a clockwork orange

6.30
7.00
9.00
9.30
11.14
1.02
2.30
5.15
6.45
7.30
8.30
10.00
12.30
........
6.30
7.00
9.00
9.30
11.14
1.02
2.30
5.15
6.45
7.30
8.30
10.00
12.30
........
6.30
7.00
9.00
9.30
11.14
1.02
2.30
5.15
6.45
7.30
8.30
10.00
12.30
........

the coffee got cold .......................

and one morning the media woke .. shook the yawn off its drooling mouth
and poured itself a hot cup of coffee
and thought ......

enough with the camcorders voyeuring all around the place
enough with the shanky affairs
enough with the party divides
enough with the bribe
enough with the contortion
enough with the scoops of gossip
and decided to concentrate on a more global cause :

"the city is full of bakeries and the country is full of cities and wannabe-city-villages
... most of the bakeries are named " zam zam"
how come?"

stuck

trot trot trot
trut trut stop
look up tiptoe
look up scurry
gasp hide
breathe
gasp hide
sniff
smirk
smuggle
scare
scared
stumble
swim through shallow depths of smoke
suddenly
sok poof pow
shoot
shoot
duck shoot
sink up shoot
scuffle in the shambles
scream
secrets
secret screams
scream secrets
scary, secrets
sok poof pow
scuffle
sack
scupper
shameless, hung the skull full o' scum
shampoo bubbles on top of the skull, still full of scum
skimp
open sesame
shackle free
skate skyward
skein skyward
seamless skyward

sitting in the railway station on a sunday afternoon

mood : autumn
grub : rava dosai and coffee at an udupi hotel
book : the flying circus of Physics
song in the head : Nedanuri singing Thodi with no accompaniment
math in the head : sankeerna thagimpu set to 64 beats
want : to explain the math behind a sankeerna thagimpu to somebody
need : a different mood

gum sticks

chewing all day long on a gum stick
tasteless now
chewing still
... winding thru some hopeless passages .. nostalgic
song in the head " old friends " "dangling conversation"
staring at a blank unix session .. that reads me no dark secrets
feeling like a cow tethered to a lamp post


chew chew chew

images from the movie taxi driver .......screen past .......
fades out
...........
the narrative fills in
fades out
.............
traffic zooms past
..............
chew chew chew
.............

from THE PHANTOM 'RICKSHAW

When little boys have learned a new bad word they
are never happy till they have chalked it up on a door. And this
also is Literature.


From the horrible to the commonplace is but a step

must i ?

why must i vie?
why must i, why?
why? must i? vie !

(throw my head back and laugh)

while feelings vacillate
while some others veiled
vie, must i ? why ?


to be cont .....

gutted

catgut crossthread
crossthread cut
the godman cuffed

half moon a crooked sneer
bellies belching beef and beer
the godman cuffed

godman's men ,ash smeared
faith bombed future feared
the godman cuffed

biscuit dipped in ginger tea
garbage dump bugs and flea
the madman coughed

hopelss

.. .. hoped to feed nostalgia .....
...the slip slid away .......
....eyes rolled out of boredom ...
...mind roved around events .....
...thoughts raced to find common grounds ..
....smiles ... ate the lasagne !!!..
the spoon was heavy ..
the moments have passed us ...............
song for the day : Dangling conversations and superficial sighs !!!!

at my wits end ..

pursuit

and the wind blew
gales of dust
soot covered eyes
vision blinded
impaired i groped
searching for meaning
truth blinded
truth vieled
soot covered eyes
gales of dust
and the wind blew stronger than before


----- i

The tar filled air of the corporate ...

The tar filled air of the corporate ...

the corporate world chokes ...
the corporate world is shamful..
welcome to the real world
....
stop the earth i want to get off !!!!

rigmarole

... later

software voices

Software voices :keys chattering madly , mouses clicking curses ,ac a horrible drone away
phones madly riniging .. ignored ....
people turning into machines that spew codes ....
people hollering their points of view away .. unheard and loud !!

reeking routine

random chunks of thought ..at work ...............
Plodding thru lines of code ...............


thought flits in:
I am glad they did not make a cartoon flick of Calvin and hobbes.
thougt flits past.........

