The Last Leaf, a short story by O. Henry

In a little district west of Washington Square the streets have run crazy and broken themselves into small strips called "places." These "places" make strange angles and curves. One Street crosses itself a time or two. An artist once discovered a valuable possibility in this street. Suppose a collector with a bill for paints, paper and canvas should, in traversing this route, suddenly meet himself coming back, without a cent having been paid on account!

So, to quaint old Greenwich Village the art people soon came prowling, hunting for north windows and eighteenth-century gables and Dutch attics and low rents. Then they imported some pewter mugs and a chafing dish or two from Sixth Avenue, and became a "colony."

At the top of a squatty, three-story brick Sue and Johnsy had their studio. "Johnsy" was familiar for Joanna. One was from Maine; the other from California. They had met at the table d'hôte of an Eighth Street "Delmonico's," and found their tastes in art, chicory salad and bishop sleeves so congenial that the joint studio resulted.

That was in May. In November a cold, unseen stranger, whom the doctors called Pneumonia, stalked about the colony, touching one here and there with his icy fingers. Over on the east side this ravager strode boldly, smiting his victims by scores, but his feet trod slowly through the maze of the narrow and moss-grown "places."

Mr. Pneumonia was not what you would call a chivalric old gentleman. A mite of a little woman with blood thinned by California zephyrs was hardly fair game for the red-fisted, short-breathed old duffer. But Johnsy he smote; and she lay, scarcely moving, on her painted iron bedstead, looking through the small Dutch window-panes at the blank side of the next brick house.

One morning the busy doctor invited Sue into the hallway with a shaggy, gray eyebrow.

"She has one chance in - let us say, ten," he said, as he shook down the mercury in his clinical thermometer. " And that chance is for her to want to live. This way people have of lining-u on the side of the undertaker makes the entire pharmacopoeia look silly. Your little lady has made up her mind that she's not going to get well. Has she anything on her mind?"

"She - she wanted to paint the Bay of Naples some day." said Sue.

"Paint? - bosh! Has she anything on her mind worth thinking twice - a man for instance?"

"A man?" said Sue, with a jew's-harp twang in her voice. "Is a man worth - but, no, doctor; there is nothing of the kind."

"Well, it is the weakness, then," said the doctor. "I will do all that science, so far as it may filter through my efforts, can accomplish. But whenever my patient begins to count the carriages in her funeral procession I subtract 50 per cent from the curative power of medicines. If you will get her to ask one question about the new winter styles in cloak sleeves I will promise you a one-in-five chance for her, instead of one in ten."

After the doctor had gone Sue went into the workroom and cried a Japanese napkin to a pulp. Then she swaggered into Johnsy's room with her drawing board, whistling ragtime.

Johnsy lay, scarcely making a ripple under the bedclothes, with her face toward the window. Sue stopped whistling, thinking she was asleep.

She arranged her board and began a pen-and-ink drawing to illustrate a magazine story. Young artists must pave their way to Art by drawing pictures for magazine stories that young authors write to pave their way to Literature.

As Sue was sketching a pair of elegant horseshow riding trousers and a monocle of the figure of the hero, an Idaho cowboy, she heard a low sound, several times repeated. She went quickly to the bedside.

Johnsy's eyes were open wide. She was looking out the window and counting - counting backward.

"Twelve," she said, and little later "eleven"; and then "ten," and "nine"; and then "eight" and "seven", almost together.

Sue look solicitously out of the window. What was there to count? There was only a bare, dreary yard to be seen, and the blank side of the brick house twenty feet away. An old, old ivy vine, gnarled and decayed at the roots, climbed half way up the brick wall. The cold breath of autumn had stricken its leaves from the vine until its skeleton branches clung, almost bare, to the crumbling bricks.

"What is it, dear?" asked Sue.

"Six," said Johnsy, in almost a whisper. "They're falling faster now. Three days ago there were almost a hundred. It made my head ache to count them. But now it's easy. There goes another one. There are only five left now."

"Five what, dear? Tell your Sudie."

"Leaves. On the ivy vine. When the last one falls I must go, too. I've known that for three days. Didn't the doctor tell you?"

"Oh, I never heard of such nonsense," complained Sue, with magnificent scorn. "What have old ivy leaves to do with your getting well? And you used to love that vine so, you naughty girl. Don't be a goosey. Why, the doctor told me this morning that your chances for getting well real soon were - let's see exactly what he said - he said the chances were ten to one! Why, that's almost as good a chance as we have in New York when we ride on the street cars or walk past a new building. Try to take some broth now, and let Sudie go back to her drawing, so she can sell the editor man with it, and buy port wine for her sick child, and pork chops for her greedy self."

