Trade?

I want to sell some memories
That I can live without
So I can buy back
What I used to be.

The Pig

This is one very chilling poem put forth in a delightful manner.

In England once there lived a big
And wonderfully clever pig.
To everybody it was plain
That Piggy had a massive brain.
He worked out sums inside his head,
There was no book he hadn't read.
He knew what made an airplane fly,
He knew how engines worked and why.
He knew all this, but in the end
One question drove him round the bend:
He simply couldn't puzzle out
What LIFE was really all about.
What was the reason for his birth?
Why was he placed upon this earth?
His giant brain went round and round.
Alas, no answer could be found.
Till suddenly one wondrous night.
All in a flash he saw the light.
He jumped up like a ballet dancer
And yelled, "By gum, I've got the answer!"
"They want my bacon slice by slice
"To sell at a tremendous price!
"They want my tender juicy chops
"To put in all the butcher's shops!
"They want my pork to make a roast
"And that's the part'll cost the most!
"They want my sausages in strings!
"They even want my chitterlings!
"The butcher's shop! The carving knife!
"That is the reason for my life!"
Such thoughts as these are not designed
To give a pig great piece of mind.
Next morning, in comes Farmer Bland,
A pail of pigswill in his hand,
And piggy with a mighty roar,
Bashes the farmer to the floor…
Now comes the rather grizzly bit
So let's not make too much of it,
Except that you must understand
That Piggy did eat Farmer Bland,
He ate him up from head to toe,
Chewing the pieces nice and slow.
It took an hour to reach the feet,
Because there was so much to eat,
And when he finished, Pig, of course,
Felt absolutely no remorse.
Slowly he scratched his brainy head
And with a little smile he said,
"I had a fairly powerful hunch
"That he might have me for his lunch.
"And so, because I feared the worst,
"I thought I'd better eat him first."

- Roald Dahl

Muted

Dear Deaf Old World,

If I wanted to tell, would you really listen?
Or would you pretend, as you always have
to understand life through filters
of shattered beauty and faulty reason.

Yours Truly,
Muted.

Race

Running along the tracks of Saturn's rings,
I jogged from stone to stone till I leaped over
to Andromeda and back.
I stretched out while on a ride upon Haley
breathing out Aurora Borealis.
Heavy Breath. Radiating Breath.
Listening to the celestial symphony
that floats on Qausar radio waves.
Warm up.
Paused for a drink at the Great Dipper
before dashing off into a sprint
racing into the Crab Nebula
and beyond.
Timing myself. Waiting for an Event Horizon
So I could just about slip past Light.
Slip past Time herself,
Into the grave of vision.
Into the cradle of all life.
Into the Black Hole.
And back.
I lose again.

What I wanted

Hordes run down.
In multitudes they swarm.
But I, looked all the time
at the path less trodden.
Would be cool they said.
A bored programmer,
pummeling the skies in a 747.
0.8 mach. As fast as they get these days.
A strict medical test.
A mildly defective gene.
A hundred colour vision tests.
We're not so sure they said.
We know you're ok
but need substantial evidence.
Substantially evident assholes.
I'm not so disappointed I think
As long as you had a shot,
You've lived just that longer.
But it was your dream you tell me
Great people have said the same,
Follow your dreams.

In the end, perhaps I mixed up my dreams..
Maybe I didn't really want to be a pilot.
Maybe... Just maybe..
I simply wanted to fly.
Maybe someday I will.

For those of you who haven't heard, yes I tried to change professions. Went through a series of medical tests and discovered that I'm mildly colour blind. Genetic defect. It's still under accepted limits but this small thing is making me go mad conducting tests for senile Air Force doctors. Seems like I'm fighting a losing battle. It's still not over though and I really wonder why.

Ghalib

Na tha kuchch to Khuda tha,
Kuchch na hota to Khuda hota
duboya mujhko hone ne,
Na hota main to kya hota ?

Huaa jab Gham se yoon behis
to Gham kya sar ke katne ka
na hota gar juda tan se
to zaanoon par dhara hota

Huee muddat ke Ghalib mar gaya
par yaad aata hai
wo har ek baat pe kehana,
ke yooN hota to kya hota ?

With all due respect, a humble attempt at translation:

God was when was nothing else,
when nothing else there would be God
Existence does drown me,
without me what else would be?

Grief does surprise me,
I grieve not my execution,
If not separated from my body,
my head would still lay on my knee.

It's been a while since Ghalib's passing
but is still remembered..
His words uttered, as often as he could,
"Had this not been, then what would?"

This was really hard. It's almost impossible to extract the beauty of a passage of one language into another.

I do Not Love you

I do not love you - By Pablo Neruda

I do not love you as if you were salt-rose or topaz,
or the arrow of carnations the fire shoots off.
I love you as certain things are to be loved,
in secret, between the shadow and the soul.

I love you as the plant that never blooms,
but carries in itself the light of hidden flowers.
Thanks to your love a certain fragrance,
risen darkly from the earth, lives darkly in my body.

I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where,
I love you straightforwardly, without complexities or pride,
so I love you because I know no other way than this:
where "I" does not exist, nor "you,"
So close that your hand on my chest is my hand,
So close that your eyes close and I fall asleep.

I wonder why Neruda's poems never featured in any of our school text books. They were positively brilliant!

I Duddit!

Abandoning the idea of writing a seemingly hortatory but rebarbative travelogue on my recent trip to Dandelli with my friends, I'd just like to say that this trip helped me immensely by giving me a much needed break from the SSDD routine. Awesome trip. Great Company. Feeling much better now.I feel good :D

Check out the pics here.

But before you leave, do read this poem that flashed my mind while staring at two pairs of fiery feline eyes probing us at night with only a 100 meters of forest ground seperating us..

The Tiger

TIGER, tiger, burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deeps or skies
Burnt the fire of thine eyes?
On what wings dare he aspire?
What the hand dare seize the fire?

And what shoulder and what art
Could twist the sinews of thy heart?
And when thy heart began to beat,
What dread hand and what dread feet?

What the hammer? what the chain?
In what furnace was thy brain?
What the anvil? What dread grasp
Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

When the stars threw down their spears,
And water'd heaven with their tears,
Did He smile His work to see?
Did He who made the lamb make thee?

Tiger, tiger, burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

-William Blake