Song Of The Open Road

1


Afoot and light-hearted, I take to the open road,
Healthy, free, the world before me,
The long brown path before me, leading wherever I choose.


Henceforth I ask not good-fortune—I myself am good fortune;
Henceforth I whimper no more, postpone no more, need nothing,
Strong and content, I travel the open road.


The earth—that is sufficient;
I do not want the constellations any nearer;
I know they are very well where they are;
I know they suffice for those who belong to them.


(Still here I carry my old delicious burdens;
I carry them, men and women—I carry them with me wherever I go;
I swear it is impossible for me to get rid of them;
I am fill’d with them, and I will fill them in return.)


2

You road I enter upon and look around! I believe you are not all that is here;
I believe that much unseen is also here.


Here the profound lesson of reception, neither preference or denial;
The black with his woolly head, the felon, the diseas’d, the illiterate person, are not denied;
The birth, the hasting after the physician, the beggar’s tramp, the drunkard’s stagger, the laughing party of mechanics,
The escaped youth, the rich person’s carriage, the fop, the eloping couple,
The early market-man, the hearse, the moving of furniture into the town, the return back from the town,
They pass—I also pass—anything passes—none can be interdicted;
None but are accepted—none but are dear to me.


3

You air that serves me with breath to speak!
You objects that call from diffusion my meanings, and give them shape!
You light that wraps me and all things in delicate equable showers!
You paths worn in the irregular hollows by the roadsides!
I think you are latent with unseen existences—you are so dear to me.


You flagg’d walks of the cities! you strong curbs at the edges!
You ferries! you planks and posts of wharves! you timber-lined sides! you distant ships!
You rows of houses! you window-pierc’d facades! you roofs!
You porches and entrances! you copings and iron guards!
You windows whose transparent shells might expose so much!
You doors and ascending steps! you arches!
You gray stones of interminable pavements! you trodden crossings!
From all that has been near you, I believe you have imparted to yourselves, and now would impart the same secretly to me;
From the living and the dead I think you have peopled your impassive surfaces, and the spirits thereof would be evident and amicable with me.


4

The earth expanding right hand and left hand,
The picture alive, every part in its best light,
The music falling in where it is wanted, and stopping where it is not wanted,
The cheerful voice of the public road—the gay fresh sentiment of the road.


O highway I travel! O public road! do you say to me, Do not leave me?
Do you say, Venture not? If you leave me, you are lost?
Do you say, I am already prepared—I am well-beaten and undenied—adhere to me?


O public road! I say back, I am not afraid to leave you—yet I love you;
You express me better than I can express myself;
You shall be more to me than my poem.


I think heroic deeds were all conceiv’d in the open air, and all great poems also;
I think I could stop here myself, and do miracles;
(My judgments, thoughts, I henceforth try by the open air, the road;)
I think whatever I shall meet on the road I shall like, and whoever beholds me shall like me;
I think whoever I see must be happy.


5

From this hour, freedom!
From this hour I ordain myself loos’d of limits and imaginary lines,
Going where I list, my own master, total and absolute,
Listening to others, and considering well what they say,
Pausing, searching, receiving, contemplating,
Gently, but with undeniable will, divesting myself of the holds that would hold me.


I inhale great draughts of space;
The east and the west are mine, and the north and the south are mine.


I am larger, better than I thought;
I did not know I held so much goodness.


All seems beautiful to me;
I can repeat over to men and women, You have done such good to me, I would do the same to you.


I will recruit for myself and you as I go;
I will scatter myself among men and women as I go;
I will toss the new gladness and roughness among them;
Whoever denies me, it shall not trouble me;
Whoever accepts me, he or she shall be blessed, and shall bless me.


6

Now if a thousand perfect men were to appear, it would not amaze me;
Now if a thousand beautiful forms of women appear’d, it would not astonish me.


Now I see the secret of the making of the best persons,
It is to grow in the open air, and to eat and sleep with the earth.


Here a great personal deed has room;
A great deed seizes upon the hearts of the whole race of men,
Its effusion of strength and will overwhelms law, and mocks all authority and all argument against it.


