Skip to main content

Grow a heart

For the last few years, the only question that has visited me day and night with an intensity no candela can measure is how to be a writer.

The answer eludes me even now. I know it is not in the books. I know it is not in the writing programs; neither in workshops, discussions, interviews, or biographies.

You see, it is a personal thing. When you decide to be a writer, it is not a choice at all. As they say, choice is a luxury. We don’t have that luxury when it comes to two things – writing and love. They both are absolute.

Do not mistake this for the love for writing, though. The love for writing is another luxury. I don’t think I, or anyone who has to be a writer, can own this, either. Writing cannot be an emotion for someone who seeks to be a writer. It has to be their whole existence.

And how?

A writer is that crack in the old floorboard. For someone else it is just a slight wreck, but to him it is an abyss and the abyss is him. It hides a story, a fragment of time when things were in their infancy. It wasn’t this shallow then. It wasn’t so dark then. And it certainly didn’t creak.

A writer is that stubborn tree, which is yet to give up on its roots. He is the yellowing leaf looking out to embrace the ageing of its fate. He is the wandering clouds abounding with the weight of hope, struggling to reach the right place before it detonates.

A writer is the hunger pangs arising in the stomach of the famished. He is the shriveled skin burnt under too much sunshine. He is the teardrops about to be lost without being seen. He is the muffled voices that died before the light broke in.

He is those small, heavy steps of an old woman who everyday carries a tokra full of vegetables on her head to sell it in the local market so that she can survive in a world that has outdated her.

And hope? Promises? Laughter? Happiness?

What about things he cannot accommodate himself to? What about sorrows that overwhelm his wits and melancholy that erodes his mind?

Does the writer have anything to do with all these?

Perhaps not.

Because when a writer sees these, he becomes a poet.

He grows a heart, builds a song.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

I will remember

This day metro isn’t so crowded and I get a seat toward the end of the coach. Two stoppages later a family boards the train. They have a couple of luggage bags. I vacate the seat for them. The woman reluctantly contemplates taking the seat as I insist. Men around focus on the opportunity if she refuses. She sits. The three children, who all seem 3-6 years old, slowly sit over the berth constructed of the bags. All these three sit with their backs to each other, all facing opposite directions. The man stands near the steel bar about a foot from the children, observing them. I take another look at the family - the man’s shirt is torn from places. Sensing my own unease, I hastily look at his feet. The shoes are okay, not worn out. I strangely feel as if this discovery is a consolation to my own blessings. I shift my sight. The kids are well-dressed in the clothes the parents could afford them, the woman seems to be wearing a new saree . I feel relieved that I have overcome the bout of s...
Post a Comment
Read more

Jonathan Livingston Seagull is the world's edge

I remember when I picked Jonathan Livingston Seagull for the first time. It was long ago. A thin, square-sized book that it was, with every sentence Richard Bach had me to the skin. It was as if the time had frozen. Although I was too young, I could gather what I had bumped into. It wasn’t a book. It was the edge of the world. Upfront was the dark abyss of all your fears and apprehensions about the life. And somewhere far far ahead a faint light seemed to break in. Right then that day, I dashed into that tiny dot of light, not caring if my way ploughed through the deep void. You see, there is no abyss ever. It is you at either side. Validating the abyss is denying your connection to what is beyond you. Don’t be afraid when they tell you that the abyss stares back at you. It does not know the way to trespass on its own. Right across it stand specks of hopes, dreams, joys pulsating through the spectrum of your being. Transgress a little and you’d see that all the ashes burdenin...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Nuance of a Story

Sometimes, late awake, staring out of the window, sitting at the study table, in a relatively quiet universe I think about the different times. Curls of wisps of smoke slowly float ahead and then up and finally vanish into some other form. The cigarette runs out. I light another. I wish to write, but my muse is silent. I know there are a million stories out there. I know a hundred stay with me. The difficulty is to tell those exactly as they deserve to be told. Most often we all fail to. Stories exist because hope exists. We look back in time to bring to our present a perspective. Without it, it is impossible to see why we would want to laugh amid the all-pervasive banality or go crazy with passion about quite simple things and deem them beautiful. Stories deconstruct the absurd and demystify the conscience. Some stories are like a flickering flame, about to die any moment, waiting to be acknowledged, wanting to be received by those who know what it is like to be born a story. ...
Post a Comment
Read more