They Paid Their Bill and Left the Booth

I wrote this while I was at an attractive restaurant in Leh. My companions chattered mindlessly about things I didn't care about. I was however, intrigued by the couple on the table not far from us. This poem (?) just fought its way out.

It was read by two people, before I published this, which was one too many. What better way to preserve and to be kept a secret, than this blog?

Here goes.

They Paid Their Bill and Left the Booth

Two silhouetted in the shadow of the fading light,
sexuality oozing from every pore,
one unabashed the other hesitant,
one from the past,
the other--future.
Turn away,
we'll look at them later.
Blow out the candle,
the sun has set.

Let's get Leh'd

My homage to the only man who could makes depravity an art form—Charles Bukowski

Fancy some Hummus in Leh?
We walked out,
I needed some hummus,
She walked where we did,
Her face wouldn’t have started wars, nor would it have ended any.
Her face did stir my deep desires.
I moved away, she moved toward,
Our fingers brushed.
We passed each other,
I turned around, she didn’t.
We walked in,
I needed some hummus.


It is all a conspiracy, believe me.

The city, the dusty boring city is 10050 meters above mean sea level. The climb up to the illustrious castle, in disrepair, was steep. The other two were racing each other—a gym rat race. Those with beer bellies flopping in the breeze, like yours truly, can’t race gym rats. They do, however, pass judgments.
I was running out of breath. I was at the top. Still wheezing, I was shown a village, still within the rehabilitation project.
“We should scream—Screw you Chinese bastards—just for the sake of it,” I said, expecting my comment to be received with quiet contempt that my observations had received through the last three days. I didn’t give a royal, flying fuck.
“Why?” she asked.
“Maybe, that crater is,” I pointed to an unmade foundation hole, “shelled by the Chinese and the government didn't tell you,” baiting her to ignore. She didn’t. “You call yourself a journalist?” she asked.

Vocal contempt! I loved the punishment.

“You shouldn’t believe everything your government tells you, it usually lies,” I told her.
“Don’t tell anyone you are a journalist,” she replied.

There were several instances I could have narrated where senior, expert journalists trusted the government and were left with their foot in the mouth, but this was getting funny. The quiet cultural floozies versus me. The fight begins.

She narrated the same story to him. He loved the punishment met out to me. I loved it too, but my pleasure wasn’t where they felt it was.

“Maybe it was a water balloon,” he smirked. The two looked at me. Laughing, mocking, looking down at me.
“I know, that is a foundation site, you guys have no imagination.” I explained. Why did I explain? I wanted them to keep pushing themselves down that road. But then, I had a propeller up my ass and enthusiasm is overvalued.

They exchanged meaningful glances.

A few days ago, both, had spat and ridiculed the concept of masochism. Now both, shamelessly, indulged in it. Oh the irony of it all.

I got up, ran towards them and pushed them off the cliff, my arms wrapped around them. The wind whistled in my ears. They cried, screamed, the ground was approaching. Gravity, my friend, is an ugly, unforgiving bitch. We were going to be the proverbial pulp on the sidewalk.

"Imagination, creativity makes you flexible, expands your horizons. Letting the child take over doesn't make you stupid, it gives you perspective... a smile, try it," I bellowed over the wind and the screams.

“Let’s go, there is a climb left,” he said as he prepared himself for the ascent. She eagerly followed. She always followed.

My knee hurt, so did my ankle.
“Fuck you. Fuck you,” I told my knee. It wouldn’t take my weight.
Mind over matter, the stupa awaited us. Fucking Gumpa.


P.S: This isn't meant to offend anyone. I am not complaining. I loved every second of my journey up and, then subsequently, down. It was something that could be best described as, how a dear friend would call it, flash fiction.

Three friends, a fishing boat and the secret to levitation- continued

II

Abe stared at the sea. He held in his hands, a net, coarse to his delicate fingers. “Abe, the net,” his father screamed at him to keep the net taut. It was three years ago, since he was offered a way out. They had promised to meet at the bus stop the next day at noon. He had written a goodbye letter, he had packed his bags and was ready to leave when he fell down the stairs. Curiously, his parents never found the goodbye letter. Abe had debated leaving to find that mysterious messiah but his childish innocence tied him tied him to his little world, even though he knew it was small, too small. He had once packed and reached the bus stop but didn’t know which bus to get into. So, here he was. Living the life his father planned for him and it did not involve flying. His life, he thought, was wasting one day at a time. He convinced himself he was not selling his soul for the simpler pleasures of life. Abe’s dreams were less vivid, he dreamed about cabbage and beetroot. Once he dreamed a tiger was let loose in their village. None of them let him fly.

The sea spat back at him, it was time to take it in, dawn was just about to break. The sky was turning the colour of a newlywed bride—a pink hue on an almost white sky. The sea gulls flew over his boat, their wings ruffling in the wind, just like the sheets of a marriage bed. Wisps of dark clouds like her eyelashes completed his fantasy. It was the beginning of a new day, a new passage in his life. He was now wedded to his dream. Not many understood this. They preferred to avoid Abe; his parents ignored his rambling as long as he was the best fisherman in the village, which he was.