"You needn't get any more wine," said Johnsy, keeping her eyes fixed out the window. "There goes another. No, I don't want any broth. That leaves just four. I want to see the last one fall before it gets dark. Then I'll go, too."

"Johnsy, dear," said Sue, bending over her, "will you promise me to keep your eyes closed, and not look out the window until I am done working? I must hand those drawings in by to-morrow. I need the light, or I would draw the shade down."

"Couldn't you draw in the other room?" asked Johnsy, coldly.

"I'd rather be here by you," said Sue. "Beside, I don't want you to keep looking at those silly ivy leaves."

"Tell me as soon as you have finished," said Johnsy, closing her eyes, and lying white and still as fallen statue, "because I want to see the last one fall. I'm tired of waiting. I'm tired of thinking. I want to turn loose my hold on everything, and go sailing down, down, just like one of those poor, tired leaves."

"Try to sleep," said Sue. "I must call Behrman up to be my model for the old hermit miner. I'll not be gone a minute. Don't try to move 'til I come back."

Old Behrman was a painter who lived on the ground floor beneath them. He was past sixty and had a Michael Angelo's Moses beard curling down from the head of a satyr along with the body of an imp. Behrman was a failure in art. Forty years he had wielded the brush without getting near enough to touch the hem of his Mistress's robe. He had been always about to paint a masterpiece, but had never yet begun it. For several years he had painted nothing except now and then a daub in the line of commerce or advertising. He earned a little by serving as a model to those young artists in the colony who could not pay the price of a professional. He drank gin to excess, and still talked of his coming masterpiece. For the rest he was a fierce little old man, who scoffed terribly at softness in any one, and who regarded himself as especial mastiff-in-waiting to protect the two young artists in the studio above.

Sue found Behrman smelling strongly of juniper berries in his dimly lighted den below. In one corner was a blank canvas on an easel that had been waiting there for twenty-five years to receive the first line of the masterpiece. She told him of Johnsy's fancy, and how she feared she would, indeed, light and fragile as a leaf herself, float away, when her slight hold upon the world grew weaker.

Old Behrman, with his red eyes plainly streaming, shouted his contempt and derision for such idiotic imaginings.

"Vass!" he cried. "Is dere people in de world mit der foolishness to die because leafs dey drop off from a confounded vine? I haf not heard of such a thing. No, I will not bose as a model for your fool hermit-dunderhead. Vy do you allow dot silly pusiness to come in der brain of her? Ach, dot poor leetle Miss Yohnsy."

"She is very ill and weak," said Sue, "and the fever has left her mind morbid and full of strange fancies. Very well, Mr. Behrman, if you do not care to pose for me, you needn't. But I think you are a horrid old - old flibbertigibbet."

"You are just like a woman!" yelled Behrman. "Who said I will not bose? Go on. I come mit you. For half an hour I haf peen trying to say dot I am ready to bose. Gott! dis is not any blace in which one so goot as Miss Yohnsy shall lie sick. Some day I vill baint a masterpiece, and ve shall all go away. Gott! yes."

Johnsy was sleeping when they went upstairs. Sue pulled the shade down to the window-sill, and motioned Behrman into the other room. In there they peered out the window fearfully at the ivy vine. Then they looked at each other for a moment without speaking. A persistent, cold rain was falling, mingled with snow. Behrman, in his old blue shirt, took his seat as the hermit miner on an upturned kettle for a rock.

When Sue awoke from an hour's sleep the next morning she found Johnsy with dull, wide-open eyes staring at the drawn green shade.

"Pull it up; I want to see," she ordered, in a whisper.

Wearily Sue obeyed.

But, lo! after the beating rain and fierce gusts of wind that had endured through the livelong night, there yet stood out against the brick wall one ivy leaf. It was the last one on the vine. Still dark green near its stem, with its serrated edges tinted with the yellow of dissolution and decay, it hung bravely from the branch some twenty feet above the ground.

"It is the last one," said Johnsy. "I thought it would surely fall during the night. I heard the wind. It will fall to-day, and I shall die at the same time."

"Dear, dear!" said Sue, leaning her worn face down to the pillow, "think of me, if you won't think of yourself. What would I do?"

But Johnsy did not answer. The lonesomest thing in all the world is a soul when it is making ready to go on its mysterious, far journey. The fancy seemed to possess her more strongly as one by one the ties that bound her to friendship and to earth were loosed.

