Friday, February 29, 2008
Saturday, February 16, 2008
A second life…
What if you woke up from sleep and found yourself in a place you don’t recognise? You know everything about the present but have absolutely no clue about the past? You know who you are but have no idea about who you were just a few hours ago?
Would you be bold? Or afraid? Or curious? Or indifferent? Or thrilled? Or distressed?
And then the sun came up and you realised that you were having a dream within a dream? What would be on your mind then???
Would it be the realisation that you were just a wee bit more high than the usual? Or would it be something else?
Friday, February 15, 2008
The rest of our lives
"Hear this song. It’ll change your life” said the unsettlingly beautiful Natalie Portman. I finally managed to, yesterday. You should hear it too. 'New Slang' by The Shins.
For a while, there were just the two of them. He use to swear and she hated that about him. But otherwise they were happy. It seemed natural that they would grow old together. She convinced herself it was just a matter of time.
He never lost control of himself. Even when he was drinking, he’d just grow quieter and quieter. ‘Dance’, she would say, ‘Its only me...’ ‘I can’t’, would be the unvarying reply. She used to say the only time his feet left the ground was when he was climbing trees. He loved to climb. He said the view helped him to see things more clearly.
He must have started to see things a bit too clearly because he developed what they call a mind-set. I guess you could just say he set his mind on certain things and there was no looking back from then on. And like so many people with no particular dream besides the humble desire to remain in the company of the one they choose, the sight of someone else so inspired filled her with a deep emptiness. She began to question whether he needed her at all; when he laughed and said he didn’t think it necessary to answer, this belief hardened. Finally one autumn evening, she left for her parents' house and did not return.
In the months that followed, people would stop by and ask him how he was, but he would just look up slowly, curse the town, and get on with his work. He worked through that winter as if lit by a fire no one else could see. It must have been a very unforgiving fire, for though his manner reflected heat, there was no sign of warmth.
Years went by, and the only word that was used to describe him after a while was ‘constant’. He never was as successful as he thought he would be. But he never stopped working. It was as if he had been sentenced to a lifetime of hard labour, except he wasn’t in jail. Or maybe he was, in a way.
Then something strange happened. One autumn evening, he had a surprise visitor. Time had etched some surface changes, but he could have recognised her by her footsteps, her breathing. She looked so familiar he wondered if it was just his memory playing tricks. He had aged considerably. ‘Old and bony’ was how she described him later.
‘The moment I saw her I realised I was looking in on the good life I might be doomed never to find. I wanted to say so much, but my mind was full and I didn’t know where to start. In desperation, I asked her if she was hungry. She said yes, so I went into the kitchen, but there was no bread. In frustration I shouted ‘God speed all the bakers at dawn, may they all cut their thumbs, and bleed into their buns 'till they melt away.’ When I came out and saw her, there was a strange look in her eyes and I knew I had upset her, just like before. In desperation I started speaking and the words just kept flowing from me...'
She would later tell us what he said, word for word. ‘Am I too dumb to refine? Look at me now… I’m old and my head's to the wall and I'm lonely… All these years I just kept thinkin’, what if you 'a took to me. If you’d 'a took to me like a gull takes to the wind…well, I’d 'a jumped from my tree. I’d 'a danced like the king of the eyesores. And the rest of our lives would 'a fared well, of that I am sure…’
For a while, there were just the two of them. He use to swear and she hated that about him. But otherwise they were happy. It seemed natural that they would grow old together. She convinced herself it was just a matter of time.
He never lost control of himself. Even when he was drinking, he’d just grow quieter and quieter. ‘Dance’, she would say, ‘Its only me...’ ‘I can’t’, would be the unvarying reply. She used to say the only time his feet left the ground was when he was climbing trees. He loved to climb. He said the view helped him to see things more clearly.
He must have started to see things a bit too clearly because he developed what they call a mind-set. I guess you could just say he set his mind on certain things and there was no looking back from then on. And like so many people with no particular dream besides the humble desire to remain in the company of the one they choose, the sight of someone else so inspired filled her with a deep emptiness. She began to question whether he needed her at all; when he laughed and said he didn’t think it necessary to answer, this belief hardened. Finally one autumn evening, she left for her parents' house and did not return.
In the months that followed, people would stop by and ask him how he was, but he would just look up slowly, curse the town, and get on with his work. He worked through that winter as if lit by a fire no one else could see. It must have been a very unforgiving fire, for though his manner reflected heat, there was no sign of warmth.
