The Gypsy and The Caged Bird

It was a beautiful bird, and so was the song. It was a beautiful day, and so the bird had sung.

The wanderer came to her side, enthralled by the zest of her voice, lost in the music of her making. He stretched his hand to touch the lovely bird- alas, he couldn’t. A cage of glass kept him from the warmth of touch, the truest of all our senses. The cage was of crystal glass. The cage was beautiful. A cage, it still was.

And now our bird looks his way, and notices the man the cage has kept at bay. A wandering gypsy, she thought, surely a man not to trust. Long locks of hair, bearded jaw and a light so deep in his eyes. Still she likes him, and so she sings once again, in a voice of silk, laced with raisins of laughter, as sweet as honey and milk.

He asks her,” What a song cometh from thy lips, how it changes my little world!” She laughs in pleasure, with a silent guilt. He asks again,” Would thee come, in my hands? Together we shall fly in fairy winds, and see oceans blue, winter lands afar, sing to the sweet delight of many a misty mountain night, wander through grass so green, drink blessed water from a sparkling stream.”

The light in his eyes so shone, that her heart skipped many a beat and tone. Yet she spoke, in pleading notes, more for herself than for him- “ I am bound to this cage of glass, and its master too, and I must be loyal to his love.  Thou are full of life and brightest hope, with many a word silky smooth. Yet Stranger, I cannot break this cage of glass, nor can I break my master’s heart.”

The wanderer sighed, then smiled. With a last look at the lovely bird, he turned around. Only then did the lovely bird see the wings of mighty white. He flapped them once and off he flew, the angel , or the wanderer as we knew..

Of love and loss

All those who wander are not lost.

All that you love will be carried away.

All those who wander, for lost love, will be carried away, in time.

All those who love, all those who lost, will be carried away, in time.

All those who loved, all those who lost, and not,

All those who fought, all those who dreamt, and not,

Will be carried away, in time, by time.

-Special thanks to J.R.R Tolkien, Alfie Zimmer, and Gopikrishnan Nair

Epiphany

We are tall walkers, proud of ourselves and our skills, our achievements and our triumphs. And yet, there comes a time in our lives when we realize that all this eventually meant as much to us as a broken web meant to a spider. Turn around, and what do you see? No, not the skyscrapers you built, not the sculptures that you made. Just a smouldering, burning wreckage of what might have been, had you chosen differently. In hindsight, life is a perfect journey that went wrong at so many crossroads. Many a right turn you have ignored. Many a wiseman's word you have pretended not to hear. The legacy that we left unseized, the treasures that could have been so rightfully ours, lost .Plundered by that unseen yet seemingly invincible adversary, which some call fate. Hindsight is of course, a mirage. Instead of the oasis you see much ahead of you in the desert, this one is far behind you. You think that there had been a lovely green patch, with a cool flowing stream waiting for you and you had ignored it. It is but a mirage for the misfortunes that have besieged your soul know not the fights that you have lost.

The world laughs at the plight of a lost man, for a lost man is filled with doubt. These carrion eaters laugh at the carcass of your dreams, feed through the maggots that infest the rotten meat of your failures. Burn them away, drive them aside. He who laughs at your state now shall laugh tomorrow, but to merely please you. You should know that more than anyone else. You long to tie these creatures with barbed wire-chains onto an electric chair, beat their bloated, stinking, fat guts out, and at the end throw that damned switch on. Burn in hell. My version of hell. Hell is not on a distant planet. Its right here, right next to us, right within us. In a corner of the mind, when someone throws a seed of doubt. The seed that grows in to that wicked plant that strangles and chokes the breath out of your self-belief.

It is then that we need to find ourselves. Look deep into the reservoirs of strength, and hold out. Park the bus, so as to use a certain figure of speech. Stand your ground. Take out the broadsword of your resilience, and plunge it hard into the flesh of the adversary. Never mind the splashes of red that will be tattooed against your soul. For some treasures cometh at a price. Such as inner peace.

Nemesis

The following lines are a tribute to one of the masters of English literature,William Blake, a legendary visual artist unrecognized in his time.Through "Nemesis", I seek to explore the depths of fears of the metaphoric protagonist from his most famous work, "The Tyger".



Tyger, tyger burning bright
In the forests of the night,
Which creature puts true fright
In thine heart of rock granite?

Is this form a forest beast?
A ghost or a poltergeist?
Doth it boast of a wicked claw
To rip away a flesh so raw?

Doth he own a heart of stone?
Mercy, hath he ever shown?
Doth he pleasure to bring thee strife?
Would it dare to take thy life?
What the fuel?What the fire?
What the reason for his ire?

Are its muscles forged in steel?
Doth he even fear or feel
The lightning from the skies above
Or the mighty final foe?

Tyger, tyger burning bright
In the forests of the night,
Which creature puts true fright
In thine heart of rock granite?