The day wore away, and even through the twilight they could see the lone ivy leaf clinging to its stem against the wall. And then, with the coming of the night the north wind was again loosed, while the rain still beat against the windows and pattered down from the low Dutch eaves.

When it was light enough Johnsy, the merciless, commanded that the shade be raised.

The ivy leaf was still there.

Johnsy lay for a long time looking at it. And then she called to Sue, who was stirring her chicken broth over the gas stove.

"I've been a bad girl, Sudie," said Johnsy. "Something has made that last leaf stay there to show me how wicked I was. It is a sin to want to die. You may bring a me a little broth now, and some milk with a little port in it, and - no; bring me a hand-mirror first, and then pack some pillows about me, and I will sit up and watch you cook."

And hour later she said:

"Sudie, some day I hope to paint the Bay of Naples."

The doctor came in the afternoon, and Sue had an excuse to go into the hallway as he left.

"Even chances," said the doctor, taking Sue's thin, shaking hand in his. "With good nursing you'll win." And now I must see another case I have downstairs. Behrman, his name is - some kind of an artist, I believe. Pneumonia, too. He is an old, weak man, and the attack is acute. There is no hope for him; but he goes to the hospital to-day to be made more comfortable."

The next day the doctor said to Sue: "She's out of danger. You won. Nutrition and care now - that's all."

And that afternoon Sue came to the bed where Johnsy lay, contentedly knitting a very blue and very useless woollen shoulder scarf, and put one arm around her, pillows and all.

"I have something to tell you, white mouse," she said. "Mr. Behrman died of pneumonia to-day in the hospital. He was ill only two days. The janitor found him the morning of the first day in his room downstairs helpless with pain. His shoes and clothing were wet through and icy cold. They couldn't imagine where he had been on such a dreadful night. And then they found a lantern, still lighted, and a ladder that had been dragged from its place, and some scattered brushes, and a palette with green and yellow colors mixed on it, and - look out the window, dear, at the last ivy leaf on the wall. Didn't you wonder why it never fluttered or moved when the wind blew? Ah, darling, it's Behrman's masterpiece - he painted it there the night that the last leaf fell."

Aur bhi gham hain...

Zindagi Sirf Mohabbat Nahin Kuch Aur Bhi Hai
Zulf-o-Rukhsaar ki Jannat Nahi Kuch Aur Bhi Hai
Bhookh Aur Pyaas ki Maari Hui Is Duniya Mein
Ishq Hi Ek Haqeeqat Nahin Kuch Aur Bhi Hai.

Sahir Ludhianvi

A Flower By The Roadside

Everyone's walking.
I stand.
Still. By the road.
On the edge.
I stand.
And watch them moving past.
I think.
One can either move or stand.
They move.
I stand.
Two different experiments.
I know the result of mine.
I stand. But.
At times
I wish I didn't.
I wish I moved too.
Then I reconcile.
To be me
I have to stand.
What I want to know is
If the other experiment too
Similarly fails.
Do they who move
Too wish sometimes
That they were me,
Not them?
Because then, I could say
That all
Do sometimes wish
They were not what they are.
That it's not only me.
(It very much scares me,
to think
What if it is indeed only me?)
These moving people sometimes stop by
For a moment
And look at me, and think.
Then they exclaim
"Oh this flower! So lovely!"
I look away. Disappointed.
That is not what I want to know.
What I want to know is
Whether in them a thought is born
A thought, a wish, to stand.
As I do.
Or, in my place.
That is what no one will say.
But that is what I want to know.
That is what I wonder about
As I stand.
Looking at people hurrying past.

Japinder Gill

On Similar Lines, an older thought: Read here

Back into the olden days

The timer chimed, the time was five
She was caught up in a cloud of code
The office buzzed like bees in hive
She ought to fly and hit the road
Soon, if she was to make in time
That is, half hour late, as was agreed
A date it was, with the one prime
Love of hers. She smiled. Hurried.
“After so long!” she would once more
Walk into the moments she often saw
In mind, in memories still so raw
Oh! How she longed for an encore!
It had come. She was now on the road
That took her back to the Magboard.

She reached. She parked. She looked around
No crowd, no people, she frowned
And took her cell out. Two missed calls.
“I hope not ‘postponement’ befalls
Again!” With doubt, she made the call
And heaved relief to know that all
Were on the second floor. She walked
Past the spots where she’d talked
And hawked and stalked (for Spektrum)
Now lost in cabins small and dry
She turned away and took her eye
And self above, where sounds swum
She entered. The room was full to brim
The event clicked, said the crowd’s vim.

