Amazing.. flowers that are borne directly on a tree trunk..
What tree is this, do you know?

A roomful of graceful women dressed in finery and gold, singing the chorus to age-old wedding songs for my nephew, and this one song I know the words to because I used to sing the words to you as a lullaby. Once upon a time.

Yesterday, I saw infinity. And man's conquest thereof.
From the T. Land's end, the sea is a glittering, dancing carpet, tripping over the horizon.
And the concrete and steel sealink, as it swooshes into the distance-a conqueror, valiant.

"Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour."

More of putting my head down and getting on with it.
So write that letter. Pay all your bills.
Keep your will updated, and cross that T.

Last week was busy season at work.
And then the horrible news on the crash.
Managed to shut myself from the rabble rousers on tv, limited n’paper reading to a quick headline scan.
Until I visited my old landlady last night and saw the grieving crowds and media vans—the co-pilot was a neighbor, apparently.
Hits hard.

And in the unending celestial balance, the solidly good- a friend held a puja for her new home, a lovely apartment up high, flooded with light and air, every square foot and plastered wall paid with the sweat off her brow…some dreams come true, and some dreams tell you to walk tall.
antariksh shantihi... vayu devo shantihi..pruthvihi shantihi..
be calm the universe... calm the air gods... calm the earth
to the witness of the Lord Ganesha and Goddess of wealth Lakshmiji,
the witness of the nine grahas- the nine planets, the mother goddesses, and Lord Visnu in his many forms, her house was sanctified.


I take a deep breath. And try remember sunlight.

So when the stars turn, when saturn crosses the celestial path or so they say, if nothing
you learn a life lesson. Something important that you would not have learned otherwise.
A pause moment. Where you step away from yourself and see.
Resulting in a change in behavior that prevents you from a larger debacle, blunder, mistake.
How true.
And I don't even have a problem.
In a thoughtful mood rather than an upbeat one.

I’ve been grinning all morning.
All you need is one chance, right?
One break.
One person earning and then the family can latch on and then the momentum takes them to another place.

http://www.livemint.com/articles/2010/05/13203709/Umeed-soft-skills-for-the-urb.html

Umeed, a short non-free program that retrains people from the slums for jobs in malls, shops, the new economy. Seriously smart.

Is this a baobab? Not?
For the past several months now I’ve admired this tree, watched the sheen on its almost-silver bark, envied its insistence on standing tall, leafless or not, been respectful of the sap that surges and ebbs in its upright wooden frame, branches held out, bare, stubby twig-like and none the worse for it; even as the many trees around put on their finest greens for spring, then pirouetted and clad for summer.
Drumroll- Leaves! Tender leaves, unfolding. See? Just a day old.
Difficult to say who’s happier, the tree or I.

"Suhana safar aur ye mausam haseen.."
Madhumati. circa 1958.
What is it about the lines that resonate?
Specially the chorus, that sort of echoes?
Or "sa sa ni ni reni pa ni, ma ma ni ma ni pa pa ni" from the Dil Se title track.
Haunting.
I sing this when I'm walking back home.

Prayers for my ill friend, pls.

I drink in this golden profusion every morning.

Earlier this week, someone sent me a slim volume of essays.
Without any message or covering letter.
Like the message that comes from unknown directions?
I can only guess this is for a bhasha anuvaad.
No, the essays are not long- a page, two pages.
But a different kind of writing. Poetic.In taking to English, I’d have to chop. Mercilessly.
At the risk otherwise, of looking horrendously overwritten.
Maybe emotions are different in different tongues? In some language a sigh, in some a drum beat?
Will the cutting not be equal to rewriting?
How correct is that? Fair?
No, I’ve not replied as yet.
Dwidha.

Stunned.
http://karaditales.com/contest.aspx

Thank you for opening up a whole new world.

Do the things external which fall upon thee distract thee? Give thyself
time to learn something new and good, and cease to be whirled around.
But then thou must also avoid being carried about the other way. For
those too are triflers who have wearied themselves in life by their
activity, and yet have no object to which to direct every movement,
and, in a word, all their thoughts.
-Book 2, Meditations, Marcus Aurelius.


Marcus Aurelius. As in Emperor, yes?
What brilliance. Sigh.
If only it were easy to determine what is a trifle, and what indeed, an object worthy of attention.

I resolve to limit my twitter time.
No more trivia or breaking news.

The gulmohar are in bloom. Riotous reds.

Frisky. That’s what I called the affectionately mad pup at the end of the road, not that you could call him a stray, for he adopted the road, the chaiwallah and all who walked on the road. Every morning, beady eyed and tail a-wag, he would rush to greet Baba, rush and try to get close, Baba would step back arms akimbo, and I would scold the pup away in the simplest Gujarati. (Dogs like Baba, but he doesn’t like them.) Frisky went the way of all strays last week, maybe he is as curious, and energetic, and joyous, those bright eyes gamboling, hunting, sniffing and playing in some dog heaven. But even the birds were silent that morning.

Perhaps this is in the rightness of things. That unanswered call, that for-always lost part of my history, the over-late news and grieving over the death of the only person, my long lost Aunt, who could possibly have filled in the blanks in my lineage. Did Ma have a temper? Did she swear? Sweet all the time? Now I shall never know. So be it.

Work, and most of life is like a conveyor belt right now. Next, please.
I withdraw to the silence.