Through the Window

A mile beyond the wood-pained glass
Amidst tall glistening intimidating grass
There stands a boy with half-open arms
Meandering in his own hesitant charms
His face bares all, his eyes hide some,
His hands reach out, his feet are numb
He's ready to take off, but anchored well
A cheetah's blood in a turtle's shell
And the pastures swaying in the breeze
Make him feel like fallen trees
Yet there's a drive, but questions too many
The answers are expensive, and he hasn't a penny
Perhaps, there's hope, his head rises high
He refuses to give up, but maybe he's shy
He wants to write, but he wants to read
He wants to force, but he has to plead
There are tears across a pitiful face
Yet he exudes a fighter's grace
Cuts and bruises across a torn chest
and marks of subdued, but raring zest
Forgiveness on his forehead, a master's trait
But fear and suspicion for every mate
Pain in every anxious wait
For turns that turn up in his fateful fate
I see a mile of freshness stale
Sad happiness, and brightness pale
I see him distinctly, and I have a fair view
But, maybe it's a mirror I'm looking into.
Maybe, it's a mirror I'm looking into.

Why doesn’t this happen to you?

“The breeze flies past me,
It touches me like a ghost, makes me shiver.
But why doesn’t this happen to you?
It excites every tree
And the black water in the silent river
But why doesn’t this happen to you?

In the bluish-black night sky
That you yourself have lit
Clouds try to hide your light
Apparently making you feel shy
They, themselves, closely knit,
To darken the beautiful night.

I sway along and so my moods do,
But why doesn’t this happen to you?

Why are you just there where you were when I was swung by the breeze?
Why doesn’t your light move with the vapourous cotton crossing your path with ease?
Don’t you feel lonely in the barren plain sky with only a few fixed stars?
Don’t you want to go around and have fun and play on the planet of Mars?”

“No! I don’t feel lonely.
The breeze doesn’t brush me aside
It pats me while on the glide
As if I’m a baby in a pram.

The clouds do not hide me,
They come over for a party.
I do not shiver in the wind’s cold
For, to stay in my place I’m told.

I do not feel lonely at all.

I have myself to have fun
And of course, in the morning, the sun.
Like sitting down there, you enjoy natural sights,
I enjoy people like you all around the globe, the glamour, the lights.
And this is what makes life interesting here.
I wonder too,
Why doesn’t this happen to you?”

Kalam's Speech in Hyderabad

Why is the media here so negative? Why are we in India so embarrassed to recognize our own strengths, our achievements? We are such a great nation. We have so many amazing success stories but we refuse to acknowledge them. Why?
We are the first in milk production.
We are number one in Remote sensing satellites.
We are the second largest producer of wheat.
We are the second largest producer of rice.

Look at Dr Sudarshan, he has transferred the tribal village into a self-sustaining, self-driving unit. There are millions of such achievements but our media is only obsessed in the bad news and failures and disasters. I was in Tel Aviv once and I was reading the Israeli newspaper. It was the day after a lot of attacks and bombardments and deaths had taken place. The Hamas had struck. But the front page of the newspaper had the picture of a Jewish gentleman who in five years had transformed his desert into an orchid and a granary. It was this inspiring picture that everyone woke up to. The gory details of killings, bombardments, deaths, were inside in the newspaper, buried among other news. In India we only read about death, sickness, terrorism, crime. Why are we so NEGATIVE? Another question: Why are we, as a nation so obsessed with foreign things? We want foreign TVs, we want foreign shirts. We want foreign technology. Why this obsession with everything imported. Do we not realize that self-respect comes with self-reliance?

I was in Hyderabad giving this lecture, when a 14 year old girl asked me for my autograph. I asked her what her goal in life is. She replied: I want to live in a developed India. For her, you and I will have to build this developed India. You must proclaim. India is not an under-developed nation; it is a highly developed nation.