Here is the test of wisdom;
Wisdom is not finally tested in schools;
Wisdom cannot be pass’d from one having it, to another not having it;
Wisdom is of the Soul, is not susceptible of proof, is its own proof,
Applies to all stages and objects and qualities, and is content,
Is the certainty of the reality and immortality of things, and the excellence of things;
Something there is in the float of the sight of things that provokes it out of the Soul.


Now I reexamine philosophies and religions,
They may prove well in lecture-rooms, yet not prove at all under the spacious clouds, and along the landscape and flowing currents.


Here is realization;
Here is a man tallied—he realizes here what he has in him;
The past, the future, majesty, love—if they are vacant of you, you are vacant of them.


Only the kernel of every object nourishes;
Where is he who tears off the husks for you and me?
Where is he that undoes stratagems and envelopes for you and me?


Here is adhesiveness—it is not previously fashion’d—it is apropos;
Do you know what it is, as you pass, to be loved by strangers?
Do you know the talk of those turning eye-balls?


7

Here is the efflux of the Soul;
The efflux of the Soul comes from within, through embower’d gates, ever provoking questions:
These yearnings, why are they? These thoughts in the darkness, why are they?
Why are there men and women that while they are nigh me, the sun-light expands my blood?
Why, when they leave me, do my pennants of joy sink flat and lank?
Why are there trees I never walk under, but large and melodious thoughts descend upon me?
(I think they hang there winter and summer on those trees, and always drop fruit as I pass;)
What is it I interchange so suddenly with strangers?
What with some driver, as I ride on the seat by his side?
What with some fisherman, drawing his seine by the shore, as I walk by, and pause?
What gives me to be free to a woman’s or man’s good-will? What gives them to be free to mine?


8

The efflux of the Soul is happiness—here is happiness;
I think it pervades the open air, waiting at all times;
Now it flows unto us—we are rightly charged.


Here rises the fluid and attaching character;
The fluid and attaching character is the freshness and sweetness of man and woman;
(The herbs of the morning sprout no fresher and sweeter every day out of the roots of themselves, than it sprouts fresh and sweet continually out of itself.)


Toward the fluid and attaching character exudes the sweat of the love of young and old;
From it falls distill’d the charm that mocks beauty and attainments;
Toward it heaves the shuddering longing ache of contact.


9

Allons! whoever you are, come travel with me!
Traveling with me, you find what never tires.


The earth never tires;
The earth is rude, silent, incomprehensible at first—Nature is rude and incomprehensible at first;
Be not discouraged—keep on—there are divine things, well envelop’d;
I swear to you there are divine things more beautiful than words can tell.


Allons! we must not stop here!
However sweet these laid-up stores—however convenient this dwelling, we cannot remain here;
However shelter’d this port, and however calm these waters, we must not anchor here;
However welcome the hospitality that surrounds us, we are permitted to receive it but a little while.


10

Allons! the inducements shall be greater;
We will sail pathless and wild seas;
We will go where winds blow, waves dash, and the Yankee clipper speeds by under full sail.


Allons! with power, liberty, the earth, the elements!
Health, defiance, gayety, self-esteem, curiosity;
Allons! from all formules!
From your formules, O bat-eyed and materialistic priests!


The stale cadaver blocks up the passage—the burial waits no longer.


Allons! yet take warning!
He traveling with me needs the best blood, thews, endurance;
None may come to the trial, till he or she bring courage and health.


Come not here if you have already spent the best of yourself;
Only those may come, who come in sweet and determin’d bodies;
No diseas’d person—no rum-drinker or venereal taint is permitted here.


I and mine do not convince by arguments, similes, rhymes;
We convince by our presence.


11

Listen! I will be honest with you;
I do not offer the old smooth prizes, but offer rough new prizes;
These are the days that must happen to you:


You shall not heap up what is call’d riches,
You shall scatter with lavish hand all that you earn or achieve,
You but arrive at the city to which you were destin’d—you hardly settle yourself to satisfaction, before you are call’d by an irresistible call to depart,
You shall be treated to the ironical smiles and mockings of those who remain behind you;
What beckonings of love you receive, you shall only answer with passionate kisses of parting,
You shall not allow the hold of those who spread their reach’d hands toward you.


