Month: July 2016

Who are we….?

Kumar Harsh71 Comments

Quickly browsing through my daily feed of news I came across some articles. Some articles that usually fall down on the ground because they weren’t scandalous or marred with utter disrespect for someone or something. They are the ones who inspite of having the vigour and the stature to ruin you into many thousands of pieces, are ignored, left for vultures to be feasted upon. They free you from the shackles of ignorance, maybe make you cry, maybe make you smile or even better, make you smile and cry the same time. Talented are those who can fill words with hue, emotion, tad bits of laugh they had when they wrote it, give them the respect, the boldness, the italics.
I happened to read such an article. This is what I could introspect through it.
You know the equation of human emotions is so damm simple. Laugh is laugh, tears are tears, pain is pain. The dexterity of human emotions come to play here. It so effortlessly shrouds everything we believe that we know about ourselves.

Take for instance, I never knew I could dance. But I did dance one day and I did it wonderfully. (Atleast according to me).

I never knew what it feels to work when you are sick. Until, my mother was out of town and I had to make breakfast for my brother.

It’s simple yet complex. 
Human emotions don’t teach you things in a simple way. Smile may not be a smile. Tears may not be tears. Pain might be imaginary. 

 

The greatest teacher what I believe for anyone is “LOSS“. Yes, you read it right. Nothing teaches better than a sense of “LOSS”. We cry over lost time, over lost youth, the opportunities that could have been converted into something useful.

Let me bring a dimension of science. Our brain has numerous amount of nerves that together form our nervous system. The brain, a masterpiece that reigns over our body is one complex system of emotions.

Imagine a situation( may God forbid such type of situation), because of some accident, your body is rendered useless, except your mind which can feel and sense everything and everyone. But the loss of body is something very shocking for it. You want to move, hug that person right in front of you, cry out loud, jump, even want to feel pain. But nothing happens.

Life will change when your body starts kicking. Won’t it?
The greatest other teacher to human emotions is visual stimuli.

Have you ever jumped with joy when an unexpected twist in a game happened and everything changed, have you ever despised those heaps of garbage laying around, have you ever cried seeing someone you love, lay still. 

Pictures or photographs come a second close to this stimuli. The first one for very obvious reasons is the human eye. Part of the the five sensory organs- the ear, the nose, skin, eye and the tongue, the human eye is again something very unique. Compared to a camera,  a human eye produces an image of image of resolution of 576 Megapixels. All the organs are yet again connected with our mind.

Albeit every fact, every iota of knowledge we have about the humans as a whole, is still just like a color in the pallette of nature. 

One such color is courage, Valor or bravery.

We tend to compare bravery with muscular strength because that’s what we have seen since our organs have started to function. But bravery is a broad term. A mother working so that her family could sleep without an empty stomach is bravery, a child confronting a bully at school is bravery, thinking against the set lines, the blood that forgets a family for a nation is bravery, raising your voice against wrong, casting your vote not because you know that the wrong may come into power but a greater thought that the country is made by people who dare to chose, that is bravery.

Just like water, that has no shape, no form, no fragrance but a clarity, a purity, an ingeniousness, bravery too is simple but yet complex. 

There is this conception about people who cry out loud. They are weak and vulnerable. What is weak according to you? Is it subsiding under the pressure of something, holding hands when you want to cross a road, giving up, crying out loud when you see something soul shattering, skinny, malnourished, undernourished.

Is weak just about all this or being weak is a state of mind? You sometimes just think a thing cannot be done and you give up not because you couldn’t do it. But it was easier to give up.

 

Except physical boundaries, everything and everyone is strong or weak, depends on what you tell your mind to be. 

Many things awaken our many emotions. A laughing child, a singing beauty, a bleeding wound, a frail old man, a talkative lady, men running for work, sparrows looking for water, dogs barking at other things, a still standing cow, a gush of cold wind, a surprise rain, separation, friends, friendship, intimacy, love, kiss, scolding by your parents, walking on moist sand, standing barefoot over pool of pebbles, a baby fisting your finger, a pat on the back, a fall, a rise, learning something new.

So much we know about humans and yet we know nothing. There is so much buried deep inside us that most of the times we forget that we can be someone we have not seen.

 

The question is as real as the universe, as the very earth you are standing on. And the question we must ask ourselves is.

Who are we?

And believe me, I could find my answer even after searching through my remains, my roots, my success, my failures, my senses and most of all, my emotions.

And oh yes, the process of finding something or the other about me won’t ever stop because we living beings were gifted with something not given to the dead – life.