Do you have 10 minutes? Allow me to come back with a vengeance.
Got 10 minutes for your country? If yes, then read; otherwise, choice is yours.
YOU say that our government is inefficient.
YOU say that our laws are too old.
YOU say that the municipality does not pick up the garbage.
YOU say that the phones don't work, the railways are a joke, the airline is the worst in the world, mails never reach their destination.
YOU say that our country has been fed to the dogs and is the absolute pits.
YOU say, say and say.

What do YOU do about it? Take a person on his way to Singapore . Give him a name - YOURS. Give him a face - YOURS. YOU walk out of the airport and you are at your International best. In Singapore you don't throw cigarette butts on the roads or eat in the stores. YOU are as proud of their Underground links as they are. You pay $5 (approx. Rs. 60) to drive through Orchard Road (equivalent of Mahim Causeway or Pedder Road) between 5 PM and 8 PM. YOU come back to the parking lot to punch your parking ticket if you have over stayed in a restaurant or a shopping mall irrespective of your status identity... In Singapore you don't say anything, DO YOU? YOU wouldn't dare to eat in public during Ramadan, in Dubai. YOU would not dare to go out without your head covered in Jeddah. YOU would not dare to buy an employee of the telephone exchange in London at 10 pounds ( Rs.650) a month to, 'see to it that my STD and ISD calls are billed to someone else.'YOU would not dare to speed beyond 55 mph (88 km/h) in Washington and then tell the traffic cop, 'Jaanta hai main kaun hoon (Do you know who I am?). I am so and so's son. Take your two bucks and get lost.' YOU wouldn't chuck an empty coconut shell anywhere other than the garbage pail on the beaches in Australia and New Zealand .Why don't YOU spit Paan on the streets of Tokyo ? Why don't YOU use examination jockeys or buy fake certificates in Boston??? We are still talking of the same YOU. YOU who can respect and conform to a foreign system in other countries but cannot in your own. You who will throw papers and cigarettes on the road the moment you touch Indian ground. If you can be an involved and appreciative citizen in an alien country, why cannot you be the same here in India?

Once in an interview, the famous Ex-municipal commissioner of Bombay, Mr.Tinaikar, had a point to make. 'Rich people's dogs are walked on the streets to leave their affluent droppings all over the place,' he said. 'And then the same people turn around to criticize and blame the authorities for inefficiency and dirty pavements. What do they expect the officers to do? Go down with a broom every time their dog feels the pressure in his bowels? In America every dog owner has to clean up after his pet has done the job. Same in Japan . Will the Indian citizen do that here?' He's right. We go to the polls to choose a government and after that forfeit all responsibility. We sit back wanting to be pampered and expect the government to do everything for us whilst our contribution is totally negative. We expect the government to clean up but we are not going to stop chucking garbage all over the place nor are we going to stop to pick a up a stray piece of paper and throw it in the bin. We expect the railways to provide clean bathrooms but we are not going to learn the proper use of bathrooms. We want Indian Airlines and Air India to provide the best of food and toiletries but we are not going to stop pilfering at the least opportunity. This applies even to the staff who is known not to pass on the service to the public.

When it comes to burning social issues like those related to women, dowry, girl child! and others, we make loud drawing room protestations and continue to do the reverse at home. Our excuse? 'It's the whole system which has to change, how will it matter if I aloneforego my sons' rights to a dowry. So who's going to change the system? What does a system consist of ? Very conveniently for us it consists of our neighbours, other households, other cities, other communities and the government. But definitely not me and YOU. When it comes to us actually making a positive contribution to the system we lock ourselves along with our families into a safe cocoon and look into the distance at countries far away and wait for a Mr Clean to come along and work miracles for us with a majestic sweep of his hand or we leave the country and run away. Like lazy cowards hounded by our fears we run to America to bask in their glory and praise their system. When New York becomes insecure we run to England. When England experiences unemployment, we take the next flight out to the Gulf. When the Gulf is war struck, we demand to be rescued and brought home by the Indian government. Everybody is out to abuse and rape the country. Nobody thinks of feeding the system. Our conscience is mortgaged to money.