12

Allons! after the GREAT COMPANIONS! and to belong to them!
They too are on the road! they are the swift and majestic men; they are the greatest women.
Over that which hinder’d them—over that which retarded—passing impediments large or small,
Committers of crimes, committers of many beautiful virtues,
Enjoyers of calms of seas, and storms of seas,
Sailors of many a ship, walkers of many a mile of land,
Habitués of many distant countries, habitués of far-distant dwellings,
Trusters of men and women, observers of cities, solitary toilers,
Pausers and contemplators of tufts, blossoms, shells of the shore,
Dancers at wedding-dances, kissers of brides, tender helpers of children, bearers of children,
Soldiers of revolts, standers by gaping graves, lowerers down of coffins,
Journeyers over consecutive seasons, over the years—the curious years, each emerging from that which preceded it,
Journeyers as with companions, namely, their own diverse phases,
Forth-steppers from the latent unrealized baby-days,
Journeyers gayly with their own youth—Journeyers with their bearded and well-grain’d manhood,
Journeyers with their womanhood, ample, unsurpass’d, content,
Journeyers with their own sublime old age of manhood or womanhood,
Old age, calm, expanded, broad with the haughty breadth of the universe,
Old age, flowing free with the delicious near-by freedom of death.


13

Allons! to that which is endless, as it was beginningless,
To undergo much, tramps of days, rests of nights,
To merge all in the travel they tend to, and the days and nights they tend to,
Again to merge them in the start of superior journeys;
To see nothing anywhere but what you may reach it and pass it,
To conceive no time, however distant, but what you may reach it and pass it,
To look up or down no road but it stretches and waits for you—however long, but it stretches and waits for you;
To see no being, not God’s or any, but you also go thither,
To see no possession but you may possess it—enjoying all without labor or purchase—abstracting the feast, yet not abstracting one particle of it;
To take the best of the farmer’s farm and the rich man’s elegant villa, and the chaste blessings of the well-married couple, and the fruits of orchards and flowers of gardens,
To take to your use out of the compact cities as you pass through,
To carry buildings and streets with you afterward wherever you go,
To gather the minds of men out of their brains as you encounter them—to gather the love out of their hearts,
To take your lovers on the road with you, for all that you leave them behind you,
To know the universe itself as a road—as many roads—as roads for traveling souls.


14

The Soul travels;
The body does not travel as much as the soul;
The body has just as great a work as the soul, and parts away at last for the journeys of the soul.


All parts away for the progress of souls;
All religion, all solid things, arts, governments,—all that was or is apparent upon this globe or any globe, falls into niches and corners before the procession of Souls along the grand roads of the universe.


Of the progress of the souls of men and women along the grand roads of the universe, all other progress is the needed emblem and sustenance.


Forever alive, forever forward,
Stately, solemn, sad, withdrawn, baffled, mad, turbulent, feeble, dissatisfied,
Desperate, proud, fond, sick, accepted by men, rejected by men,
They go! they go! I know that they go, but I know not where they go;
But I know that they go toward the best—toward something great.


15

Allons! whoever you are! come forth!
You must not stay sleeping and dallying there in the house, though you built it, or though it has been built for you.


Allons! out of the dark confinement!
It is useless to protest—I know all, and expose it.


Behold, through you as bad as the rest,
Through the laughter, dancing, dining, supping, of people,
Inside of dresses and ornaments, inside of those wash’d and trimm’d faces,
Behold a secret silent loathing and despair.


No husband, no wife, no friend, trusted to hear the confession;
Another self, a duplicate of every one, skulking and hiding it goes,
Formless and wordless through the streets of the cities, polite and bland in the parlors,
In the cars of rail-roads, in steamboats, in the public assembly,
Home to the houses of men and women, at the table, in the bed-room, everywhere,
Smartly attired, countenance smiling, form upright, death under the breast-bones, hell under the skull-bones,
Under the broadcloth and gloves, under the ribbons and artificial flowers,
Keeping fair with the customs, speaking not a syllable of itself,
Speaking of anything else, but never of itself.


16

Allons! through struggles and wars!
The goal that was named cannot be countermanded.