She entered, and by the wall put down
Her bag, and stood. All around
Were the Magboard crew
A breath she drew
And watched them ‘live’
In action, and the audience, alive
With cheers, and hoots. Each dude
And dame of Magboard does exude
A charm, she thought with pride.
She watched the event, satisfied.
“We’re going to have a meeting now!”
Were her words at the wind-up. All did bow.
In step they walked, down, as a group
Into the parking, they did swoop.

“Haaa!” Back again! She breathed deep
And royally descended on the kerb
They all sat down, in the sweep
Of (g)olden days. “Do not Disturb!”
They began. Well, this or that
It did not matter what was said
What mattered was they sat as one
After so long. When next, knew none.
They played with ideas, like before
Quiet, recruitments, events and more
It was her group! Hers! She didn’t know
How to handle the thought! Whoa!
Two hours under the evening sky, with lit UIET
Tall behind, and Magboard chirping. Sheer Delight!


A relic from 'the olden days': This Poem :)

The same magic, a different voice: Read Himanshi's post on that day.

Tere Bina Zindagi Se Koi

Tere bina zindagi se koyi, shikwa, to nahi, shikwa nahi, shikwa nahi, shikwa nahi
Tere bina zindagi bhi lekin, zindagi, to nahi, zindagi nahi, zindagi nahi, zindagi nahi
Tere bina zindagi se koyi, shikwa, to nahi

Kaash aisa ho tere qadmo se, chun ke manzil chale aur kahi door kahi - 2
Tum gar saath ho, manzilo ki kami to nahi
Tere bina zindagi se koyi, shikwa, to nahi

Jee mein aata hai, tere daaman mein, sar jhuka ke ham rote rahe, rote rahe - 2
Teri bhi aankho mein, aansuo ki nami to nahi

Tere bina zindagi se koyi, shikwa, to nahi,
shikwa nahi, shikwa nahi, shikwa nahi
Tere bina zindagi bhi lekin, zindagi, to nahi,
zindagi nahi, zindagi nahi, zindagi nahi

Tum jo keh do to aaj ki raat, chaand doobega nahi, raat ko rok lo -2
Raat ki baat hai, aur zindagi baaki to nahi

Tere bina zindagi se koyi, shikwa, to nahi,
shikwa nahi, shikwa nahi, shikwa nahi
Tere bina zindagi bhi lekin, zindagi, to nahi,
zindagi nahi, zindagi nahi, zindagi nahi

Struggles maketh a man

"The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known
defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found
their way out of the depths. These persons have an appreciation, a
sensitivity, and an understanding of life that fills them with
compassion, gentleness, and a deep loving concern. Beautiful people do
not just happen."

Elizabeth Kubler Ross, 1926-2004
Swiss-born Author and Psychiatrist

Tujhse Naaraz Nahin Zindagi

Tum Ko Dekha To....

Tum ko dekha to yeh khyaal aaya
Zindagi dhoop tum ghana saaya

Aaj fir dil ne ik tammanna ki
Aaj fir dil ko humne samjhaaya

Tum chale jaayoge to sochenge
Humne kya khoya, humne kya paaya

Hum jisse gungunaa nahin sakte
Waqt ne aisa geet kyon gaaya

Just a song...

Tum itna jo muskura rahe ho
Kya gam hai jisko chhupa rahe ho
Tum itna jo . . . . .

Aankhon mein nami, Hansi labon par
Kya haal hai, Kya dikha rahe ho

Ban jayenge zahar peete peete
Yeh ashk jo peeye ja rahe ho

Jin zakhmon ko waqt bhar chala hai
Tum kyon unhi chhede ja rahe ho

Rekhaon ka khel hai muquddar
Rekhaon se maat kha rahe ho

Tum itna jo . . . . . .

A Magical Year in Magboard

In early 2005, full of the realization that it was the first Birthday of Magboard, and not quite knowing what to do about it, a girl wrote a poem. This poem.

February says Goodbye today
And a whole year gets tucked away
Snugly in my memories
To forever enchant and please

Etched in my mind is my first Magboard meeting
As 4 p.m. struck, my heart wildly beating
In the first few moments, I felt quite alone
Other than Anika, all faces were unkown
As the meeting rolled, my flutters began to cease
Everyone was so friendly and I was soon at ease
Shobhit sir asked me to write for Spektrum
Thus I became a part of the Magboard buzz ‘n’ hum

Taking that first day along, a whole year has now flown
Not me alone, but Magboard too has seen many a milestone
From Spektrum alone, our bouquet today has Spektrum, Quiet, Kyzen
That meant work strewn all around- here, there and beyond the horizon
We’ve braved the work avalanche with an adventurer’s zeal
We gave to Magboard with a smile our sleep, time and meal

For all these efforts, the return gift was really great and immense
Magboard has enhanced me with showers of Confidence
I befriended my Creativity, and learnt many a new skill
From listening to others’ ideas, to how to handle a bill
In Dec Holidays, I received perpetual Magboard mails
Whenever I checked my mail, there would be a few ‘Unread’ without fail
It was a novel experience, checking my mail thrice a day
And even after that Tornado went, this habit doesn’t go away!