Sometimes people get lost in the drone of routine.People make machines of themselves and just exist around.


...............I can feel my brains getting rancid and spilling all over the place


................reeking routine ....................




Our generation is dwindling in class.Actually a new definition of fineness has mushroomed.

The truth hits when you meet and interact with people of the decade before, or before that . Art is now just in the exhibition (of it).

While the job slowly chews on my interests.....

Back to dwindling in class us
...

The senses are active and eager now .. and we have to gear them up .


yeah so ,we are a comforatbly cushioned bunch .. ... with bouts of effort and wanting speedy results

..getting it too ....and this has ruined us .
A lax bunch..which ll overwork itself at sporadic gists of time just to get things done and then hiberanate .

Chethalapathi Mama

Chethalapathi mama passed away .
He was the direct disciple of Papanasam sivan .

After i joined VIT i could never attend to my music well enough .. more so because the place and people and peers were not that kind and most importantly because of my muddled/distracted mind.
After i got a job in tcs i had a lot of free time until my training session at tcs began( in sept .)
It was then that i joined classes with Chethalapathi mama . He was known for his soulful rendition of Viruthams.
Viruthams were mama's forte . He would get totally engrossed in the lyrics and the tune and would sing it with so much soul . Every word seemed to come alive and the substance and feel would hang around /stay etched in your memory .


Mama taught tamil at the Ramakrisha school. He retired and was known (in mami's words) for how he used to beat children and then console them by telling them a funny story and making them laugh until they split their sides .
(she said the children would say " anikki neenga enna adikalai na na inikki ibdee varamaaten ")


Mama's classes would go on for hours and each minute would be an experience for both my dad and me.
Our classes would break for a nice hot cup of (mami' special) malli tea and tiffin( arusee upma,kara kozhakattais et al).Mami is a frail obedient loving woman who made you feel at home and happy .The moment anyone entered their apartment you could feel the warmth and true hospitality in the air around.The rule was that anybody who visited Mama could not leave without having a sip of coffee or tiffin. He would annouce for a hot cup of cofee or malli tea with tiffin. Their hospitality was not put on and did not have an ounce of hesitation.

Mama began my first class by teaching me a virutham on Lord Vinayaka.. the popular
"paalum, theli thenum ,paagum ,paruppum kalandhu unakku naan tharuven
kolam shei thunga karimugatthu thoomaniye
.. nee yenakku sangha tamil moonrum thaa"
in Karaharapriya and the song' ganapathiye' . I remember goose pimples rising to the size of ice capped mountains .

Mama brought out in me ( a hindi /sanskrit student throughout school ) an appreciation for tamil.
He taught me "sivakamasundari" and then would say "indha kutti ponnukku edhukku indha madhree paatu".
He could quote slokams and selected apt viruthmas from that huge database in his mind . he never referred or groped around for the text.He was 67.
Then he would begin singing the virutham stressing words at the right points to bring out their meaning well , adorning the lyric with apt, well suited sangathees and brigas .



The one that i loved most was :

"vedha nool pirayam nooru ,
manidhartham pugavarenum ..
pathiyum urangee pogum ,
midhee pani pasee moopu thunbam ( i cannot remeber the lyrics)
but to the effect of meedhi pani pasee moopu tunbam le waste aidum ...
aadhalaal piravee venden "

"oorile kaani illai uravu martoruvar illai
paaril nin paadhamoolam patrinen...........................paramamoorthy
karolee vannnane kannnane kadaarugindren "

in behag . We ( my dad and i) would fall silent and sniffing after he rendered viruthams .. with tears welled up in our eyes .

hehehee his grandson - ambi thambi avargal ( as coined by mama) would gambol in and out of our sessions . Mama would make him sing witty/funny songs.( i think there was one on a kosu -mosquito) that would have us laughing all over the place.
Also mama had a nickname for everybody ..eg.M.A.Krishnaswamy was called MAC haha .

Mama was adored by all cos he would make you feel comforatble .

He was the king of virutham singing.

I have with me a treasure of tapes and memories .

gulliver

mind a still afternoon ....... a still sunday afternoon !
blaring noisy thoughts hovering arnd like angry bees ................
mind still a still afternoon