Life, my friends is one hell of a Roller Coaster ride wherein all your emotions, senses and mind trigger and they trigger with a boom. 

The kumbh mela tag

Kumar Harsh69 Comments

Reblogged on WordPress.com

Source: The kumbh mela tag

Following this Kumbh Mela Tag given by the very colorful Poppins. This is you have to do. 

Continue the chain of poem, rhyming with erry. 

Craziness personified; thoughts of a jobless blogger; endless mind chatter; this tag says it all😀
Be merry
and eat cherry
and drink sherry
meet a deary
vote for Hillary
—–
my turn to continue :
find a berry
was that weary?
say hello to parry
be a fairy
don’t be teary

My turn-

See the ferry,
Going on the single jerry,
Whoosh the canary,
Turn the dairy.


And these people please continue-  Mona,  Morgan,  Radhika, Chitra

तारीखें।।

Kumar Harsh18 Comments

शाम ही कुछ अजीब है बुझी बुझी,
देखता हूँ मैं उसे, 
नज़रें झुकाए वो बैठी है मेरे सामने,
शब्द निकलते हैं नहीं,
शाम भी कुछ अजीब है बुझी बुझी,
नज़रें उठाके ज़रा उन्होंने आज हमें कुछ इस तरह देखा,
नज़रें भी कुछ अजीब हैं,
शब्द निकलते हैं नहीं,
और तारीखें लिख जाते हैं।।।।।

Why do I love long conversations?

Kumar Harsh63 Comments

There is something mysterious about words. The way they find their form from the infinite number of combinations from a limited collection. I am amazed by how every word, every single meaning and the very tone, the pronunciation a word can embed in itself and yet remain humble enough to lie among all its fellow mates. 

There is thing about conversations. They might not be pleasant all the times but still they invigorate you to add something to yourself. For example, consider a conversation between a child and an aged person. They both may not be able to talk but still they say thousands of things. Yesterday, it happened that I had taken out Joy for a walk ( For those of you who don’t know who joy is, he is my 5 year old yet to grow up dog), I saw a pram that was being pushed by someone about the age of my grandfather. He was so excited that I, even Joy could sense his excitement. The pram he was pushing had an adorable little girl in it who wore a pink dress. Her grandfather said, ” See, a Dog.” And she rolled in excitement in her little pram. Eye contacts between them spoke the necessary. 

Yet again , I saw a conversation. A child had come to her mother, all dirty with mud. He stood there and listened. 

As I passed by, I heard what she said. “I just got this shirt for you and you made it a mess.” ” I will wash it mumma.” He said. “Go wash your hands, I had prepared noodles for you.” She said. 

Conversations are something rarely we notice because just like air and water, we have taken it for granted. Distances both of space and time, have introduced yet another form of conversations- texting. 

I was introduced to texting by my school friend, during the days when SMS used to rule. We used to text. Hi bro, how are you?, tomorrow  we have this test, did you see Pokemon? Simple, basic and yet complete. I was so excited, waited for it to arrive on my fathers phone that sometimes I used to sleep with it. It was sheer joy to see a SMS arrive. He was my first text buddy. 

Fast forward to college life. I was gifted a smartphone by my parents. The first things that came in it were games. It was my ritual of inducting something in the family. It is now as well. My elder brother told me of something called Whatsapp. I had fun installing it, making some use of my phone number for the first time was refreshing!. My friends were already used to it and they started sending me texts as well. LOL! OMG! IDK! WTF!. These were certainly out of my space. I was reading these words for the first time in my life and just like a confused fellow, I turned to my bestfriend. He was my saviour, he sent me a complete list of all the abbreviations used in texting. 

People don’t have this much time to type in complete words, they must be really busy, I thought. 

After my share of good amount of texting, I came to a conclusion that it is not my cup of tea. I used to get infuriated when people sent me those corpses of words in convenient little boxes that I have caught the wrath of many people. I even remember telling a girl, the first girl I ever started talking to, I cannot understand these abbreviations ,can you please use complete words. She was humble enough to acknowledge. There were at times when I wanted to speak so much but the other person would send me a LOL and I would be turned down. 

The magic of words is slowly eroding away with every LOL or an OMG. 

However, after a great amount of torture at the hands of abbreviated textors, I thought let me do something different. I have never used these abbreviations because murder of language is something so brutal. It’s like killing away your tongue with your own hands, chopping it of its vigour. 

