Will O' the Wisp

Sometimes you can't speak. You find yourself amidst so much happenings, good and bad, that you lose the strength to speak. The words in your head jumble up so badly that you also don't know what exactly to speak. The smallest words like no, yes, okay, thanks feel more difficult than the last novel you read aloud. But then you can't stay silent for long. You have to answer what happened to you. You have to go through interrogations and judgements. You have to know why this has happened to you and how you are better than so many other people. This continues for long. For longer than all the time you were feeling worse about yourself. The banyan tree which promised you to hide from the rest of the world either has died or is so far from you that even to reach it, you need to speak. Hence, you speak. You speak in the language of lesser loved people. But you speak.

The other ponds in the village are far away from hers. She desires to go there but she is too small to swim across rivers. The duckling doesn't like her pond at all because she is the only duckling there. She sees fishes, tadepoles, swans, flies but she doesn't see another duck. Still she assumes it to be her home. She doesn't understand home is where heart lies, she doesn't understand "family" is what we choose. She tries to swim in there, she tries to swim out of there, she can't. The little boy who comes to the pond everyday to complete his homework has grown older. He doesn't have homeworks to complete anymore. She doesn't grow. The paperboats sail away. The duckling tries to follow them. They drown. She doesn't. Sometimes they are picked by someone on the other side of the pond, she sails in vain. The flies buzz, the people talk, the birds chirp, every sound becomes malignant to her ears. She doesn't talk. She doesn't have an...

There is a favorite kid of mine who happens to be the daughter of a professor of Jadavpur University. She is in class five. Sometimes we talk about the story books she recently read and my honours syllabus as she finds it very fascinating how we both have Shakespeare and Bond in our syllabus. And she talks a lot. Like a lot. She can talk for any length of time with anyone (I assume) Today she got a few plantable pencils, pens and notepads from school as children's day gift. She showed me all of them. And while she was keeping the pens and the pencils back in the case, she asked for the cover of the nib of the pen (the itty-bitty white transparent cover). I told her it's not important, people throw it away. She said, "I'm not among the people who live in the astonishing world of nothingness" . . . She is in class 5.

The worst thing in India (which is because I am not much aware of the other parts of the world) is this parents often glorify their sacrifices. It might not be a story of many houses but I have come across a recent picture of parenting which could not stop me from writing this. I see the parents using words, words which are very negative, words which make the  children doubt their existential importance in the world, words which are atrocious and cruel, words which have huge implications. Though words are often said to be a way to purge the pent up emotions, it is asked not to take them seriously. But I see the mother spitting on herself for being the mother of the children in front of the children. I see her cursing them and herself and for what? For certain things which the children do because they are children, because they are unaware of a lot of things which make their parents worried.  From my limited conversation with the children, I don't find them insensible or...

Yesterday's rain had successfully made small pools on the roads. I walked consciously because I had to save my clothes from getting spoiled from the splashes of the dirty water which the vehicle on streets throw, voluntarily and involuntarily.  I carried an umbrella and held it in front of me. The kids who studied in local schools have started dispersing from their homes. We share the same institutional time. As I stood for the bus, two kids of 6-7 year old purposely jumped on the water and spoiled their dresses. I was not allowed to enter school premises with dirty clothes and in college, it creates an inferior image to the people. I was afraid of that. Soon, some more kids joined them. They laughed and shouted as they jumped on the water and the cars helped them in spoiling their dresses. I looked at my superior clean clothes. I didn't laugh. I didn't jump. I didn't smile. I didn't shout. Sudeepa thamma,  one of my neighbors watched me from her balcony. She alw...

Fare you well :) I have seen dust, autumn fall, spring set, disappearing of stars from the sky of Kolkata, I have let go of broken toys, rusted bicycles, torn letters, old teddy bears and half written diaries. None felt like you, none. I don't know where you were before we met, how much longer would you stay with all of me who always irritates you being an emotional fool and with her useless state of existence. Because forever is cliché. And always is never. Do you know I have a fascination for woods? The woods which welcome me everytime unfailingly, with a tree house, a burrow and a muffler in it? I keep walking there. I walk and I meet people, people I knew long ago, people I know now, people I never knew. They can't see or hear me. Yet I talk to them, sometimes unconsciously, sometimes consciously because resistance goes away from my mind. Sometimes on the roads, the unkept promises, the dedicated songs and the words of poems scatter along. They interrupt my tired j...

Dear Professor McGonagall, It is always wondrous for me to see how you have cared for someone who was never very expressive about his  feelings, understood when he needed something or when  he was just upset without letting others know, so much that I always go back to the chapters of the books or the scenes from the movies to feel how good it would have been if I had a mother like you've been to Harry. The journey of Harry Potter for me came late but was the best. And one of my favourite reasons to come back to the stories is because the way you were always being patient with Harry. From being protective about him when he was being brought by Hagrid to the Dursleys, offering him a ginger newt biscuit when he was sent off by Umbridge and was in an extremely bad mood, to standing by his side for his dream to be an auror in the Ministry of Magic even if it was the last thing you'd do in your life and supporting him when he went against Snape to fight the Dark Lord. Professo...

I have made a small tree house, so small that nobody would fit there except both of us. It does not have a balcony like you have dreamt or a water pool near it. It will have us. It will have sleeping me on your lap. I will sleep for hours, no complaints okay? And then, I'll make a cup of tea for you which I have recently learnt and I'll talk about the dreams I see, the people who are important to me, if I have a boyfriend, and about all my illegal demands and complaints against the world. When you pass through Earth to the the nearest planet, wait for me. Awake me up if I'm asleep. I will take you, take you there, where I will not have to share you, share you with anyone. You will only be my mother and nobody to the rest of the world. You will awake me while you pass through earth, will you not? Happy mother's day :')