Talent finally recognized

Guyzzz!! Here's some news. part of it is good and part bad...The good part is that Jayakrishnan got his first book published!! , Thanks to ‘Tangled Web Publications’ and a group called ‘The Poets of Mars’, that he finally got a break. The book is titled "Once in the Wilderness" and is a collection of around 80 poems written by him, edited by Elaine.S.Paul. The bad part of it is that we might not be able to get a glimpse of the book for at least a month. That is because the book was published in the US and we are not yet clear about the date of its arrival in India. Definitely JK will get copies of the book and i will let you know about it.

visit the website http://blog.poetsofmars.com/ and go to the link "Blossoms of India" and you can read interesting poems written by Indian poets. It also has poetries written by our own Tara, Saranya and Remya Chechi!!

DARKNESS INSIDE

My purple nights and the blown out candles..
Threads of smoke...
Figers burnt and sticky wax...
All is but inside my heart.
I could sense it there..
All because i lost my moon while counting stars...
All because my stars were scattered on a thorney bush..
And yes..it bleeds as they left an indelible spur on my membrane.
Embers of my fireplace have gone to sleep...
I'm in darkness silently panting,
And withdrawing to another darkness inside..
Inside me.

BURIAL OF THE DEAD- No I don't Mean the Blog!

The Burial of the Dead

I get up early (around 7) in the morning, brush my teeth and go downstairs to the kitchen to make myself a cup of tea. Amma is not in the least bit happy with my sleeping habits. Her physiognomy reflects her disapproval. But I carry on undeterred, with my culinary task. Then my precious mobile starts making ‘noise’ (according to parent jargon). And my mother cannot control herself any longer. She lashes out at my erratic way of life (my friends would definitely roll their eyes at this since they have a different opinion).

The point is, here starts my life. The first ‘peace’ offered by the dawn of a new day is cruelly shattered as I am reminded of the harsh realities of my existence. It would be foolish of me to dismiss my mother’s advice as generation gap. Sometimes I feel that what she says is true. And then a whole lot of doubts and uncertainities regarding my life and life in general rush in. The funny thing is that I never realized it. I thought I was capable of being happy and contented with what I have. I wonder how I forgot all those moments of brooding over the insignificance of the life I lead.

So, as I was saying I was leading a content life till Waste Land happened. Yep! Eliot’s poem…a seminal piece of modernist writing. Dr Meena T. Pillai, introduced us to the wastelander…the true and genuinine representation of the modern man, she kept saying. She would always end the class saying that we are all wastelanders. Like I said earlier I somehow or the other missed the point. I was hell bent on deciphering the literal meaning of the lines (silly me!). Life didn’t look bleak to me. I thought I was so optimistic that even The Waste Land did not affect me. I felt so proud of my goody good mind which refused to be bogged down. Until “The Burial of the Dead” happened on the 24^th of July, 2009. An eight minute long film by my class mate Pramod.

He had rewrote the Waste Land and that was the script of the film. He made it into a movie with visuals to match (Aromal chettan wielded the camera). Suddenly I discovered that missing piece. That connection which was so significant in understanding the wastelander, significant in making me realise that deep down all the ease and calm and happiness I display to people around, is this unsatisfied person. This unsatisfied person had been there all the while. I was aware of her presence but I was reluctant to reveal her. The fighting spirit in me was unrelenting; it had an ego problem. The spirit thought she would be debasing herself if she admits that she also harbours the wastelander within her. It would make no different from the rest of them.

But I don’t think this revelation was not coincidental. It is the power of the film. The visuals so beautifully blended with the script and created this atmosphere of uneasiness which would force anyone to do a little introspection. Here, Rahul chettan, the cast of the film, has to be mentioned. This may sound a bit prejudiced that not even in my wildest dreams did I think that he could carry it off so well…after all he has such a placid and benign face. But Ave Maria! Iam surprised again. Its now impossible for me to think of another face to portray the poignant emotions conveyed through the script. The grave being digged, the concentric circles being drawn, the constant reference to the “black book”, the pecking at the uprooted trees and its remnants…now everything seems to have attained a new meaning…thanks to Pink Flower Productions!!!

Thanks for making me realise that I can be a wastelander too.

It Happens only in India

Recently archaeologists traced back the ancestry of ‘Whales’ to Pakistan. While the news found a place in almost every international news channels, none of the Indian channels found it important enough to telecast, simply because it’s ‘Pakistan’. Although all Indian news channels are dumb, this takes them to the next level of dumbness. Any time Pakistan comes on news it’s always for the wrong reason. “Pakistan didn’t give an answer, they didn’t do this, they didn’t do that”. It seems that the word “Pakistan” itself is enough to wet their pants. For them it is just a country which is a monster, the kind of Chinese dragons that spit fire of terrorism. They don’t understand that radical forces are everywhere and that it’s the relationship between the two countries which is more important. May be it is true that the government officials in Pakistan didn’t respond properly regarding the Mumbai attacks. So blame it on them. Blame the Pakistan President or the authorities concerned. Please don’t use the word Pakistan for these kinds of sensitive issues.
I take tuition for the children staying in my neighbourhood. I don’t remember the context, but I said that it is important that our country maintain a good relationship with neighbouring countries like Pakistan and China. Then one of my student’s asked me “why Pakistan? aren’t they supposed to be our enemies” and then I had to convince them about the matter, but I think that was not convincing enough for them. This is truly a bad situation and our news channels make it worse. Recently there was a test match between Pakistan and Srilanka, and Pakistan lost. What better news can our news channels find? “PAKISTAN LOST” It was not the fact that Srilanka won the match that mattered. It was Pakistan’s lose. I say “SUE ALL INDIAN NEWS CHANNELS!!!” for such outrageousness. What do these people want? ....”WAR?”