, I try to calculate and recall my worth but the figures say zero and I spend another chain of hours doubting every part of myself like I have every day of these two years. Slipping. Tastelessly. Losing. Slowly. Every hour, every day. Doubt scraping at these walls that have set themselves up over these two years. Screaming. Screeching it's sharp, tormenting nails down these bare, chipped walls.
It's just another day when my anger will not let me sleep. Another day when it can't stay unspoken, unwritten any longer. I don't even think this is anger. Anger is supposed to be productive. I say something clever and then the utter futility of it hits me. The fact that those 'clever, well intentioned, carefully thought-out words just dissipated into a vacuum-space. "Har waqt bolti rehti ho par kuch kar nahi sakti." It's frustration but it's all in vain. I contemplate him, contemplate my search, contemplate if even this search holds some meaning. I try to stand up but fail to find my position in all of this. I don't know what this is. Out of the 24 hours of an average human being's day, the averagest of our kind probably spend 20 blinking, lying awake with exhausted eyelids that want to retire but do not know how. I don't think crises have homes to retire to. They just die. Die down, die out. Like those epidemics we hear of that take hundreds of lives in one day, out of nowhere. Gradually we stop hearing of them and forget about the whole thing all together.
Wiping off the fog my breath forms on the looking-glass, I look at myself and then I realise how much all of it is nothing and might never be anything. I look but I don't see what I'm looking for. I don't see myself.
I look for him every day. I search for him all day long. I try to pretend all day too so that they know I'm still searching. I try to pretend as if I found him for their comfort to remain unperturbed... But then how is it a 'he'? Who decided to associate the masculine to His name? I just capitalized the 'aich'. Does that mean I believe he is out there? Is there a difference; difference between the fact that I search for him and the belief I have that he is out there? Or is this temporary cynicism as I am told? Cynicism that will be swept away with one blow; a tragic blow, they said. It must be tragic, and full of regret and remorse. I don't believe it. But I have felt it. The fear of being completely and absolutely unaware of what may come. I am not ashamed of owning up to my fears and never was. It's my lack of ability to display it all too animatedly unlike the immaturity I put up on display every moment unabashedly. I am not afraid of being called shameless or immature. I am afraid that might be too right. Too much than I know it to be. And just like them, I fear too. Sometimes people are blind to the difference between unabashedness and fearlessness. You want know where I think the line is drawn? Perhaps, there is a transcendental quality to fear, that is unlike the very humane shade to shamelessness and unabashedness. I rarely feel shame. I do however fear if that's all right.
Not that I was forced to think today. In fact there isn't a moment my head stops talking these days. I don't think it stops talking even while I'm asleep. But here I lie, and here I sit. With my palms stretched out beneath my eyes and I simply stare and try to win the staring game with whoknowswhat. I barely stand. Here I sit, angry, unable to do, unable to stand. This ability to speak, write, type and express! Express this anger coupled with this inability to act. A disastrous pair. A situation sold to hopelessness. Anger for naught. Corrupted. Maybe he was just joking. But I know he's right. It did hit home when he told me to take a long look at my jokes. It was a stale joke too. Then again, I guess all those jokes always were. Maybe I'm just trying too hard to get a sense of humour about all of this. But I hear that tone every other day, that glare, that sigh that indicates a critical case of worthlessness. Their expressions that suggest and perhaps, just maybe even mock the dormancy and aimlessness of this time of my life. And I know there is truth in it. It's a little scarring.
Perhaps it's all right for us to carry scars. Shamelessly. At this point, when my friends' return to their moving lives, their lives that are much ahead with speed of purpose and momentum of cause, I try to calculate and recall my worth but the figures say zero and I spend another chain of hours doubting every part of myself like I have every day of these two years. Slipping. Tastelessly. Losing. Slowly. Every hour, every day. Doubt scraping at these walls that have set themselves up over these two years. Screaming. Screeching it's sharp, tormenting nails down these bare, chipped walls.
It's just another day when my anger will not let me sleep. Another day when it can't stay unspoken, unwritten any longer. I don't even think this is anger. Anger is supposed to be productive. I say something clever and then the utter futility of it hits me. The fact that those 'clever, well intentioned, carefully thought-out words just dissipated into a vacuum-space. "Har waqt bolti rehti ho par kuch kar nahi sakti." It's frustration but it's all in vain. I contemplate him, contemplate my search, contemplate if even this search holds some meaning. I try to stand up but fail to find my position in all of this. I don't know what this is. Out of the 24 hours of an average human being's day, the averagest of our kind probably spend 20 blinking, lying awake with exhausted eyelids that want to retire but do not know how. I don't think crises have homes to retire to. They just die. Die down, die out. Like those epidemics we hear of that take hundreds of lives in one day, out of nowhere. Gradually we stop hearing of them and forget about the whole thing all together.
Wiping off the fog my breath forms on the looking-glass, I look at myself and then I realise how much all of it is nothing and might never be anything. I look but I don't see what I'm looking for. I don't see myself.
I've been following your blog for quite some time. You always write well but this was amazing. I've already read it thrice.
ReplyDeleteread this out loud for me sometime. it has power.
ReplyDeleteThank you so much! :)
ReplyDelete