Couple Goals

We have celebrated our days of togetherness as if each day was a special occasion, gone on adventures in the city, explored new nooks and corners in the city or even watched movies back to back on weekends. We have also captured our moments of delight on the lens enjoying the simple delights that life offers on the way.

You and I have woven many dreams of travelling in our days of togetherness and in some of these we have woke up in each other's arms every morning watching the streaks of dawn spread across the sky. We have watched the stars come out and gone to sleep snuggling each other.

You have come to my place of birth, to this house near the River Green and watched the snake-boats glide in the waters during Onam. I have dreamt of this mighty river at times when I have been away for long especially during the summer months and when one thinks of home.

May be we will find love once again and we will beam our childhood smile once again . May be we will dab our lives with the colours splashed from our memories. Once again, we will celebrate holi with spontaneity and with mischief like from a long-forgotten childhood.

Though times have changed, I still want to go on our little adventures with you and watch sunsets and sunrises or chat with each watching the night sky. I remember our good old days and think how your presence was a source of comfort though now the days are gone by and the magic lost from this life. Yet, you long for the same delight that you felt when you recognized a kindred wanderer in him.

I find that this heart might sing a song of delight and rejoice beyond words if you come back as my soul companion. At times, you search every face that you know for a semblance of this same dream, then feels depressed when you find it is nothing but a mirage and ends every such thought with heavy feet and grim thoughts.

You choose the same kindred spirit from the many that you know for its companion, for it has known its many ups and downs, the secrets that you will never say aloud and small talk that never used to run out about everything under the sun. You dream of the same face in every dream and though surprised by your heart's desire to be with your soulmate, you wait for life to resolve your worries turning a deaf ear to the noises around you the whole time.

Home

Home is where your heart goes back time and again, where you want to spend your quality time enjoying the activities that you like. Home is the elated feeling that you experience when you reach the city that you grew up after being away from it. You love glimpses of your city in films or snaps an even recognize locations just by looking closely at the public spaces.

Home is the city that you travel through every day and still feel that there is more to explore, places you have never been to and places which you know like the palm of your hand. It’s always with a sense of curiosity and streak of curiosity that you love to explore its nooks and corners along with your soul friend and you just love the comfort of your favourite hangouts such as the museum campus or the beaches or the coffeehouses.

Home is your sacred space, the altar that you have created for everything that you hold close to your heart. Home is a place where I am comfortable, candid and naughty, real and authentic. Home is not four walls but the familiar comfortable space that you curl up with a well-thumbed book and a cup of coffee.

Home is you. You are my home, the safe space that you return to every time for solace far from the strife of this world. You are my home, a place of comfort that I want to wake up in and go to sleep in and cherish every time your thought crosses my mind. Home is your memory that I carry safe in my heart, safe and sacred like a talisman throughout the years and where I wander every time this world becomes too much to bear.

Memories

Earlier, life was celebrated fully and these cherished moments were captured on the lens. Most of the time, you loved to stand and stare and wander and find joy in the things around you. For you could watch with delight whatever was offered on the wayside and in your wanderings you came across many sights that always caught your eye. 

Every occasion was marked by countless snaps took on the camera and sometimes even our days of togetherness were treasured memories in small pixels. But with the passage of time, on growing older and wiser and lazier, you have changed a lot and you no longer believe in the power of the lens to capture memorable moments. Now, you want to sit still and enjoy the moment, be mindful and present, taking in the whole experience in its entirety. 

The sights that you see around are captured on your mind’s eye as you savour and record each and every sensory detail- the miracle of your child's first cry, the morning sights on the city roads, the sunsets by the beach and the soothing sight of the waves crashing against the shore, the rhythmic way your wayside shopkeeper makes your favourite pani puri and the countless moments that are too good to be caught on the lens. 

I find that there are moments more cherished than all these, like our days of togetherness though not caught on any lens any day. What you and I try to do is to find the magic of togetherness in the everyday life and beauty in the mundane around us. 

You need to wait so that you and I can set forth on our wanderings and find delight in the solace that nature offers. I wish for more days when we can sit idle near the seashore listening to the soothing music of waves thrashing against the shore or wander in the city basking in the morning light. 

Anyway, I would say you are my favourite movie rerun in my mind's eye, with the smallest details and more precious than any captured moments and I would trade everything just to capture your smile on the lens, with you watching the beauty around you.

Memories

When I was in my twenties, I had this habit of capturing moments on the lens and almost very occasion was marked by the countless snaps took on the camera. But with the passing of years, on growing older, you have changed your nature and you no longer believe in taking snaps to treasure memorable moments. 