Magboard got me friends out of juniors, ‘Ma’ams’ and ‘Sirs’
Knowing so many people gave my confidence a big surge
Thanks to Magboard UIET has become for me a home
Staying home on holidays really seems out of the norm
Meetings at 1, Meetings at 5, Meetings day in and out
As a group we discuss every idea, problem and doubt
Sometimes we make a fish market, but that is fun too
‘Coz despite the differences or debates, to the Team Spirit we stay true

11 out of 900 is a tiny figure to deem
And WE are those special 11 chosen for the team
Call us Eccentrics, freaks, crazy or the Madboard
Still we all love being a part of the Magboard
I’ll be proud of Magboard memories till I’m dead
A great year just went by, a GREATER lies ahead!


Thirty months later, she was to write a poem again.

'To begin' is the key

If you haven't got an idea, start a story anyway. You can always throw it away, and maybe by the time you get to the fourth page you will have an idea, and you'll only have to throw away the first three pages.

~ William Campbell Gault

Courtesy: Arti Honrao's blog

On Idealists and their Idealism

Found this description of Idealists on Himanshi's blog, and couldn't resist posting it here. It describes me well enough! :D

"Idealists, as a temperament, are passionately concerned with personal growth and development. Idealists strive to discover who they are and how they can become their best possible self -- always this quest for self-knowledge and self-improvement drives their imagination. And they want to help others make the journey. Idealists are naturally drawn to working with people, and whether in education or counseling, in social services or personnel work, in journalism or the ministry, they are gifted at helping others find their way in life, often inspiring them to grow as individuals and to fulfill their potentials.
Idealists are sure that friendly cooperation is the best way for people to achieve their goals. Conflict and confrontation upset them because they seem to put up angry barriers between people. Idealists dream of creating harmonious, even caring personal relations, and they have a unique talent for helping people get along with each other and work together for the good of all. Such interpersonal harmony might be a romantic ideal, but then Idealists are incurable romantics who prefer to focus on what might be, rather than what is. The real, practical world is only a starting place for Idealists; they believe that life is filled with possibilities waiting to be realized, rich with meanings calling out to be understood. This idea of a mystical or spiritual dimension to life, the "not visible" or the "not yet" that can only be known through intuition or by a leap of faith, is far more important to Idealists than the world of material things.
Highly ethical in their actions, Idealists hold themselves to a strict standard of personal integrity. They must be true to themselves and to others, and they can be quite hard on themselves when they are dishonest, or when they are false or insincere. More often, however, Idealists are the very soul of kindness. Particularly in their personal relationships, Idealists are without question filled with love and good will. They believe in giving of themselves to help others; they cherish a few warm, sensitive friendships; they strive for a special rapport with their children; and in marriage they wish to find a "soulmate," someone with whom they can bond emotionally and spiritually, sharing their deepest feelings and their complex inner worlds.
Idealists are rare, making up between 20 and 25 percent of the population. But their ability to inspire people with their enthusiasm and their idealism has given them influence far beyond their numbers."

Solitude!

Loneliness is the poverty of self; solitude is the richness of self
— American poet-novelist May Sarton

Courtesy: R P Dutta@Flickr.com

The Optimism of an Early Morning :)

It's me blogging on a weekday. That too in the morning :)

After AGES I finally managed to get up at 5, and go for the morning walk that sits disappointed in my plans for each day. Poor it! The last time I took it was on my second day of Infosys. A morning walk really is the best way to start a day (I'm writing this for my own future reference :P) It fills me up with such positivity for the day ahead, and gives me a sense of power, of being in control of my life. It truly uplifts the day.

While taking the walk today, words were sounding in my head of what I'll write in my blog immediately after the walk. I intend to write on my perspectives becoming clearer.

This weekend, random chats with three friends gave me a new way to look at my job. They said that this was just the beginning! The journey has just started! Everyone starts like this, as a small, insignificant part of the big world, and then how far they go depends on them.