Have the past struggles succeeded?
What has succeeded? yourself? your nation? nature?
Now understand me well—It is provided in the essence of things, that from any fruition of success, no matter what, shall come forth something to make a greater struggle necessary.


My call is the call of battle—I nourish active rebellion;
He going with me must go well arm’d;
He going with me goes often with spare diet, poverty, angry enemies, desertions.


17

Allons! the road is before us!
It is safe—I have tried it—my own feet have tried it well.


Allons! be not detain’d!
Let the paper remain on the desk unwritten, and the book on the shelf unopen’d!
Let the tools remain in the workshop! let the money remain unearn’d!
Let the school stand! mind not the cry of the teacher!
Let the preacher preach in his pulpit! let the lawyer plead in the court, and the judge expound the law.


Mon enfant! I give you my hand!
I give you my love, more precious than money,
I give you myself, before preaching or law;
Will you give me yourself? will you come travel with me?
Shall we stick by each other as long as we live?

Walt Whitman

George Gray

I have studied many times
The marble which was chiseled for me--
A boat with a furled sail at rest in a harbor.
In truth it pictures not my destination
But my life.

For love was offered me and I shrank from its disillusionment;
Sorrow knocked at my door, but I was afraid;
Ambition called to me, but I dreaded the chances.
Yet all the while I hungered for meaning in my life.

And now I know that we must lift the sail
And catch the winds of destiny
Wherever they drive the boat.

To put meaning in one's life may end in madness,
But life without meaning is the torture
Of restlessness and vague desire--
It is a boat longing for the sea and yet afraid.

Edgar Lee Masters

The Sin Of Omission

It isn't the thing you do;
It's the thing you leave undone,
Which gives you a bit of heartache
At the setting of the sun.
The tender word forgotten,
The letter you did not write,
The flower you might have sent,
Are your haunting ghosts tonight.

The stone you might have lifted
Out of a brother's way,
The bit of heartsome counsel
You were hurried too much to say.

The loving touch of the hand,
The gentle and winsome tone,
That you had no time or thought for
With troubles enough of your own.

The little acts of kindness,
So easily out of mind;
Those chances to be helpful
Which everyone may find—

No it's not the thing you do,
It's the thing you leave undone,
Which gives you the bit of heartache
At the setting of the sun.

Margaret E. Sangster

Poetry Arrived

And it was at that age . . . Poetry arrived
in search of me. I don't know, I don't know where
it came from, from winter or a river.
I don't know how or when,
no, they were not voices, they were not
words, nor silence,
but from a street I was summoned,
from the branches of night,
abruptly from the others,
among violent fires
or returning alone,
there I was without a face
and it touched me.

I did not know what to say, my mouth
had no way
with names
my eyes were blind,
and something started in my soul,
fever or forgotten wings,
and I made my own way,
deciphering
that fire
and I wrote the first faint line,
faint, without substance, pure
nonsense,
pure wisdom
of someone who knows nothing,
and suddenly I saw
the heavens
unfastened
and open,
planets,
palpitating plantations,
shadow perforated,
riddled
with arrows, fire and flowers,
the winding night, the universe.

And I, infinitesimal being,
drunk with the great starry
void,
likeness, image of
mystery,
I felt myself a pure part
of the abyss,
I wheeled with the stars,
my heart broke free on the open sky.


Pablo Neruda

Barter

Life has loveliness to sell,
All beautiful and splendid things,
Blue waves whitened on a cliff,
Soaring fire that sways and sings,
And children's faces looking up
Holding wonder like a cup.

Life has loveliness to sell,
Music like a curve of gold,
Scent of pine trees in the rain,
Eyes that love you, arms that hold,
And for your spirit's still delight,
Holy thoughts that star the night.

Spend all you have for loveliness,
Buy it and never count the cost;
For one white singing hour of peace
Count many a year of strife well lost,
And for a breath of ecstasy
Give all you have been, or could be.

Sara Teasdale

A Choice

They please me not--these solemn songs
That hint of sermons covered up.
'T is true the world should heed its wrongs,
But in a poem let me sup,
Not simples brewed to cure or ease
Humanity's confessed disease,
But the spirit-wine of a singing line,
Or a dew-drop in a honey cup!