Most of the time you want to sit idle and be there in the moment, taking in the experience as a whole with your whole self. Then, you come back to your experience and rerun it in your mind's eye savouring each and every detail- the miracle of your child's first cry, the morning sights on the city roads, the sunsets by the beach and the soothing sight of the waves crashing against the shore, the rhythmic way your wayside shopkeeper makes your favourite pani puri and the countless moments that are too good to be caught on the lens. 

I find that there are moments more cherished than all these, like our days of togetherness though not caught on any lens any day. Anyway, I would say you are my favourite movie rerun in my mind's eye, with the smallest details and more precious than any moment ever caught on the lens. 

My Dream World

I belong to only to you, my dream world- not to the place that I have left as a child, or to my native place, to my father's place which I have left as a child. I do not feel that I belong to my father's family as he is dead and gone long back and what I have left of him are a few scattered bones in a graveyard and some books and diaries that he left behind.

I do not belong to the place I grew up as a child beside the River Green, where it was always fun playing in the river yet I never belonged to my mother's family for there were rightful inheritors who belonged more rightful than me. I do not belong to my extended family for I have blindly followed their traditions and values without questioning them and created a tradition of handing over the acquired culture.

I belong only to you, my dream world and my twin flame, who knows my ups and downs, my feminine spirit and tenderness, my occasional clownishness in trying to belong to some name, some family, some tribe,where I do not belong. Yet in the realm of unreality, it is you who define me, in the sacred space of our togetherness,in the melting down of the barriers between you and me, and the all engulfing tenderness that follows, that is the space where I see myself, as yours having a name that you call me when no one is around and being yours other beloging to any place, tribe or family.

Rain Chants

The sacred space by the temple was created on a platform of red bricks and nearby a saffron-clad priest chanted the ancient chants for rain in high tones. The land was dried up and deviod of any trace of life and the people draped in earth-coloured cottons chanted with the sun scorching their wheat-coloured skins.

The chants reverbrated in the blazing summers and were offered to the gods of the sky and the wind and the people remembered all the occasions when the land was blessed with rain following the rituals. The children from the village played by the dried up temple pond, thinking of the days where they splashed in the cool water, sat idly in the cool recesses of the rocks, or chattering with the juice of ripe mangoes oozing on their hands and faces.

The ancient chanting went on incessantly, in a land of purity, where none could wash or bathe except in the muddy pond waters and the summer  blazed along with the hot afternoons, when none could sleep, for the heat numbed and scorched the earth.

The ancient chants went on praising the rains: oh you rain; much awaited, the boon of heavens,
that brings joy to the earth, wealth to its people,oh you rain, come with thunder and lightning,
and soak our brown skins with delight. Oh rain, the fulfillment of forecasts and incessant prayers,
I invoke you in the names of the barren earth, the dried up rivers and lakes, the animals and birds,the silent trees and the people on earth.

The rains were awaited after the prayers to end the blazing afternoons of summer heat with the first drops of summer rain and you set the warm smell of earth rising and you bedeck trees with jewels like brides, from furnace hot afternoons to nights of restless pace. It is for the rains, incense is burnt and prayers chanted and it is for you, the comforter on hot summer days. The land and the people waited for the comfort offered by the summer rains.

However, on the third day of endless repentance and prayers, grey and white dappled clouds rose to silhouette the sky, with hints of a sudden outburst. With the advent of the rain clouds, the entire city rejoiced as the wait was over.  The days of drought are finally over and the soft rain slushed over the crowd with bolts of thunder and lightning. The people received in open hands stretched to skies what the heavens granted as comfort from the scorching heat of Indian summer.

The rain fell over the blazing holy fire, with the land and the people soaked in the rain and the beaming children screamed at delight when the droplets of rain drenched their bodies. Finally, the prayers of the people were answered and the land was blessed with rain.

 

Desires

When we began our days together, I remember how you mentioned your wants, desires and needs as a man and what couple goals you dreamt of when you thought of us. I think our days were spent in the small details that you imagined for our life together. 

 

I think you chose assurance and I chose unconditional love for what we needed from each other. You wanted understanding for your words and thoughts while I needed a lot of shaking laughter for my clownishness. You wanted a realignment in thinking while I wanted healing for my past wounds. 

 

I know that we come from two different worlds of understanding and at times, you need to understand what the other feels like. You know that there are days when the past wounds hurt too much and I want this bond to stay strife from memories that haunt. 