An obvious point, are you saying? But, I didn't see this point all this while! Really, I can get so wrapped up in my own philosophies that even the commonest sense can become a revelation to me! (When I write like this, I always feel like a mathematician who is always lost in the abstract :D)

Yesterday morning, when I got up, I felt like a 'girl with a purpose' once again. With the jazba of kuchh karna hai, and determined eyes, and a confident smile. It felt good to feel so sure again, with a "I've miles to go before I sleep" kind of determination.

A few days back I was talking to Sim that this year, my Bday just seems to be coming. There seems to be no special significance attached to it. And she said, "Well, you never know!"

I now sense a significance. 'The Year of Intense Mental Activity' is drawing to a close. I'm stepping out of the haze. Into the honey-coloured sunshine. It's a lovely morning. :)

On Vikram Seth :)

Hmmm....so, my post of the week. That's what job does to blogging-reduces it to just a weekend amusement!

Last night, I started 'The Golden Gate' by Vikram Seth. And, he had the same effect on me again- he made me smile. Reading him is always so rewarding. The joy he must have felt while writing comes through! I had once copied a quote of RK Narayan about him, "Here was a genuine writer with the right values, gift and outlook, not writing in order to blow ff steam or to reform society but a genuine artist who takes pleasure in writing. Here I found rhyme, reason and humor, and above all sensed a rhythm which “vibrates in the memory” even after the book is shut and put away. Vikram Seth shows absolute mastery of the English Language and has created a unique literary alchemy. Yes, this is a book fit to be kept beside Palgrave’s Golden Treasury for frequent literary refreshment."

Really, I think that if I ever do write a book, I am going to write a 'Thank You' note in it to Seth, for giving me a model for my writing.

I had first come across him two years back, when I picked up 'A Suitable Boy' off the shelves of British Library, attracted enough by the title (hehe :P). I still remember how, that evening, I started reading it, and just could not put it down! The writing had a glowing, sunny feeling about it, a warmth that I had not felt in any book since long. The only book that I remember with similar affection is 'David Copperfield', and that is partly due to the nostalgia it evokes. It was the first novel I ever read, in my class fourth.

I am sure there would be many favourite books that I'll be able to list, but they would all be afterthoughts. The book and the author that immediately comes to my mind is 'A suitable boy' and Vikram Seth.

It was such a simple story! It made me want to write myself! To write a book as 'A Suitable Boy' became the dream for me.

The next book that I picked of him was 'All You Who Sleep Tonight.'

Again, I went "Wow!!!"

It is perhaps the only book of English poetry that I've read from end to end, and got photocopied, and remembered by heart, and loved to quote. I have been an avid collector of Punjabi poems, and have loved their rhythm and usage of beautiful, melodious and sweet words. I love reciting them aloud, even if only to myself. Somehow, not many English poems had had the same effect on me. Some poets had, randomly, but apart from Shelley's imagination, nothing made me go "Wow!"

Vikram Seth did.

His poems were so simple! Very easy to understand, and so enjoyable! He plays with words and that playfulness makes his poems a joy. I could perfectly relate with what he wrote, I could understand him, because I had had similar experiences myself. That made me think, "Here is he, who has turned his experiences into such beautiful poetry. And, you've just let them go by!"

My writing style is usually similar to Paulo Coelho-ish philosophical ramblings. But, that also makes me glum and an introvert. My friends already say I think a lot, and such heavy writing makes me go even deeper. Also, the chief element of my writing then becomes cynicism, and irony, whereas I am generally quite optimistic and cheerful. In short, it almost creates an alter-ego of mine, someone who is cynical and depressed about everything. Such writing always leaves me unsatisfied. It's not the kind of a person I want to be. It's not the kind of writing I want to do.

Last night, reading 'The Golden Gate' lit me up again. That is the writing that makes me smile. That's how I want to write.

A day's work

W.B.Yeats was told at dinner that he looked tired.

“yes, I had a very tiring day, working.”

“Oh . And what were you doing?”

“If you must know.

In the morning I took out a comma.”

“Yes” said the listener…

“Then, this afternoon, I put it back in.”

The words for my writing.

He never oversimplifies people or situations. Ambivalence is the key to his work – running through his stories is the delicate (and inconvenient) question: What can we ever really know about ourselves, our motivations, our choices, the accumulation of incidents and influences that define us over a lifetime? And if we can't know ourselves, what hope then of understanding anyone else, even the people we are closest to? This also means that elements of his writing can be frustrating, especially when some threads are deliberately left untied (as they would be in real life) – an important character disappearing, for instance, and the reader never learning anything about him again, outside of conjecture.

(From Jai Arjun Singh's article on MG Vassanji.)