Years went by, and the only word that was used to describe him after a while was ‘constant’. He never was as successful as he thought he would be. But he never stopped working. It was as if he had been sentenced to a lifetime of hard labour, except he wasn’t in jail. Or maybe he was, in a way.
Then something strange happened. One autumn evening, he had a surprise visitor. Time had etched some surface changes, but he could have recognised her by her footsteps, her breathing. She looked so familiar he wondered if it was just his memory playing tricks. He had aged considerably. ‘Old and bony’ was how she described him later.
‘The moment I saw her I realised I was looking in on the good life I might be doomed never to find. I wanted to say so much, but my mind was full and I didn’t know where to start. In desperation, I asked her if she was hungry. She said yes, so I went into the kitchen, but there was no bread. In frustration I shouted ‘God speed all the bakers at dawn, may they all cut their thumbs, and bleed into their buns 'till they melt away.’ When I came out and saw her, there was a strange look in her eyes and I knew I had upset her, just like before. In desperation I started speaking and the words just kept flowing from me...'
She would later tell us what he said, word for word. ‘Am I too dumb to refine? Look at me now… I’m old and my head's to the wall and I'm lonely… All these years I just kept thinkin’, what if you 'a took to me. If you’d 'a took to me like a gull takes to the wind…well, I’d 'a jumped from my tree. I’d 'a danced like the king of the eyesores. And the rest of our lives would 'a fared well, of that I am sure…’
Thursday, February 14, 2008
Me'nage A Trois ~
R.E.M.
huh…..escapes life with the last breath of silence.
The Elysian garden of the Flowering Peach is plagued by a random gust of Brownian chaos. Asthmatic cough keeps blinking into oblivion of disorder. Eventually, chaos disappears into the Machiavellian foxholes of evil deceit.
Behind the colourful bushes two men murmur in warm gulps of caffeine secrecy. The jackal pauses on its silent paws. Vainly looks at them. And violently dashes into the dimensionless room. Markus, half awake, is peering into the clandestine wilderness that looks out of his windows. A ragged man runs down the rough hillside causelessly holding a white flag in his hand. With a fluttering swiftness he disappears behind the frame of right window leaving behind a shrieking shout of silence. To quickly appear on the left one that generously features the rest of the dirty blue landscape. Eyes of stillness chase him down the hillside till he disappears into vanity. Lemon green vignettes blow away the sepia one with a sudden gust of a chilling breeze. Pastel curtains pitter-patter into huge halls of human hubbubs. And the hubbubs blend into an accordion tone of spendthrift delight. A glint in the jackal’s eyes trigger voiceless conversations. Homer, half naked, is flaunting his genius in front of the silken woman who keep bursting into moans of lustful laughter. In the adjoining room, soft reeds of velvet music buoy in the fragrance of the Lilac enchantress. Each passing whiff open like fresh new buds redolent with the temporal essence of material acquisition. An oaken door is left open with a nonchalant demeanour of passionate love making. And inside it, Nietzsche lies peacefully submerged in the tart waters of lemony liaisons.
Thursday, February 7, 2008
Blue Notebook No. 2
Once there was a redheaded man without eyes and without ears. He had no hair either, so that he was a redhead was just something they said.
He could not speak, for he had no mouth. He had no nose either.
He didn't even have arms or legs. He had no stomach either, and he had no back, and he had no spine, and no intestines of any kind. He didn't have anything at all. So it is hard to understand whom we are really talking about.
So it is probably best not to talk about him any more.
He could not speak, for he had no mouth. He had no nose either.
He didn't even have arms or legs. He had no stomach either, and he had no back, and he had no spine, and no intestines of any kind. He didn't have anything at all. So it is hard to understand whom we are really talking about.
So it is probably best not to talk about him any more.
Born in St. Petersburg in 1905, Daniil Kharms was one of the founders, in 1928, of OBERIU, or Association of Real Art, an avant-garde group of writers and artists who embraced the ideas of the Futurists and believed that art should operate outside the rules of logic. In 1941, he was arrested by the N.K.V.D. for making “defeatist statements”; sentenced to incarceration in the psychiatric ward of a prison hospital, he died of starvation the following year, during the siege of Leningrad. For more of his absurdist stories visit http://www.sevaj.dk/kharms/kharmseng.htm
Tuesday, February 5, 2008
Monday, February 4, 2008
Waiting For Gold
Proving once again that all good things are meant to be stolen, mangled and recycled… including Mr. Becket
Art: Nothing to be done
Copy: Try something new
Art: I'm beginning to come round to that opinion. All my life I've tried to put it from me, saying Art, be reasonable, you haven't yet tried everything. Try something new. And I resumed the struggle.