 

And, I want us to drink love wild from our togetherness yet grow old as individuals learning from perfect love. You want this love to have a future while I want it to become a sacred space of refuge for us. Let the past try to haunt us with pain and strife but we have each other and our moments of perfect bliss.

Grand Rising

I have always carried you in my heart, safe from the prying eyes of the world and even after all these years, I find it surprising that you still remember me in the words you write. When I read your words, a springtime of happy memories flash before my eyes and feel transported to a different time when the heart was lighter and the steps sprightly. 

 

In your words, I read your need to store each and every fond word, every strange fantasy and strangest turn of phrase that I may have said. In them, I see myself attain a beauty that I never knew was mine, a strength that I have recognized only in the latter years. 

 

Sometimes, I wonder whether you will be truly happy cherishing a fond memory which is gone from this world. When I leave this world, I may close my eyes and be gone from this world in an instant. You might wait for me to respond to your voice then find out that the breath had left this mortal body. You might try to call out loud and retrieve my soul from the other world. 

 

In the days that follow, I will have a grand rising in another world. I will appear as the tiny sprout of grass on the ground you tread, or as waves that rise to meet your feet, or the air that blows around you or the raindrops that caress you with tender love. Everyday, I will be sending you letters in sky writing, as clouds that bring you rain and nourishment. And, I will be waiting for you to greet me, good morning!

A December full moon

It's a lovely night in cold December during the Christmas week, your favourite week from childhood. The cold fingers of the moon seeps through the tree branches and the night looks so perfect, so beautiful and no less can capture the lightness that you feel when you look at the night skies. 

You treasure this moment in your memory as a perfect mindful occasion when you look at something outside yourself and you forget your daily bundle of worries for an instant. You forget the world, the reality that offers you reasons not to follow your heart and to listen to your reason. Everything looks perfect this night, including you and I, enjoying the moment forgetting all worries. 

And, you go revisit this beautiful full moon night for this beauty that nature offers, perfect sights

that never fail to astonish- the turquoise blue of the ocean, the fiery skies during sunsets, the soothing cascades of waterfalls, the perfect symmetry of things that you see around. 

And, you rest under this December full moon, singing the songs of the supermoon forgetting all worries as you bask in the light of the cold full moon, celebrating togetherness and learning that love is much beyond sweet words or intimacy. This lesson lasts beyond time and you treasure the wisdom learnt from this beautiful moments for days to come. 

Female Icarus

Your soul was like a huge flame blazing and burning bright often leaping to the skies in its attempts to stand for what you really wanted and fighting for your dreams till the end. Then, your soul got weary as you experienced various ups and downs and in your struggle with life, you lost your joy of living and your soul experienced the angst of living. 

 

When you look back at the ages that have gone by, you remember that you are like Icarus at heart and like him, you burn down your many mazes in your dash for freedom.

 

There were times when this soul was too silent, too shut out and too withdrawn, incapable of finding meaning in life. Yet with time, you learnt how to read mazes and fly out of them and this dash for freedom looked so easy and so original.

 

This soul still yearns for those yesterdays, when like Icarus you had headed out of the maze you are in and learnt to conquer the difficult situations in life- with courage and not caution. And, you were like Icarus, full of ingenuity and courage though it look a while to heal your hurt wings and dash into the wild skies.

The Wanderers

You were a wanderer who left behind your hometown to start a new life, to prove yourself in the eyes of your near and dear ones. I was a dreamer who could listen with wonder to your ramblings and walk with you everywhere, one who could go places without leaving my favourite armchair.  

In the many years of absence from each other, you and I travelled together across many exotic lands. From these wanderings, we have gathered so much of wisdom and have arrived at a place of mutual understanding. I stand alone in crowds yet walk with you in green fields at the same time. I run in many new paths sitting at my armchair though I never leave my  world but for fresh signs or old paths. 

You are my other self, whom I do not know for I have never seen you as you really are, for I was struck blind by your light. Yet I know you were with me in each and every circle round the holy fire and will find you near me in every dream.  

You are my favourite daydream that I return to time and again just to hold your hand in an unreal realm where rules don't matter and hearts speak only the truth. In another world, in a different circle of life, you and I will win our eternal game of love.  

In the long years you have been away, I have glimpsed you in many forms but not in real but I still remember your strong belief in sticking to your dreams and nothing else. For me, who have lately started following your footsteps, the world looks new and vistas inviting.  