Someday, these would be the words that would describe my writing. Because, these are the words that describe my thought process.

After Years

She entered. A simple shimmer.
She walked. She didn’t look up.
Her eyes focussed on the floor.
Watching the carpet. The legs of chairs.
The shoes. The legs of people sitting.
Of people walking. She walked.
Till she saw a pair of shoes
Right in front of her.
A pair of polished black shoes.
She saw.
She didn’t look up.
She couldn’t.
Fixed she was to ground
The magnetic ground.
A magnetic pull from all sides.
She could not move.
A million spirals were growing
Out and out and out of her
The shoes were all she saw.
She wished the moment should go
On and on and on and on.
The next moment should not come.
What would she say!

Slowly, she looked up.
She saw.
And, she saw.
And, tears came.

They moved out of the path
And sat on two chairs.
In silence. Together.
What could any words have said?
The finite walls of words
Can hold not the free gusts
That sweep the fields of mind.

Japinder Gill

When you think you can't

When you think you can't make it any further, hold on a little longer.

Read also: The Power of the Dream

The Infy Experience- First Impressions

8: 30 am
The Staff Bus

She is studying for the module test scheduled at 9. It is her first test at Infosys. She reminds herself that she has to click pictures of her cubicle from her cell. She wants to show her family how nice and personal a space it is.


1: 30 pm
The Food Court

A group of friends are sitting around a table. Her classmates from college. They have read her blog, and know how uncertain she was about joining Infosys. The topic of discussion is the facilities provided. The vote is unanimous.

She likes the place. Especially her cubicle, she adds with a grin.


6 pm
The Cubicle

She’s been sitting there for the past four hours. She so loves the solitude it provides! It has a whiteboard, a pc, a phone- all her own. Today, she created her account on the Infy Communicator. She called a few friends and chatted with a few others. It was fun!

Life’s setting into a routine again, and it’s hardly as tough as she had imagined. She had worried that the job would cut her away from everything else she wanted to do. She’s learning that is not the case. She would need discipline to manage her time well, but it is possible. She can have a life outside of her job.

8: 30 pm
Home

Her mother happily tells her the latest about S, the son of her mother’s colleague. He was one year her senior. They had both prepared for IIT. He cleared. She didn’t. He was now being sent to US by the consultancy firm he had joined for a premium assignment. His mother had told her mother that he often says that she should have gone to IITs.

She listens quietly. The same empty loss gnaws at her. She didn’t go to the IIT. It is her single regret in life. And one that time has not been able to overcome.

Had she dropped that one year!

She often imagines the girl she could have been had she studied in an IIT. How different things would have been. How her mind could have flowered. How wide her options would have been. Perhaps, she would actually have become passionate about research? It was her childhood dream to discover something, or create something new. She had always seen herself as a blend of a researcher and a philosopher. Certainly, she was as eccentric as them! She wanted to be one of that select club. But in UIET, all her creative talents found only one outlet- Magboard. And so, today she plans to be a writer. Academics at college failed to rouse her! She sometimes shudders that if Magboard hadn’t happened either, the flame in her may have totally extinguished!

It is at moments like these that dissatisfaction arises in her, and makes her restless. Had she been an IITian, she would have got a job on her merit. Because she was intelligent. Or because she had solved some difficult problems that no one else had. Or maybe, because she had promising ideas.

In her current job, she is repeatedly told that the greatest talent of all trainees would be their learnability. The fact that they can let their minds be moulded as per “business requirements”.

She doesn’t know if she is actually capable of free thinking, or how intelligent she actually is. It may just be an illusion that she’s created for herself. But the fact is, that illusion makes it difficult for her to accept her reality. There is a huge gulf between the life she wished she had, and the life she has. She ought to make her decisions based on her reality, but she rather gets jumbled up in all the ideals that she creates under the spell of her illusions. She had no other option but this job in hand, and yet, she went declaring that she was not too sure if she would take it up or not.

She’s a funny, whimsical girl. Or rather, she’s too much of a romantic. She thinks too much, and then lets those thoughts warp the realities.

The reality is that the job has given her a sense of security. She has been writing regularly now, and with joy. That is something she has been unable to do for a long time. Because, each time she would set to write, she would get anxious about how important it was that she should write well, and that her book should be a success. She was leaving it all for her writing. She could not afford to fail in that. It was a tremendous pressure on a new, naïve writer like her. She could not take it. Each time, she found it easier to just get up from her desk, and do something else.

Now, she can afford to write the way she wants. Her focus has shifted to learning her craft, rather than publishing. She feels calm. Light. She looks forward to her hour on her novel. Her job has set her free.