Thank you,

Dr Abdul Kalaam (PRESIDENT OF INDIA)

I can feel too...

I can smell a fragrance as well as you
or touch a petal as all else do,
but what I still can’t figure out
is why people forget that I can feel too!

I can sense when the sky turns dark
and picture the sun’s fiery hue,
yet they say my sense has worn out
and forget again that I can feel too.

I can hear the chirping morning birds
or relish a tasty steaming stew.
But when among others, I stand out
for perhaps it’s untrue, that I can feel too.

I can touch your heart and mind alike
for which I need no worldly cue;
only my inner eyes, just they
who still think that I can feel too.

I am wild, I know for sure,
yet for me, out of the blue
there are flashes of enchanting light
that make me feel that I can feel too.

This is one of my latest and heartfelt poems. I would like you to tell me how you interpret it, what images it brings to your mind, because that is important for my development as a poet - as a communicator of my ideas.

Valentine's Day - Do think about it

February 14th, this date has become synonymous with heart-shaped balloons, exotic cakes, fancy candles, expressive cards, witty SMSes and of course, money making. Did someone say love, perhaps yes, but it seems love is only secondary. It's more about how expensive my gift is, or whether or not I have someone to give it to. But surely, there's much more to Valentine's Day than just that.

I disagree with those who disregard it as an influence from the West, because it's not a bad thing. After all, it celebrates the most common and most beautiful of all human emotions - love! What I am against is the mass hysteria over celebrating the day, when only half the people understand the true meaning of love. The media hypes it and its commercialisation fills a few pockets, but in my opinion, it must not be manifested only in physical forms; it must be felt! We must feel grateful to those who love us, and that includes our parents, siblings, friends, and that special someone, and must cherish those or that which we love.

Most importantly, we must regard it as a day of stock-taking, of making an account of whether or not we've loved more than being loved in the past year.

Think about it and tell me what you think.

Freedumb

We are a free country, a country free from the cruel hands of foreign rule. We are free to lead a sovereign life, to voice our thoughts, to express our opinions through our deeds, to breathe, to live. We are free to make movies, to eat and drink, to love, to innovate, to produce, to understand, to get and to give. We are free!

Yet, my heart believes it not, that we are absolutely free. It seems to me that most of us are free to take everything, including our freedom, for granted. We are free to spit on the walls and pavements, free to stick gum on benches, free to sweep our dust onto the neighbour’s doormat, free to let our children throw banana peels out the car window, free to urinate by the street, just outside the public urinal, free to test the endurance of all public benefit objects by pelting them with stones, free to forget our national anthem, free to prove that our worth is in abandoning everything Indian, free to endanger the lives of millions of people with drunken driving, free to test the patience of tourists, free to loot, free to rob, free to murder, free to misbehave, free to ridicule, free to criticize, free to discriminate, free to work at our whims, and free to blame the government for all of the above.
We are free – only to be clutched more tightly by the handcuffs of anger, jealousy, greed, lust for power, loss of humanism and the loss of our very soul!

The freedom to elect our government came as an immediate aftermath of our gaining independence. But did it bring with it the intelligence to be able to elect an effective government? Ironically, it did bring along the freedom to curse the government we have elected, to refute the corruption seeds of which we have sown, to let everything go on as badly as ever, as long as we individually do not receive any immediate harm.

The freedom of expression of thought is a fundamental right. We are entitled to forums to voice our views, problems and ideas. We are free to have television channels deliver the truth at our doorstep, movies and the media to entertain us. Yet, are we free from the indignity of having to cross any limits in competition? Are we free from the immature mindsets and useless, and all the more detrimental, customs prevalent in society? Are we free from badly informed, irresponsibly fast and sensation-obsessed news channels, whose journalist can film a man burning himself in public, but cannot try to put out the fire, let alone prevent him from doing so? Are we free from endless sob stories that are wasting away the minds of a large section of our population every afternoon, by promoting illogical and unrealistic stories as something going on in every household? No wonder, many women and, contrary to common belief, men are convinced that this is some form of entertainment.

