'WE ARE FORCED TO BEAR WITNESS'

Before I start writing on my feelings about the shocking incident that took place in Mumbai, I must salute our brave Indian Army. I did not feel like writing about it earlier. But now I feel that if I do not express my feelings about it, I will be turning away from reality.

We all know that life is uncertain and anytime anyhow we will have to leave the world, but the trauma of going through living hell is inexplicably excruciating. As I was reading the interviews of survivors of this holocaust, I was completely shaken. I did not know how to react. The traumatic experience has left an indelible impact on their lives and the nightmarish memories would continue to haunt them in the years to come making them breathe in a life-in-death.


My fears can best be expressed in T.S.Eliot’s words:

“There has been minor injustice,
Yet we have gone on living,
Living and partly living.
Sometimes the corn has failed us,
Sometimes the harvest is good,
One year is a year of rain,
Another a year of dryness,
One year the apples are abundant,
Another year the plums are lacking.
Yet we have gone on living,
Living and partly living.
We have kept the feasts, heard the masses,
We have brewed beer and cyder,
Gathered wood against the winter,
Talked at the corner of the fire,
Talked at the corners of streets,
Talked not always in whispers,
Living and partly living.
We have seen births, deaths and marriages,
We have had various scandals,
We have been afflicted with taxes,
We have had laughter and gossip,
…………………………………..
…………………………………..
We have all had our private terrors,
Our particular shadows, our secret fears.
But now a great fear is upon us, a fear not of one but of many,
…………………………………..
…………..We
Are afraid in a fear which we cannot know, which we cannot face, which none understands,
And our hearts are torn from us, our brains unskinned like the layers of an onion, our selves are lost
In a final fear which none understands ……..”

THE MASK, a poem

The mask I wore yesterday is lost.
This is another day, but with the same misgivings-
I need another mask to hide my disfigured face,
Distorted and wrinkled with the scars of life.


The need arises, the desire demands:
The mask is an absolute necessity.
But…but it can’t be found anywhere:
The search continues, yet it meets with failure-


The realization comes with a shudder-
The mask has adhered to the skin!
It has stuck, it’s not coming off!
It is blending with the pale old skin….


Help! My soul cries out-
I scratch and tear at my face-
The scars deepen and deepen slowly and slowly
Till…….. till the distortion settles for eternity.

THE SEARCH, a story

It is a sultry afternoon. The rays of the setting sun have lost their intensity, but somehow the heat seems to oppress the inhabitants of Kolkata. Pia is looking at the sky, above the tall buildings. It is changing colour – white , red, pink, white, red, pink, grey and blue and black and…………………….. Her eyes are burning, due to fever or due to feverish anger, she is not sure why. Waves of anger pass through every vein of her body. She wants to revolt, her every organ wants to revolt, to break free from every constraint, but something prevents her from doing so…


This is but one of the many phases of depression she is experiencing these days. The heat-oppressed brain of hers does not understand why this happens. “Am I going mad?” Pia asks herself. No, it can’t be. What is it that she doesn’t have? A successful career, good salary, a host of friends……then why? Why is Pia upset? She tells herself, “I must go on and on and on and………”


Lost in the wilderness of thoughts , Pia finds her very self revolting. I want love, she cries and her cries sound hollow as they turn and twist in the recesses of her heart and fade in the arteries and veins. They remain unuttered and unsaid.


The phone rings. It is Neil. The voice on the other side had once acted as a soothing balm, caressing and healing every wound of hers. But now he has called to say ‘Bye’. A single word, yet it strikes her heart like a steel knife-this invisible steel plunges deep into her heart , twists and turns till drop by drop tears come out of it.

Six months ago Pia and Neil got to know each other while chatting on the net. In a month Pia’s life was different. Neil’s careful attention and passing praises made Pia fly to the seventh heaven. Floods of sms-es, phone calls and e-mails made her days and nights. Then one day…………. Thud! She fell from her heaven. Neil told her he was getting married to somebody, his parents had chosen for him. “We’re good friends, Pia, isn’t that enough?”


Damn Neil. Pia has forgotten. Okay, she loved or tried to love and lost. But she cannot accept this defeat. Defeat tortures her, terrifies her; she wants to be victorious. Did she ever love Neil? She wanted Neil to add a new meaning to her tedious life. But did she love Neil? Neil, the man? .......... She does not remember, she does not care. She created Neil in her imagination- he had taken shape, become misshapen, ugly and then faded just as the star…… The star, which Pia loved and talked to, has disappeared from the night sky. Pia doesn’t find it these days. Where is it? Where is it now?


Pia, don’t worry about it, don’t go to the edge of the roof to see the star. You want love, isn’t it? I love you, I carefully nurse you in my bosom, I feel for you. You are my creation, Pia. I am with you. Wait a bit, we’ll find a way towards salvation, I swear. I still have some ink left in my pen. Wait, Pia, WAIT………………



‘Life’ and ‘love’- both are words having four letters. Both start with ‘L’ and end with ‘E’. Any significance? What say linguistic scholars? Pia Mitra is found lying in a pool of blood on the street in the morning. She has fallen from the roof of her house. People are saying she has committed suicide.





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WORDS,a poem

Carefully I chose the words,
Words, only words; nothing, but almost everything.
Yesterday they had significance-
Now? They are just words and words and words................
Do I speak? Do I ever reveal my thoughts?
Words fail me; and...and I can't!
Because words have lost their wings........
They have lost their meanings..........
They are simply empty words comprising empty letters....
They strive to mean everything, yet dissolve into thin air-
Dissolve into nothing...... leaving a void between you and me!

THE DISTANT ECHO,a poem

The distant echo resounded through the recesses of the mind
And left me wondering What Am I? Why Am I?
The importance of I diminishes and You appear as a mammoth shape
Am I to find the strange import of the vision and the sound?
Or is it as distant as you are……………………?
Over the distance, over the time, I will rise to find-
To find? Or, just to seek You, or I , or a blend of the two….
Does it matter what the echo suggests?
When the meaning is lost before it reaches the mind
Only to find another new shape as distant as You are.

LIFE, a poem

The Past hovers over the Present
And makes you aware of some unpleasant gnomes
Existing in your self……………you can’t do away with them.
They sleep in your mind, feed in your memories,
And drink in your soul-
Till you have no means to protect yourself,
Or protest…….
Feeling vanquished you feel completely choked…….



Then suddenly you see the LIGHT
Your thoughts soar higher,
You catch a glimpse of hope……
And Life begins ……….. once again……..!!