Copy: Am I reasonable?
Art: I'm glad to see you back. I thought reason had left the building.
Copy: No, I’d just stepped out for a smoke.
Art: Together again at last! We'll have to celebrate this. But how? (She reflects.) Roll me one. I’ve had it with this Great Depression.
Copy: After you finish the layout
Art: May one inquire where His Highness spent the night?
Copy: With the client
Art: The Client? Doing what?
Copy: Getting debriefed.
Art: And they didn't beat you?
Copy:Brief me? Certainly they briefed me.
Art: The same brief as usual?
Copy: The same? I don't know what’s same and what’s different anymore. Everything different has been done so we might as well stick with the sameness to be different.
Art: (smoking up) When I think of it . . . all these years . . . but for me . . . where would you be . . . (Decisively.) You'd be nothing more than a little heap of words nobody bothers to read including the client, no doubt about it.
Copy: And what of it?
Art: It's too much for one person. (Pause. Cheerfully.) On the other hand what's the good of losing heart now, that's what I say. We should have thought of it a million years ago, like in the nineties
Copy: Ah! Stop blathering and do the bloody layout
Art: We were respectable in those days. Now it's too late. They only let us do scam stuff. (Copy tears the layout) What are you doing?
Copy: Tearing up your layout. Did that never happen to you? Layouts must be torn everyday; I'm tired of telling you that. Why don't you listen to me?
Silence for 60 seconds. Art sits in front of a blank screen. Copy stares at it hoping she will start doing the layout
Copy; Well?
Art: Nothing.
Copy: Show me.
Art: There's nothing to show.
Copy: Try and do it again.
Art: There is no change in what is to be said?
Copy: No
Art: Yet I must show something new
Copy: In one word. Yes
Art: What if I don't?
Copy: Don't what?
Art: Don't do the layout
Copy: (laughs) that is not a wise choice
Art:What will you do?
Copy: Nothing to be done.
Art: Nothing to be done
Copy: Try something new
Art: I'm beginning to come round to that opinion. All my life I've tried to put it from me, saying Art, be reasonable, you haven't yet tried everything. Try something new. And I resumed the struggle.
Copy: Am I reasonable?
Art: I'm glad to see you back. I thought reason had left the building.
Copy: No, I’d just stepped out for a smoke.
Art: Together again at last! We'll have to celebrate this. But how? (She reflects.) Roll me one. I’ve had it with this Great Depression.
Copy: After you finish the layout
Art: May one inquire where His Highness spent the night?
Copy: With the client
Art: The Client? Doing what?
Copy: Getting debriefed.
Art: And they didn't beat you?
Copy:Brief me? Certainly they briefed me.
Art: The same brief as usual?
Copy: The same? I don't know what’s same and what’s different anymore. Everything different has been done so we might as well stick with the sameness to be different.
Art: (smoking up) When I think of it . . . all these years . . . but for me . . . where would you be . . . (Decisively.) You'd be nothing more than a little heap of words nobody bothers to read including the client, no doubt about it.
Copy: And what of it?
Art: It's too much for one person. (Pause. Cheerfully.) On the other hand what's the good of losing heart now, that's what I say. We should have thought of it a million years ago, like in the nineties
Copy: Ah! Stop blathering and do the bloody layout
Art: We were respectable in those days. Now it's too late. They only let us do scam stuff. (Copy tears the layout) What are you doing?
Copy: Tearing up your layout. Did that never happen to you? Layouts must be torn everyday; I'm tired of telling you that. Why don't you listen to me?
Silence for 60 seconds. Art sits in front of a blank screen. Copy stares at it hoping she will start doing the layout
Copy; Well?
Art: Nothing.
Copy: Show me.
Art: There's nothing to show.
Copy: Try and do it again.
Art: There is no change in what is to be said?
Copy: No
Art: Yet I must show something new
Copy: In one word. Yes
Art: What if I don't?
Copy: Don't what?
Art: Don't do the layout
Copy: (laughs) that is not a wise choice
Art:What will you do?
Copy: Nothing to be done.
Saturday, February 2, 2008
Today
There once was a spectacled geek in New Delhi
Who put over 19 NFC shawarmas in his belly
And then let out this cosmic fart
That ripped time & space apart
And now the entire bloody universe is smelly
Who put over 19 NFC shawarmas in his belly
And then let out this cosmic fart
That ripped time & space apart
And now the entire bloody universe is smelly
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