We are free to be educated and to educate. Education means being able to comprehend life and earn ourselves a living, not just live it but love it too. But education has acquired a new meaning today. It means to get good marks in an unnecessarily over-hyped written examination that hardly requires any skill more than cramming ability. Morality is now unheard of (kis chidiya ka naam hai, they say in Hindi) and etiquette perhaps has lost its way in a web of confused and half-hearted teachers. Education is your percentage of marks mentioned on a fragile sheet of paper, which apparently represents your future.

I ask, do you still think we are FREE? Do you still think we have the right kind of freedom, if at all we have any? I think the kind of freedom we seem to be enjoying right now needs to be rephrased FREEDUMB because this freedom is of no use, for we are entangled in the sticky threads of nonsense. They ask why do we not progress, as much as is our potential? But do they realize what progress needs? Look into yourself; are you the free bird that soars in the sky? Have you not been grappling in quicksand, which now you’ve even started enjoying? Cut those sticky threads with your teeth. Think of what you can do to your own self, if your country progresses. Waste not your time in pointless arguments about correcting that which makes no significant difference – correct that which is in you, which is all you have, which is what makes you, and makes all the difference. Don’t be dumb in exercising your freedom. Use it to make yourself see an India that can, for a change, be proud of its people, rather than you claiming to be proud of a country that has lost all its dignity because it’s been stripped all the while that its people have praised it.

I invite your comments and what you feel on the same topic - not necessarily supporting my opinion.

Let's celebrate life

Hello everyone who finds the time to visit my blog. It's called Etching Impressions on Life because that's what we're doing every second. And our lives too are being etched with experience by everyone and everything we come across.

I am a poet myself and therefore, inclined towards philosophy, yet I expect you to find truth in my philisophy (if you can't, thanks anyway for reading). I wish to start a process of thinking, of giving time to what's happening around us and appreciating what a gift we have been blessed with.

So here I invite anyone and everyone to experience the world from my eyes and life at its ironical best.

Black and White

For me, every Wednesday is a trip into a spectrum of diverse, and some strangely weird minds belonging to the most overrated species on earth - Homo sapiens.

The 'mobile' vegetable market storms the streets of our locality on Wednesdays. And very naturally, I am assigned the task of carrying the tonne or so of vegetables and fruits, which my mother loads me with, from the market to our refrigerator.

But little does she realise, that her draught horse is doing more than he is asked to. I like to look around for some entertainment, for I myself possess very little skill in the selection of good and fresh vegetables. One glance and I can scan a drama being staged right on the streets, with numerous and varied actors. There are so many interesting faces to decipher. There are newly married men whose wives (or so it seems from their expressions) have threatened a kitchen strike if they do not 'fetch' vegetables that evening. And there are newly wedded couples, walking hand in hand, perhaps buying vegetables is not on the priority list. There are babies, as cute as they can get - and even as nasty - in the arms of mostly underage ayahs, or hopping along with one finger tightly clutched. There are others, inevitably poor hapless souls, like me, laden with what was only partly to be in them, and there are elderly couples accompanied by distracted servants. There are rich people and poor people, in the monetary sense of the words rich and poor. Their true worth cannot be determined in so short a time.

In another glance, though, I spot the stress on the vendors' faces, even as they smile and hand me my kilos of vegetables in plastic bags that have cost them more than what they are here to sell. Some of them have seen this world for merely twelve or thirteen years. Children, women in the heat of their lamps, sweating it out to earn enough to live through the day. That is how life is, isn't it, like the fingers of a hand, if I am allowed to quote the cliche. And then there is my mother, who like anybody else cannot prevent herself from trying endlessly to bargain on the rates of the very thing that we owe our existence to - our food.

So that's life on every Wednesday: colours, including black and white.