I have always liked conversations that last more than blink of an eye. It may not be long in length but yes intensity, tone, hue matter a lot. I want to have a conversation in which you may not even need a medium, it just flows, like light in vacuum, like wind through mesh. There mustn’t be a constriction in it’s flow or else it is not a conversation. The weight of words, the way they sound, the way they should be used, change the complete aura of a conversation. 

                 “WTF!” 

                     Or

” Sorry, I cannot do this.”


See the difference. 
I am a miser when it comes to speaking with a person I have met for the first time or especially a person of opposite gender( and let me tell you I am horrible) face to face. Texting does fine in these situations. But when a person knows me and I know them, I change. I had conversations in which I have cried like a baby or made the other person to do so. I had a conversation that made me throw away all my distractions away and focus on things more important. I had conversations that broke my heart, laid me grasping for air. I have loved a person over a conversation, hated a person in a conversation, grew more respect for a person, was scolded over and even scolded some people so that they leave things behind.

I am not a big fan of short conversations. I don’t want to know what happened to you in the day. But I want you to describe everything to me like a movie, so I could imagine you as a hero traversing through the length and breadth of the story. 

I don’t want a list of your hobbies. Although, I would love to know when you got a sore ankle while you danced, the audience that came in your performance, the dress that tore off, the hard work that went preparing for something. I want to see that passion in your eyes when you describe me something. 


Passion fuels human beings. Brings them to life. Motivates them to be someone they desire. 

I want to hear you speak, so I could absorb each and every word of you, could feel that heartbeat pumping when you remember your grandmother or a brother that stays away. 
Words are something mysterious. They can give birth in you something extraordinary. They need to be felt, questioned upon and above all, must be respected because for every invention, every discovery this human life has been capable of, is the gift of words, language, tone, speech. 
Without words, we are just animals. We may know how to survive. But leaving a mark won’t be possible.


I am in love with long conversations. 



Are you?

Faces..

Kumar Harsh36 Comments

I am strong because I was weak. 
I know what’s loyalty because I was betrayed. 
I don’t care because once I had cared too much. 
I am silent now because the words that came out were often misinterpreted. 
I don’t wear clothes that are clean.
I have made mistakes, grave mistakes that shattered me, my image, my ego.

Choice is yours.

It’s a delusional world,  you see. We tend to be attracted towards the ones who ignore us, loyalty, faith, belief have been made cheap, disgusting by people who very proudly say they are the harbingers of love. 
What is love? 
Singing, dancing, romanticising is it love? 
Or is it something more deep, something more divine. 
All, including me, you, are hypocrites. We wear faces, masks that cover the one face we don’t show to anyone, falsely accusing anyone who crosses our ways. Because it is easy to accuse, get done with the responsibilities and oh yes,  wear a mask so that the entire universe sympathizes with you, glooming over the fact that you have been a victim of an attack. But, the real face, the one you haven’t shown to anyone, yes that one, it is the one true you. 
I admit today I am not happy with what my that face has shown me. The past, the many devious concoctions. But yes, I am ready to improve, ready to let go off everything to start afresh, build new foundations for the future. We were made to make mistakes, mistakes that taught us that fire should not be played with, that a bleeding wound needs to be looked at or else you will be infected, that throwing a stone at the sky will hit you back, sometime.
 
Yes, I am ready to show my face to the world. 

The question is, are you….? 