May be this is not a dream at all but a piece taken out of tattered lives like yours and mine, but when these words come to fruition, it is more achingly perfect than anything else heard, felt or seen. And, together we travel across the blue waters resting in an understanding that goes beyond words with a love that recompenses the eons lost and gone. 

Dreams

When we were standing together, I remembered the word vulnerable mostly. I think it describes the funny feeling that you have been through this before and you feel very sensitive about the whole experience. Though you feel like you are on cloud nine when in love, your past trauma resurfaces in the smallest slights you feel with your twinflame. 

You feel the angst of being not loved enough, the amount of attention that you received as a child looks insufficient for you to survive. One minute, you feel elated by the wonders of togetherness yet you feel driven by jealousy and unresolved emotional baggage from previous relationships. What if it happens again? You are scared to open up or even to take the risk of opening up before the person you like. 

Yet you weave dreams out of this fantasy of togetherness- to wander the world with you, go places, find beauty in nature and in simple things and live life to the fullest. What I have always wanted is to wake up early and watch the streaks of dawn across the sky and then snuggle you to wakefulness. 

The other dream has been to visit my native place near the River Green and watch the snakeboats glide in the river during Onam. Once in a while, to get soaked in its waters with your clothes on like in a lost childhood near the River. Also, to go a graveyard with my people in it to see the graves that have lost their names in renovation and forgetfulness. 

May be to find love once again in life, the beauty lost with time and the lost art of smiling many times daily like an innocent child does. May be to wear a spot of sindhoor on my forehead like a newly wed woman with pride in her acquired happiness.  

Yet in an unreal world, you are happy that though it has not started or ended, your dream has become a favourite haunt to wander in and in your days of wandering, you have managed to realign your perspective of life. 

Daily

It has always been my dream to wander the world with you- go places, find beauty in nature and in simple things and live life to the fullest. What I have always wanted is to wake up early and watch the streaks of dawn across the sky and then snuggle you to wakefulness. 

The other dream has been to visit my native place near the River Green and watch the snakeboats glide in the river during Onam. Once in a while, to get soaked in its waters with your clothes on like in a lost childhood near the River. Also, to go a graveyard with my people in it to see the graves that have lost their names in renovation and forgetfulness. 

May be to find love once again in life, the beauty lost with time and the lost art of smiling many times daily like an innocent child does. May be to wear a spot of sindhoor on my forehead like a newly wed woman with pride in her acquired happiness.  

Thunderstorm

The tiny yellow leaves that had got stuck in his hair made me feel a strange tenderness for him. At that moment, what I wanted the most was to run my fingers through his hair and to make him feel a strong sense of intimacy between us that might have started to grow in my mind. This feeling of being one with him even when away from him hit me like a thunderstorm, the first time I had gazed into his deep eyes. His eyes possessed that strange power to nudge me from your usual train of thoughts and make me high.

The leaves might have fallen on his head as he waited for me under the trees. Though he said he had not waited much, his eyes showed his longing as if he was eager to see me arrive at the spot. His eyes flickered with a strange delight the moment he heard my footsteps and he looked up. When he looked at me every time, it was like I could hear the roar of the thunderstorm that was brewing between us. I don't think I need much except this roar of the thunderstorm daily to live. 

Strength

You shine radiant and bright with the light of your wisdom, the way you fiercely stand up for what you want in life and by the fire of your words and actions. 

You heal the curse of generations by being different from the rest of your tribe and by your pure life that has become a model for others. 

You are outwardly like the rest yet a quiet strength radiates from your being, drawn from experience and from bearing with equanimity whatever life has been throwing at you. 

You own the heart of a lion and you lead the pack not by words but by being you, so that people are not scared to be themselves around you. 

You are of the house of the Sun and you love to dress in the colors of its radiance like the sunflowers and the marigolds do. You hold the torch of wisdom so that others can see in the darkness. 

#strength 

#lionheart

#josephinewall

A Glass of Lemonade

Just like most of the weary traveler scorched by the summer heat, you dream of cool water bodies to immerse yourself in or of drinking tall glasses of cool lemonade or applying unguents on your hot and tired body. In many of your summer dreams, you recollect your childhood spent playing near the River Green and spend days eating ripe mangoes from the tree in your yard. You long for your childhood companions and think of the times when you could play forever in the cool waters. The summer also brings back your dreams of a loved one and the quiet knowledge of his affection, not uttered aloud everyday but read through the love-light that you read in his eyes.