Paul Laurence Dunbar

Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep.
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.

Robert Frost

We Wear The Mask

We wear the mask that grins and lies,
It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes,--
This debt we pay to human guile;
With torn and bleeding hearts we smile,
And mouth with myriad subtleties.

Why should the world be overwise,
In counting all our tears and sighs?
Nay, let them only see us, while
We wear the mask.

We smile, but, O great Christ, our cries
To thee from tortured souls arise.
We sing, but oh the clay is vile
Beneath our feet, and long the mile;
But let the world dream otherwise,
We wear the mask!

Paul Laurence Dunbar

Grown Up!

Quoting a blog that made me smile in recognition. It could have been written by me!

"Yesterday in the changing room of Macys as I was trying on yet another skirt I did not need, I suddenly looked into the mirror and saw myself. And I thought – My God, who is this woman in the mirror? Who is she – with her fat thighs, and her plump face? Do I even know her?

I could not recognize who I had become.

And the more I looked the more I realized – my girlhood is past me now. No more will my parent’s friends ask me which year of college I am in. No more can I wait for the day when my baby fat will melt away. I cannot wait for the day when I will grow up, become famous and do all the things that I dreamt of. I cannot wait for that day because I am already in it. There is no more waiting for things to get better, for my body to get thinner or my dreams to come true.

It is in the here and now and I hardly knew it."

On Chick-Lit

"Ever since the resounding success of Sex and the City and Bridget Jones Diary - which happy event made their authors obscenely rich - pop culture has been invaded by a whole new genre of wannabes. Welcome to the world of Chick Lit (ugh, makes me think of a hen on fire). Anyway summer is upon us and one must have light reading to forget the heavy heat. And my recent visit to a Barnes and Noble store revealed that they now have a whole shelf, nay a whole row of shelves devoted to this cerebral form of literature.

Don't get me wrong, I as much as anyone else succumb from time to time to the call of Mills & Boons and other such escapist, retrograde romantic fantasies that you cry through and later hide under the bed so that noone else knows you read that stuff. But we all know where they stand in the pecking order of literature. What really irks me is that Chick Lit is now celebrated, revered and often called (even by the New York Times) the voice of the New Woman.
Pray what is the New Woman?? Is a Woman ever really made new? Even if she acknowledges she is gay or has a baby out of wedlock or builds a career instead of a family - she is still treated like a woman. Which is to say she is objectified by some and deified by others, but never ever treated normally as one would treat a mere man. The Carly Fiorinas of the world are few and far between. But then that is besides the point I am trying to make.
The point is there are these rows and rows of women who churn out these books with the sole aim of getting a movie deal and moolah, and have book reviewers calling their books literature. I am sure there is a "Dummies Guide to writing Chick Lit" or "Six Steps to Writing Best Selling Chick Lit" because they all seem to follow a certain template:

1)Cover must be bright pink/ red/ green/ yellow / any obnoxiously cheerful color. Must have picture of Sassy Looking Woman / High heeled shoe / Lipstick / something from a make up bag. Or make up bag itself.
2)Blurb must have the following words in it -"inspiring", "sweetly humorous", "improbably romantic ending", "perfect beach reading", "groundbreaking" and "first of its kind." It must also have glowing reviews (if you get a few good quotes from the reviewer at Cosmopolitan great! Else one from The Star Ledger will more than do).
3)Heroine must be single / newly divorced, in mediocre career doing something she knows she doesn't like, sure of what her dream job (which is necessarily be book editor / newscaster / media person) is but does not have the guts to take it up, have a penchant for abusive men yet have the perfect man hovering in the background. She must have heart of gold and slutty morals. She must border on loser, i.e. be slightly overweight (yet have plump, pleasing figure), upturned nose, mid to low IQ and freckles. She MUST be white (Black women feature in another genre of slightly more palatable books).
4)Other characters must include understanding gay male best friend, scheming vamp with perfect figure & face who has paws on perfect man, horrible boss who makes life hell because of heroine's inefficiency, preaching mother disappointed in her daughters singleness, seemingly happy married friend who is actually on brink of divorce and of course the aforementioned perfect man (who is a lawyer / doctor / business man / media moghul with amazing prospects and pots of money).
5)Novel must be set in New York City / San Francisco / New York City / London / New York City. Plot must include one loss of job, one rousing speech from perfect man about heroine's talents which leads her to give a miraculously good job interview at her dream company, failed relationships with at least two men and finally a reunion with perfect man with mother smiling happily in background.
6)It must have several homilies and messages to convey such as "You Go Girl!" "Men are such Bastards" or "Being Single Sucks."