A line

Kumar Harsh31 Comments

If I could draw a new line, 

The one I could see, 

A little curvy, imperfect, 

Screeches over my screen, 

Leaves some scratches, 

If I could draw a line, 

Over places and things, 

Over the people that went by, 

The line that is red, blue maybe green, 

Monotone is so monotonous, 

If I could draw a line,

Over oceans and the sunrise, 

The rays,  the waves, 

All the clouds, 

I would take a big piece, 

Store it in my room, 

Talk to it everyday, 

Maybe give it a bath, 

If I could draw a new line, 

Over the existing few ones, 

Could cross them sometime, 

See, meet, greet, absorb, express,

Maybe build a house, 

The wilderness, the right angles, 

Perfect lanes, scanty remains, 

If only I could draw a line,

The grids, the patterns, 

The Greenwich and the meridian, 

Attraction, repulsion and induction,

Science would be a little change, 

Lines are the new shape, 

These lines imaginary or a sketch, 

Drawn on the mind or on a stretch,

One dimensional,  two or maybe three, 

X crosses the country of y and z attacks, 

Why are you two always away, 

Skewed, intersecting, parallel or maybe tan, 

Lines are interesting of them all, 

If I would draw a line, 

There will be talks over the town, 

I would be famous, 

Linemaster what they will call me, 

And I will be drawing lines all over, 

I now want to draw a line, 

Can you see you are my new line… 

A rainy day…

Kumar Harsh74 Comments

Starry was the night, 
Brighter the day,
You and I, met on a rainy day,
Shivering with cold,
Drenched in the golden pour,
You ran into the shed next door,
I watched you open your soaked hair,
I wish that was a moment I could save,
Trying hard not to look,
I pushed myself away,
Mister, sit down if I may,
The rain is heavy and the car away,
And she was a beauty,
How could I disarray,
Words froze in my mouth,
Hands trembled as they were on fire,
Relax, I don’t bite,
Here have this hot tea,
She poured a cup for me and she,
Thank you Ma’am,
What all I could say,
She looked into the rain,
The infinity seemed a reality away,
A pup was shooed,
Thrown away,
Rain falls in different ways,
Hold my cup,
I shall go,
And she ran,
The pup was in her arms,
The shed can hold three,
She giggled and laughed,
I saw your soul and fell in love……

The new washing machine…

Kumar Harsh47 Comments

​”Gande kapde neeche phenk do.” Amma with high of her voice would order me to throw down the clothes that now need to be washed. She was regular, disciplined in her act so much that the days when she wouldn’t ask for my clothes,  I would check if the washing machine is working fine. Washing clothes was never so easy for Amma. I still remember the days when our first washing machine came to our house. It was my birthday and papa had given it as a gift to me. “What will I do with it?” I had said to him and he said,  “Use it.”

The washing machine was prepared for a war that it had to fight for all the weekdays. Its enemies trained in special bunkers to cause massive destruction to the image of washing machine. 

Every Sunday was the D-Day. Amma and papa would wake up early, taking out clothes from every nook and corner of the house. The school shirts, ties, socks, curtains, bedsheets. Nobody was spared. They all laid helplessly in huge piles. 

Amma used to wash clothes in batches. White clothes, colored clothes, discolored clothes and even the foot mats. 

                                          
We had that top loading washing machines in which you had do everything yourself. Filling up the water, putting in the detergent, twisting the neck of shirts. Everything but the wash which sometimes was not even visible. Amma separated those clothes. I will wash them when I will have a bath. She would say and continue her fight with the machine. 

Peeeee!,  the machine would sound,  telling Amma and all our neighbours that the first batch of washed clothes was ready. Amma would gradually take them out,  check if they are spotless,  wash them under a running tap over a bucket full of water,  completely immersed in that water, her clothes begging her to stop. But she wouldn’t. Until all the clothes were done with. 

We would quickly bring buckets to carry the done clothes to hang them to dry. Sometimes it happened that the rope broke under the pressure. But Amma wouldn’t. All those clothes she would wash again, without any word, without any complain. 

The drier of the washing machine had surrendered long ago, even before we knew what its use was. When we found out that it was to be used after washing the clothes, our wallets had become lighter in weight. “Who needs a drier when we can dry them in the sun. Natural light is the best.”  Amma would say and papa would bring two more buckets. “These two are done. How many still remain.”  He would ask. “Bas thode aur. Ap jaiye, main dal dungi.” she would say. “Accha” papa would say and go back to his Sunday news,  waiting patiently for the sound of machine. 

I remember those days when Amma would keep on washing the clothes, every Sunday of the year, no season skipped, no fever skipped. We never realised what Amma and Papa went through while using the machine until the day when we started washing them ourselves. 

It is said that great wars are fought over the grounds of a wish, a desire or maybe even an oath. The washing machine served us well. One Sunday it stopped working. We had taken them for granted. But now we could afford that shiny front loading washing they showed in the television. In which Bugs Bunny stuffed the hunter or Mr Bean who had a ride of lifetime. 

After careful consideration, we got it for us. 

The previous machine we had was very light. I could lift it up by myself. But this one was so heavy. I dared not to. The representative came the next day amidst all my excitement. I was alone at home that day. And I was so excited that I took him straight to the machine. And boy, he took so much time in unwrapping that beauty that stood in front of me. I and him, we two took out the machine and placed it where he directed. I watched him as he prepared the machine. That small pipe for inlet and that huge pipe for outlet. I was amazed seeing that artist perform Infront of me. He called me and explained me all the functions. “The clothes will come out dry.”  He said. I was shocked. ” Matlab we don’t have to do anything.” “Yes,  you don’t have to do anything,  except putting in the clothes and taking them out. ” he said and left. 
                                   

Amma came back from work and she could see the excitement on my face.” A gya machine vala. Chla di machine? ” she asked and I replied in affirmation. 

