Wednesday, July 28, 2010

Visitations from the past





 The shrill ring brought Darpana out of her reverie. Another of those customer care calls. Of late, these call centres are turning out to be a bother. The number was saved on her phonebook; so she had no difficulty in  canceling the call.


A sigh slipped out of her. Something made her glance upward--she couldn't see  herself in the rusty mirror, ...and yet she knew that her lips were parted...Abhi would often tease her for this—whether sad, or happy, or listening intently , or viewing somebody ... or simply thinking—her lips would remain parted. Whenever they went hiking into the wilds,  he would tell her that this would be her last trip, for “won’t a baby snake enter your gaping mouth  as you sleep? Or else an insect”, curving his lips hw would smile....he had a unique smile, didn't he?... he would emphasise, “some insect will definitely crawl in…the way you sleep with your mouth open”. “Don’t say mouth, say lips…that sounds better”, Darpana would feign anger. And thus they would go on with their meaningless ramble. How nice it had felt then. It feels good even now, reminiscing...
she absently pushed away a strand of hair from her eyes...how he had loved that..the way her long black tresses, would fall over him as he lay on her lap, while she kept poring over her books..she glanced upwards


Darpana suddenly  stifled. the cobwebs had been pushed back. She could see herself clearly in the mirror now...


lips withered, hair frayed , ashy...Darpana Rajkumari couldn't recognize anymore (those) visitations from her past....

Sunday, July 18, 2010

memories, imagination and words

we paint with colours....we paint with words....and we paint with feelings as well.
as i sit down at my computer this rain drenched morning, i witness a beautiful sight just outside my window...an emerald countryside, with lush green paddy on either side, as far and as wide as the eye can see....bluish hils in the distance, and a silent solemn Kopili sailing beside. The road is bumpy, and full of interjections--cows lazing, snotty children playing, tanned workers drying hay in d sun--all on the road, and yet, for a first timer like yours truly, its fun. The driver grumbles at the pathetic roads...and i laugh in glee each time we ride the bumps and troughs of this apology of a road...the countryside around me lilts and sways .. and .i am reminded of Dylan Thomas
                    "All the sun long it was running, it was lovely, the hay"
                                                                                 I know not how it is, and yet I can smell the hay.
we arrive at our destination--kampur--snuggled amidst memories, in the district of Nagon, it falls somewhere in between NH 36 and NH 37. The railways are the most effective means for transmuters. It is a town, and yet, the Kapili flows alongside...it is a few steps away from where we are put up. I am thrilled. The blessings of technology are to be seen everywhere, and yet somehow people haven't forgotten to be warm. It is my first time there, and not even for once do i feel that i am not  at home. a small world, people mostly know one another, and by the time we bid adieus to this place..i know most of them too...
we returned through  nagaon via Kathiatoli , and the sights, once again, are breathtaking. This road too isn't different--bumpy as the previous one(which by the way was the road that led directly to Kampur from Roha)---and yet the countryside is equally enthralling. It is emerald-hued, and as we  drive along country roads, the rain sprinkles... soon after the sun smiles....and then, like magic i see the most beautiful rainbow i have ever seen...it is a double rainbow actually....two wide colourful arcs..one a reversed shadow of the other, two beauty-full semicircles...it almost seems as though the heavens are smiling...(doesnt a rainbow remind you of an inverted smile??to me it does, here there are two)................and then just at the point on the earth from where the brighter arc seems2emanate there is a solitary hut, with a clump of trees(in the midst of acres and acres of paddy). Screened by the rainbow, the hut is drenched in colour. It feels as though this hut were a pebble plonked into the river of nature , and the rainbow, and its shadow close by  ripples in the wind.........
brrrrrrrrrrrr..........bbbrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr
the phone barks out its vibrations,..and i m jolted out of my reverie...a missed call.......i look out of my window,the countryside vanishes..its a concrete porch right outside my window...replete with cars parked and labourers working...obstructing the view of the lawn at our neighbours.....dejection tries to set in...d feeling that had originally led me into my reverie through words....but i refuse..i refuse to be bogged down any longer...rejuvenated, i wind up my account, and gear myself for my next project......suffused with colours, suffused  with memories, imaginations and words..........

*besides i was foolhardy enough to forget my camera at home....so i hv uploaded acouple of pix hoping it helps in d effect...
* http://maps.google.co.in/maps?hl=en&q=kampur+nagaon&um=1&ie=UTF-8&hq=&hnear=Kampur,+Assam&gl=in&ei=_6dCTO2yK47-vQPL4oz4DA&sa=X&oi=geocode_result&ct=title&resnum=1&ved=0CAoQ8gEwAA