You get my drift? So these books are basically the same old Mills & Boons with a more respectable publisher's name on the cover. I mean - you wouldn't hide a book published by Penguin under your bed would you?
What irks me though is that this so called writing about New Women always seem to be portray women as scheming, unhappy, aimless and stupid. The heroine usually has no idea about what she wants from life, lets men walk all over her, finds it a huge embarrassment to be single, cannot do anything positive without help from a man and does not have the good judgment to know who her friends really are. That is the New Woman? But I guess reading about a woman who goes to work, gets promoted, picks up kid from school, cooks dinner for husband, and plans vacations for family would not be so exciting. Well then write on about these imperfect, so called "based on true character" heroines. But pray! don't call it literature.

By the way - I am planning to write about Single Indian Girl in Bombay with gay best friend, commitment-shy boyfriend and friendly male neighbor who is Head of Star TV in India. You think it will sell?"

Picked up from this blog.

The Art versus The Craft

"My article and two shorter pieces on The Craft of Quilting for the San Francisco Chronicle this weekend. I had a good time meeting the artists and seeing how they expressed themselves with the simplest of materials. Quilters sometimes play a game where they all use the same selection of fabrics and each creates something different.

Fiction writers do something similar. You take the elements of life, frequently quite ordinary, and try to craft something unique. You structure, rearrange, edit, embroider and embellish.

I asked the quilters, "What differentiates craft from art?" They said that it is the personal vision, the individuality, the style."

Quoted from the blog of an author, Marta Acosta.

Path-Breaking

If you want something you never had, do something you have never done.

Restlessness

"Youth's narrator, a student in 1950s South Africa, has long been plotting an escape from his native country. Studying mathematics, reading poetry, saving money, he tries to ensure that when he arrives in the real world he will be prepared to experience life in its full intensity, and transform it into art. Arriving at last in London, however, he finds neither poetry nor romance. Instead he succumbs to the monotony of life as a computer programmer, from which random, loveless affairs offer no relief. Devoid of inspiration, he stops writing and begins a dark pilgrimage in which he is continually tested and continually found wanting."

Thus read the blurb of 'Youth' by JM Coetzee. I had randomly picked the book up at the English Book Shop. But reading these lines made me impatient to read it at once. Maybe I could find myself in the book! It was the autobiography of his youth, and his story seemed so similar to mine, it had the same keywords- aspiring artist, reading vastly in search of salvation, a monotonous humdrum existence, living one life, but wanting another, and continous disappointments and dissatisfaction.

That was the time when I was working in JWT as a trainee copywriter, and was deliberating over whether to join Infosys or not. The words "monotony of life as a computer programmer" had especially resonated with me. I did buy the book.

I read it. Coetzee writes in a sparse, journalistic style. He is a Nobel Prize, and a twice Booker Prize winner. And he describes how during those years of his youth (his 20s) all his philosophies were continually found wanting, and what an insignificant cog in the whole scheme of things he was. He so wanted to write poetry, but he continually found himself unable to write. So much so, that in a whole year, all that he wrote was a couple of lines.

I could so much identify with that restlessness! That is what I am going through. This is my 'Youth' in making. I so want to write! I have so much to write on! The voice continually speaks in my head. The sentences echo at random times. The syrup is just getting thicker and thicker inside. And yet, somehow, it's not flowing out.

As a result of this, my mind is in a continual state of distraction. I find it tough to focus. As a matter of fact, I have my Comprehensive Exam tomorrow morning. It's already half past ten in the night. I have a pile of topics left. Yet, here I am, on this blog, mulling over all these intangibles.

It's not coming out, and it's not letting me do anything else either.