He did however; find comfort in two other friends. They gave him one thing a 15 year old never asks for—quiet. The three were entirely comfortable in the absence of conversation. They had once spent an entire evening walking on the beach, not a word said, not a meaningful glance or a nudge. They just walked.

Amongst all the other around him these two were the only ones he had spoken to, briefly, about the mysterious man. Abe felt closer to Mahesh—known for his strength—rather than Abu—known for nothing in particular. Abu obediently sided with the majority. Luckily for him, he never had to make a choice. Mahesh and Abe never argued.

III

“I think, this time I might leave,” Abe whispered. Mahesh grunted. He looked at the bidi he had stolen from his father’s drawer. It smelt foul but he saw the adults suck at it and often, on a cold wet evening, hold it with some reverence. He was always amused.

“What do you think, Abu?” Abe asked, raising his eyebrows. Abu shrugged. He never knew what could be said in such a situation. The more he thought about it, the more he realised, he didn’t know what to say in any situation, except when his grandmother asked him if he wanted fish. Abu’s grandmother was an excellent cook, but she could never get the fish right. She always left it raw. Abu liked it. He insisted that it was the food of the future.

It would mark three years the next day since he met that man. All he had to do was get on the bus that left the village at noon and get off the last stop. This was the only logical way he could trace the steps of the man who would teach him to fly.

“I think, this time I might leave,” Abe repeated. Mahesh nodded, he patted his pocket. Mahesh had a letter Abe wrote ever week to give to his parents when he left. At the end of every week he gave Mahesh another letter and tore the previous one. Mahesh always silently pocketed it. Never a question asked, never an explanation offered. Abu nodded, he held out a small sock that had odd coins and notes and handed it over. This was another tradition, every week; Abe added a few coins and Abu hid it. Neither of the two friends ever responded. Usually, the three walked back home in absolute silence, but this time Abe took a detour; he went back to his boat while the other two walked home.

Mahesh knew this morning felt different. When he woke up, there was a knot in his stomach. The sky was different. Dawn was early. The sky was white, like the shroud on a corpse. The white was punctuated by a few deep dark clouds, the shade of a hand, which had slipped the tightly tied shroud, where the blood had coagulated. The sea gulls were making an infernal racket. They sounded like the wailing of the widow. This day, he felt, was the death of something important. He didn’t remember this till he got back home after awkwardly waving at Abe as he walked towards that wretched boat.

Creation, Destruction and Everything in the Middle

This tale was born on Colva’s premier beach. I cut the umbilical cord with the buzz that accompanies copious amount of beer on a cold February night. The story has been since stewing in the recesses of my mind, unable to see the light of day until another story pushed it out.

It has been, personally, one of the toughest weeks of my life; I think I did it well this time. No breakdowns, I didn’t give in to temptation and I kept my head firmly in place. But this isn’t the story of my bravado it is the one I narrated on a beach while chewing on a wonderful chocolate chip muffin.

Three friends, a fishing boat and the secret to levitation
The three lights were constant on Colva's horizon. People had stopped questioning who those bobbing lights belonged to. Many years ago a geology grad had explained, to the locals, it was the reflection of a methane eruption usually seen when garbage is dumped offshore. "In a few million years it will be oil," he said brightly. A few god-fearing fishermen had ascertained it was where damnation and earth met. "It is all described in those missing pages that the Vatican doesn't want us to read," they concluded. The lifeguards dismissed it as a whale with a tag that reflects when the moon shines on it. No one knows of a whale in South Goa; if there was one, it would have been on our tables.

Old man Crab said he knew. No one paid heed to the old man. He was old, wrinkled, had long arguments with dogs, was a vegetarian and looked like a hermit crab. No one listens to someone who ties their house—a cardboard box—on their back. But Crab knew and when Crab died, the secret died with him. Crab died in peculiar circumstances, he was as strong as a horse, the three bouncers from the posh beach shack up the beach can testify to that. He had once wrestled the three men, a fourth his age, beat them into submission and then bought them beer. Crab, witnesses said, was seen screaming—he is back—while pointing at an even older man, he then kneeled over and died. I met that mysterious old man, and here is that story…

I

A young boy, not more than thirteen, his shirt unbuttoned, his school shorts dirty with wet sand and sea shells ran the beach with abandon, he ran everywhere, he often hoped, if he ran fast enough he would take off. It was his dream to fly.

We all have dreams in which we fly. These flying dreams, according to popular psychology, tell us about the state of mind. We fly over cliffs and over monuments, we fly out of tough situations and some of us fly into tough situations—if you have a messiah complex. But not this boy, when dreamed off flying he could smell the salt and he could hear the cries of the sea gulls, he felt the wind ruffling his hair. He saw his hair, it was long and curled, and it also had a few beads in it. He always woke up when he saw his hair. He had these dreams in the afternoon in an abandoned boat, where he would rest to escape the white heat of the sun.

This day, his boat was the home to an old man.

He was certainly not a local, his accent was different. He had wrinkled skin, his shirt so baggy it covered his fingers, his pants were held up, gracefully, by a piece of cloth tied around his waist. His shaggy beard covered his face, his hair—dark—dropped to his eyes.

“You love to run, don’t you?” the old man asked. The old man looked familiar, the boy didn’t reply. “Have you tried to fly?” the old man asked. The boy nodded.

“Come with me, Abe and I’ll teach you.”