Papa came in evening.” Zra tika toh lga do ispe.” he said. 

And we had finally welcomed the machine in our family. 
Today, when I see Amma washing clothes in the machine,  I remember all those years of hardwork that she and papa did for us. We used to live in a rented 1 room flat, had nothing but the warmth of our relationship.  But now, when I look around, I see their hardwork has grown from a seed to a beautiful tree. “Tum Dono Bhai hi toh hum dono ki mehnat ho”,  they say whenever we all sit down together. 

Life is tough. Living through it is even tougher. But there is some kind of divine force that helps you guide through it. It doesn’t provide you with a bed of roses,  neither a bed of thorns. It keeps on giving you something or the another. It really falls on us to realise the potential of those things, those small little gestures, the fights, the celebrations.

After all, this life is all we got. 

Image source-Google. 

If it could be…..

Kumar Harsh24 Comments

I think sometimes, if she could know what I was thinking.
Silence is a sign, please hold me tight.
I think sometimes, if he could see that I am trying my best.
Please speak, I am a being.

I wish sometimes, if she could see how she is in my eyes.
The world that stops when she is infront of me.
I wish sometimes, if he would hold my hand in front of the world.
He is mine and I am his.

I believe someday, she will think that I know things.
What makes her cry, what she adores.
I believe someday, he will get my hints.
The teddy, Papa and that spicy tint.

If it could be, can we sing a song.
Maybe laugh, break a bone.
I wish we could be more alone.
Let ourselves indulge in us a little more.
I will make it up to you one fine day.
Open your eyes. 
It’s today…..

Jalebi vali baat… 

Kumar Harsh11 Comments

हैरान था मैं,
कुछ परेशान भी हुआ,
केहती थी वो,
ओ सजना बस तुम ही तुम हो,
क्या बताऊँ किस आसमान पे था मैं,
अरे दोस्तों यह भी भूल गया की था नादान मैं,
बना रहा था जलेबियाँ तभी,
वो बोली आके, 
ज़रा चखाना जलेबी ओ भैया मुझे,
क्या बताऊँ क्या बीती उस दिन मेरे यार मुझपे,
तेल गरम है सोचा नहा लूँ ज़रा इससे अभी,
पीछे से पिताजी बोले,
कमभक्त देखता क्या है खिला जलेबी इन्हें,
जलेबी को जब चाशनी मैं डुबाया मैंने,
ओ भैया क्या स्वाद उसे आया,
रोज़ आती थी वो खाने जलेबियाँ, समोसे ना जाने क्या क्या,
मगर ऐ दोस्त, पेट भरता था इधर,
एक दिन अचानक आके बोली मुझे,
आप फ़्री हो तो मिलिए मुझे,
दर्ज़ी को ढूँढा, सिलवाया सफ़ेद सूट,
भाई तेरी भाभी है,
कह के बोला उसे,
गया मिलने तब लेके मोपेड लाल,
मेरे सपनो की रानी अब आ गयी था मैं बेमिसाल,
देखा उसे वेरिंग अ सफ़ेद सूट,
मोपेड गिरी,हो गया मैं बेहोश,
उठो, अब खोलो आँखें,
नहीं नहीं अब तुम भी आ जाओ साथी,
पड़ा चमाटा, आया होश,
पागल है क्या तेरी ऐसी की तैसी,
भागा मैं जो जान बचा के,
आज पड़ेगी मार सोचा मैं घबरा के,
तभी ज़ोर का झटका धीरे से लगा,
कमबख़्त जलेबी दे, देखता है क्या,
हैरान था मैं,
कुछ परेशान भी हुआ,
मगर जो भी था, 
चलो सपना ही था।

This is complete work of fiction. I don’t work in a mithai shop neither my father is a halwai. Hope you guys like it. 😜

Dreams… 

Kumar Harsh44 Comments

There is something inexplicable about dreams. 

Some dreams see the day of light everytime you open your eyes.

Some just die a death of disbelief. 

Some become a part of yourself. 

Or some of those just fade away. 

Dreams are a reality until the power of belief kicks in and pushes us to understand the idea behind seeing a dream in the first place. 

Dreams can make you cry,  make you proud or just can scare every cell in your body. 

But dreams are an endangered species,  the one which faces a threat of being extinct under the overdue pressure of comparisons,  expectations and desire. 

We need to dream more….

This picture reminds me of the many dreams that my near ones took sometime back. The pain,  the hardwork that went into it and the result that came out of it. 

Some dream with their God, some with their eyes, some with their mind, a beating heart or some,  with their hands……