Anyways, let me paste the quotation to publish which I had come to the blog in the first place.

"Coetzee is a man of almost monkish self-discipline and dedication. He does not drink, smoke or eat meat. He cycles vast distances to keep fit and spends at least an hour at his writing-desk each morning, seven days a week. A colleague who has worked with him for more than a decade claims to have seen him laugh just once. An acquaintance has attended several dinner parties where Coetzee has uttered not a single word."

It is such self-discipline that I badly need now. The 1 hour of exercise, and the 1 hour of writing. It's just so vital. And, I am not doing it. ('Not being able to do it' is not really acceptable). And, this is making me so restless.

The Poem That Got Completed

Friday

Ninja moves the gears and screws, and fixes up the Magboard party for Tuesday, Sep 18th.

It's a 'Passing-of-the-baton' party. These are the annual parties jointly hosted by the Past-Present-Future (convenors) of the Magboard.

Last year, Prabh Sir, me and KD had given the treat. This year, it would be me, KD and Ninja.

Monday

I send this mail to the group:

"
... I'll show u the aadhi-adhuri invitation wali poem that I had started long ago, but could never finish.


One evening not long ago

She who always is gung-ho

Had gonged aloud the promise to

Treat the group with the first issue

Of her salary. The event alluded

Has gone by. The currency’s hue did

Wash her wallet through. Now you

Decide when you want the treat to

Be. Any evening, but not Sunday

Or coming Monday will do. Sundae,

Coffee, confections, snacks. Whatever

You say, as will be.


Lesson Learnt: Never start a poem in the office. Chances are, you won't be able to finish it, and then, it'll be left undone, unfinished forever. The Monday in ques here was my Bday wala Monday...so u can guess how long its been waiting completion and redemption :P"

Tuesday. 6 p.m.

I am winding things up in my cubicle. I ought not to be late at the party. Out of habit, I check my mail. There's a mail on the Magboard group titled "Re: ur poem"

Hmmm, so there's been a reply to my poem! I hurriedly open the link and scan it through. I am grinning now. I am going "Arrey Wah!"

This is what I've just read:

"One evening not long ago
She who always is gung-ho
Had gonged aloud the promise to
Treat the group with the first issue
Of her salary. The event alluded
Has gone by. The currency’s hue did
Wash her wallet through. Now you
Decide when you want the treat to
Be. Any evening, but not Sunday
Or coming Monday will do. Sundae,
Coffee, confections, snacks. Whatever
You say, as will be.

tis not the food that shall be served
tis not the drinks though there shall be some,
tis not the merriment enjoyed by all,
tis only the company of the select few
who always were, and always will.
cherish not the tangible,
for u will lose that one day,
love the way it made u feel,
for that shall forever be yours.
and so i complete this poem,
hoping someone. someday will complete mine,
hope that when we meet someday,
u remember that once,
i made u smile!"

You surely did KD! The gesture was great! :)

Sonnet 116

Sonnet 116
by William Shakespeare

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:

O no! it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wand'ring bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom:

If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved


Read the detailed discussion on this sonnet here.

Chiasmus in use

Chiasmus is a literary device. Read the explanation here. I loved the quotes given as example of chiasmus.

"...ask not what your country can do for you — ask what you can do for your country." John F. Kennedy Inaugural Address, January 20, 1961.

"...Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate.." John F. Kennedy Inaugural Address, January 20, 1961.

"Mankind must put an end to war or war will put an end to mankind." John F. Kennedy

"Let's make sure that the Supreme Court does not pick the next president, and this president does not choose the next Supreme Court." Albert Gore Jr. at the 2004 Democratic National Convention.

"America did not invent human rights. In a very real sense, it is the other way round. Human rights invented America." [1] Jimmy Carter Farewell Address

"You have seen how a man was made a slave; you shall see how a slave was made a man." Frederick Douglass, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave, Written by Himself

"To be kissed by a fool is stupid; To be fooled by a kiss is worse." Ambrose Redmoon

"What counts is not necessarily the size of the dog in the fight — it's the size of the fight in the dog." Dwight D. Eisenhower January 1958 speech to the Republican National Committee

"Well, it's not the men in your life that counts, it's the life in your men." Line spoken by Mae West in I'm No Angel (1933):

Genesis 9:6: "Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed."

