Tuesday 30 September 2014

Remembering



Every Sunday morning, Yoginder visits this particular restaurant and sits by himself. His thoughts sweep him to another time. Fifty years ago, he met Zaira for the first time here. She had come with her family for breakfast, and he had instantly been smitten by her eyes: pale blue, curious but intense. She had caught his gaze and dipped behind her father's shoulder, watching him suspiciously through the crescent cut of her burqa. He smiled unknowingly, holding her for a few moments with his eyes; the staff occasionally disturbed his view with the haphazard scurry of early morning. She looked away, of course, but her eyes kept returning to him, like a person curious to know the end of a spinning top.

Distracted by her presence, he took a sip from his chai and accidentally burnt his lip. There was a momentary scuffle with the saucer; the tea leaped from the cup, broke against the glass table and made thin lines of dirty brown. Zaira giggled noiselessly, bowing her head. Embarrassed, Yoginder struggled to wipe the table clean with the corner of his sleeve, smearing it further. A waiter with bushy brows and dark eyes rushed to his rescue. As grunted he cleared the remnants of the chai. Zaira had not looked in Yoginder's direction after that, behaving like strangers ought to, ignorant of the other's presence. Yoginder began to wonder whether there was something between them or if he had unnecessarily made up stories in his head. 

A few moments later, the family finished breakfast; the father licked the final crumbs and lifted himself from the chair. His wife and daughters followed suit. With bowed heads, they formed a line behind him and discreetly disappeared behind a door. Yoginder remained in his chair, speechless, watching the wiped tea stains vaporise like ghosts on the glass table.

{Fiction, Scribbles, Notes, Stories, Tiny Visual Tales, Love, Memory}

Sunday 21 September 2014

Birds on a Wire

As a kid, while I was still grappling with my ability to write and artfully sculpt letters, I remember the daunting feeling of flipping through the school notebook which came streaked with dotted lines. I remember how I would try to precariously balance my wavy, uncertain letters on them. And I still remember my mother holding my hands, waltzing the tip of my pencil from the dotted line into the white space of endless possibilities above it, weaving a loop to make the perfect 'l' and gliding it back to the line to end the performance with a celebratory sweep. Back then, I recognized my love for the theatrics of writing letters--of assembling them to make words, and putting the stories that I mad up in my head, onto paper.

I made this picture while driving the other day. {Don't worry, I parked the car on the side}. The birds on the wire somehow took me back to my kindergarten days and reminded me of the letters and the dotted lines. I don't know why I made this picture, but perhaps something is telling me to rewrite the story I set out to write for myself, or alter the plot a bit. It's funny how some things you come across in life, bring back some of the most unintentionally related memories. Thankfully, this was a happy one.


{longing, memories, love, photography, writing, happy incidents, notes to self}

Saturday 13 September 2014

Note to Self

Be effortless at taking risks. Let go. Imagine, dream and then attack. Get after it. Draw out a map. Write down that one thing you want and then make love to it like there is no tomorrow. Don't protect yourself. don't deny yourself that risk you must take. taste it. bite into it. devour it. be instinctive, intuitive. make mistakes. accept imperfections, your shortcomings, your flaws. {you'd be boring without them}. dream, but don't falter in imagination. think, but don't over think. live, but don't float. dive. take the plunge. take that leap of faith. dream crazy big! get that lion out of the cage and let it roar. let the world hear it. no one can deny you what is already yours. just open that cage. and leap.

{revelations, realizations, inspirations, notes to self, reminder}

Unmade



In unmade beds we lie unmade
naked, sweaty palmed
wet eyed with wet insides
lying across the wrinkled sheets

moments ago
you had dug your fingernails
altering the lines my palm contained
becoming the cartographer of my world

outside
the owls hooted and spied wide-eyed
inside
I feel into your arms and you slipped
into mine

I gave you my world in kisses and rhyme
and you gave me
memories--

memories
that lie on my bed
like torn out pages

crumpled, abandoned, silent,
unfinished

{love, stories, heartaches, scribbles, remembering}

Friday 12 September 2014

Around the Corner



She walked passed him, unaware of his presence, but his gaze followed her. It was love at first sight, even at this age. And as she turned around the corner, he realized he would never see her again. Their eyes would never meet, her heart would never skip a beat like his did moments ago. They would continue to exist in their own little worlds, and that's where their story would end. He accepted, lifted his gaze, and moments later saw the next love of his life, walk past him.

{stories, lonely series, travel scribbles, lovers, tiny visual tales}