In the midst of this tedious summer, you find reasons to celebrate- like the first rain that brings smells of the wet earth and a sense of coming alive with nature. You feel the same resurgent life as you step into the River Green and forget time in its waters. Or when you sip a tall glass of tasty lemonade from a wayside shop just to quench your thirst. This sweet and tasty taste of lemonade quenches your thirst but keeps you craving for more, and this becomes linked in your mind with summer heat. Like the love-light in his eyes that you recall every now and then, going back again and again to your loved one and your dreams of being one with him in all senses- mind, body and spirit- you dream of the tasty lemonade that comes back to you every time you think of summer.

And, though this love has lasted several summers not one and has awakened in  you desires too deep for words, your thirst for this glass of elixir and your love of your dreams have stayed the same throughout the many summers. 

 

Good Morning

When you wake up early in the morning feeling quite content with life and you are happy that you have everything that you have always wanted in life, starting with the love of the one you desire. 

You wake up feeling that all your desires are met as his limbs coil around yours early in the morning and when you wake up with your lips locked in his and mumbling good morning in his ears. 

Your heart and soul are at peace and you look serene like a lotus in the pond, exactly where you are supposed to be. There is harmony in your soul because there is a brand new day to look forward to, full of new adventures. 

More than usual, there is a need to do something different ,out of ordinary on a morning like this. Though it's cloudy you decide to go on a walk outside after a long time, all because you feel high about the kind of joy you feel. 

 

The roads are quiet and the city is silent. The signs of life are only few with a few bicycles in the road and people out for walking who like me has decided to celebrate this happy day with a morning walk. 

On a day like this, much is done and much accomplished, when I woke with the sun and with your arms coiled around me. And, you feel excited to look forward to a brand new day full of exciting adventures and the memory of a perfect morning of love.

Ode to the Puttu

In my college days, I was never fond of puttu for breakfast because it took a lot of time to eat when compared to the other breakfast dishes. But my mother always made puttu because my younger brother loved to eat it everyday and she used to call him putturumeese. My favourite at that time was sambar and idli which I could eat for breakfast, lunch and dinner without a single word of complaint. 

I remember how my grandfather used to recall a day from childhood when he had puttu from a wayside shop when he was going to Charalkunnu with his father. When he narrated this story, I was surprised to hear his love of puttu because I have never appreciated the dish. He described in detail how he watched this woman from the wayside shop mix the flour with expertise and how fast she had made the puttu though she was chatting to him. He had eaten it so fast and with relish because he was hungry after his long walk up the hill. 

Later, when I became a wife and expectant mother, I would long for the tastes of home and childhood as I have written in another post Ode to the Uppumanga. One of the cravings that I had when I was pregnant was for chemba puttu apart from a long list of items cooked by my mother and how I had recreated the same magic because my craving was so high. 

Now, there are a variety of puttu to choose from- oats, ragi, corn, wheat, millet- but I think to this day, my favourite is the familiar taste of chemba puttu along with rasakadali pazham. 

Though I belong to a generation who love the pizzas and the French fries and the Greek salad, and are much adapted to their surroundings, eating whatever is available and whatever one craves for. Yet, like the protagonist in Virasat, one longs for the tastes and smells of our childhood and this is a memory that stays with all of us. 

And, on social media, I see videos posted by people who are far from home and they recreate the tastes that they have known in the foreign land like in the videos shared by @appus08 or how food and memory are so interconnected in the narratives posted by Aparna Jeevan @inji_pennu. 

This post was triggered by a recent question by my brother about breakfast: Is it puttu today also? How times have changed!

Grand Rising

I have always carried you in my heart, safe from the prying eyes of the world and even after all these years, I find it surprising that you still remember me in the words you write. When I read your words, a springtime of happy memories flash before my eyes and feel transported to a different time when the heart was lighter and the steps sprightly. 

 

In your words, I read your need to store each and every fond word, every strange fantasy and strangest turn of phrase that I may have said. In them, I see myself attain a beauty that I never knew was mine, a strength that I have recognized only in the latter years. 

 

Sometimes, I wonder whether you will be truly happy cherishing a fond memory which is gone from this world. When I leave this world, I may close my eyes and be gone from this world in an instant. You might wait for me to respond to your voice then find out that the breath had left this mortal body. You might try to call out loud and retrieve my soul from the other world. 

 

In the days that follow, I will have a grand rising in another world. For, I will appear as the tiny sprout of grass on the ground you tread, or as waves that rise to meet your feet, or the air that blows around you or the raindrops that caress you with tender love. 

 

Everyday, I will be sending you letters in sky writing, as clouds that bring you rain and nourishment. And, I will be waiting for you to greet me, good morning.