Croesus (dates back to the 6th century BC): "In peace sons bury their fathers, but in war fathers bury their sons."

"In America, you can always find a party. In Soviet Russia, The Party can always find you!" Yakov Smirnoff

Chiasmus may be implied, as when Kermit the Frog says "Time's fun when you're having flies" or Mae West says "A hard man is good to find," or Jethro Tull's "In the beginning Man created God."

Chiasmus is not limited to an exchange of words; it can also involve the exchange of letters or syllables, as in Tom Waits' quote, "I’d rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy."

The Novel Awakes, the Blog Yawns

Today,

I took a leave from the office,
I finished 'The Golden Gate',
I started my novel.

It's a novel-in-verse.

My inspiration are 'The Golden Gate', and 'Heer'.
Two days before my Bday, I bought for myself 'Heer'. A book I had wanted to read since a long time now.

My role model is the absolute dedication with which Waris Shah wrote his 'Heer', and
Vikram Seth his 'A Suitable Boy.' (I was greatly inspired after watching Gurdas Maan's 'Waris Shah- Ishq Da Waris'. Waris Shah was such a 'darvesh', and he devoted his life to writing 'Heer'! And, I respect Gurdas Maan for the same reason)

I have a job to do. But I will write with full devotion. I know that. So, I will not be writing much on this blog now. The limited free time that I have will go to my novel.

This novel is 'The Big Experiment' of my 23rd year. By this time the next year, I would be knowing so much more about myself- about whether I am actually a writer, and so much more!

This is 'The Year Of Experimentation'.

My 22nd Bday! :)

I am blowing out the candle of my 22nd year. The last one year has seen me undergo much change. It was 'The Year Of Intense Mental Activity'. The year when I thought too much and lost it completely. It was the year of the emotional ebb.

But, I didn't sink. I am emerging from the seas. Firmly. I have strength. And, Resilience. I know it now. I am true to myself, and I esteem myself for this. I will live life on my own terms.

This weekend, I've pampered myself royally. I went shopping, all by myself, and bought everything I liked. It felt so good! I am young and independent. I love myself. I am proud of the person I am. And I am just 22 yet!

There's a whole life waiting to be lived ahead! So much potential to be explored! So many things I can do! So many persons I can be! So many ideas, so much promise!

Oh! I am so looking forward to it all!

It is with a smile that I bid goodbye to the year that is crawling by. It was one of the most happening and decisive years so far. And it ends today in smiles.

Let this be a lesson for me always. The tunnel always ends, and opens up to bright daylight.

Gee! My Bday is gonna start soon! :D


P.S. I took this pic from flickr.com. But even to myself, this girl looks so much like me. But, she's not :)

Authorial Dreams

A survey in UK reveals that writing is the top dream career of their population.

My Mother at Sixty-Six

Driving from my parent's
home to Cochin last Friday
morning, I saw my mother,
beside me,
doze, open mouthed, her face
ashen like that
of a corpse and realised with
pain
that she thought away, and
looked but soon
put that thought away, and
looked out at young
trees sprinting, the merry children spilling
out of their homes, but after the airport's
security check, standing a few yards
away, I looked again at her, wan,
pale
as a late winter's moon and felt that
old
familiar ache, my childhood's fear,
but all I said was, see you soon,
Amma,
all I did was smile and smile and
smile...

Kamala Das

To The Young Man of Letters

Don't wait around for readers, critics and the Nobel Prize in order to
consider yourself a genius, an immortal.
Consider yourself a genius, an immortal, right away.
Just think: if he waited, Henry Miller waited until he no longer had
a single hair on his head.
Just think: if he waited, Albert Cahuet waited for nothing.
Just think: if he's waiting, Jehan Ethiey Blez, who has nothing left
of his hair but the roots, hasn't received any sign.
Go ahead! While there's still time,
make the most of the life of
A genius and an immortal.
When we're dead or almost dead,
there's no time to savor the life of
A genius and an immortal.

Rejean Ducharmein, The Daughter of Christopher Columbus, a novel in verse.