It is a big gift.

The job is good too. Infosys takes very good care of the employees. Truly world-class facilities are made available to them. It’s a great work environment. The work culture too is very good. The one thing that truly amazes her is the meticulous planning that has gone into each and every aspect of the organization. It is a marvel! To create processes that can provide individual attention to each employee, when there must be more than seventy thousand employees!

Infoscions wear their identity cards around their neck in a black thread. On the first day, she had done it awkwardly. She had felt that it would dissolve her identity and reduce her to just an Employee Number. But by Friday that week, she had started liking it. It made her feel a part of the organization.

She will not say that she is proud to be an Infoscion. That would be too committed a bond to the company, that she hardly feels yet. But, the company has impressed her. It has earned her respect and admiration. She is glad that she joined it.

While searching on Zadie Smith

• She's very precious about words. "There's this great quote by Nabokov. 'He wrote like a genius, he thought like a man of letters and he spoke like a child' . . . it's a bloody good quote, and I think it's true of some very, very great writers. I'm always a bit suspicious of writers who have the gift of the gab." She immediately qualifies herself - not that she's a great writer.

• She may be ambivalent about what she has written so far, but she seems to have supreme confidence about what she will go on to write. Has she got a great book in her? "If you didn't believe that you did, at some point, even if it's when I'm 60, then why would you do it?"

• “A work of art,” said Nabokov, “has no importance whatever to society. It is only important to the individual, and only the individual reader is important to me.”

• The chief enemy of excellence in morality (and also in art) is personal fantasy, the tissue of self-aggrandising and consoling wishes and dreams which prevents one from seeing what there is outside one … This is not easy, and requires, in art or morals, a discipline. One might say here that art is an excellent analogy of morals or indeed that it is in this respect a case of morals.

Culled from an interview of Zadie Smith.

The Garden of Forking Paths

I just came across Jorge Luis Borges, a Spanish writer, who wrote an acclaimed story of this title.

This title has really captivated me. It brought back to me an idea that really fascinates me- at each point of decision, we are at a fork. We choose one way. Leave the other untrodden. Then, some point down the road we chose, we again come across a fork. We again make a choice. That's how we keep branching out in life.

What if, somehow, we could come to know what we had left behind? What would have happened if, at a particular fork, we had gone the other way? What new forks would we have faced then? Life would have been so totally different from what it is today!

The number of Permutations that arise from such speculation is really mind-boggling. It always leaves me dazzled. And, wondering.

A few months ago, when I had read Richard Bach's One, this idea had come to the forefront again. And now, this story comes so close to exactly making the same point.

There are times when I think whether I'll ever be able to write as well as the greats I admire. But then there come times like now, when this consideration ceases to matter altogether. What remains is just the idea. And, the fact that I should write just to get my idea across.

Literature is nothing but sharing of ideas. And, I am more and more beginning to think of Literature as one, borderless democratic world, where everyone shares their ideas. Ideas reign supreme. Writing a book is just a way of discussing your idea with the world. The book is just the medium.

Rushdie's surrealism

"It conforms to that ancient rule of writing, which is: make it strange. If you're going to try to get people to see what you want them to see, you have to take them by surprise. You have to come at it in a way that gets past habituation, because we all have a deeply habituated way of seeing the world. In order to get us to see freshly, the writer has to catch habit off guard. You're right, there's a lot of information overload in there, but it's for that reason, as if to say: Suddenly it feels really odd and strange and surprising, and yet it's all true. Nothing is made up, you know. If it works right, it makes readers see afresh, see the world anew. That's what it's for."

Salman Rushdie on his book, Fury, in an interview

On Passion in work

"Dont follow your dreams, chase them"


"Don't settle for something that you don't want to do. When I wake up , I don't go to work. I go to play. I go to do something that I love to do."

-Terrence J of 106 & Park

(Picked up from Himanshi's blog)

Really! Isn't this why I thank my stars so much that I became a part of the Magboard! It told me how it is like to do something you love. It's not work. It really is Play. It set the standard for all the jobs I'll ever do.

On choice

In life we have lot to lose and very little to choose; whenever you get a chance to choose, do it wisely so that you never lose what you choose.

Keep Walking

'The road,' wrote Cervantes, 'is always better than the inn.' Those who settle on fame or fortune, and having arrived, call it quits, miss the whole point of life. Realistically, there is no inn, no ultimate point of arrival. It is the road now and forever, finite man probing infinity, finding his way, endlessly. All that matters are the lessons learned along the way.

Leonard E. Read