June 21, 2000
5.40 p.m.
Many people come to this cyber café due to reduced rates.
I come here for its location…just adjoining the railway track. There is nothing to boast about the beauty of the place but there is that wonderful sound when a train rattles past…and the whole place vibrates with the power of speed for a brief span of time.
*
June 22, 2000
3.20 a.m.
I am writing on a white sheet and have to try to keep my sentences look straight. Left to themselves, they tend to levitate.
One of my sleepless nights is about to end in a few hours’ time. I have been wandering here and there…from one room to the other, then out in the open, on the roof….
Music has not made much sense all this while.
I have watched the moon travel slowly on its westward journey across a hazy summer sky.
The breeze has been lovely all through the night, seeming to come somewhere from the beyond.
About an hour ago, I was talking to the night-watchman. He was pleasantly surprised to find someone to talk to at that hour. We chatted for a while and he told me about his life and family back in Nepal. I smoked a “Beedi” with him, much to his delight. It left an awful taste in my mouth and I have had to chew a few cookies after that.
The TV was not worth watching. I could not focus on any news. Most soaps are always new to me. MTV showed half-nude women and I realized that just before morning, when the night is very deep, the mind loses the attribute to respond to lesser instincts.
At 3.00 a.m., I opened my book-shelf and came across a very old book, published by UNESCO in 1958. It is entitled, “All Men are Brothers” and contains the life and thoughts of Mahatma Gandhi. Flipping through it, a couple of paragraphs held my attention. It was as if I could identify myself with what was written:
“I am not at all concerned with appearing to be consistent. In my pursuit after truth, I have discarded many ideas and learnt many new things. Older as I am in age, I have no feeling that I have ceased to grow inwardly or that my growth will stop with the dissolution of the flesh. What I am concerned with is my readiness to obey the call of truth…from moment to moment.
At the time of writing, I never think of what I have said before. My aim is not to be consistent with my previous statements on a given question, but to be consistent with truth, as it may present itself to me at a given moment. The result has been that I have grown from truth to truth….and what’s more, whenever I have been obliged to compare my writing of even fifty years ago with latest, I have discovered no inconsistency between the two. But friends who observe inconsistency will do well to take the meaning which my latest writing may yield, unless of course, they prefer the old. But before making the choice, they should try to see if there is not an underlying and abiding consistency between the two seeming inconsistencies.”
*
3.50 a.m.
My eyes strain a bit and I do not feel too focused….as if de-minded. Like many times before, I have turned to talk to myself and who knows, later I may see myself in my dream: spread out on the bed, writing on loose sheets, struggling to write straight sentences while the sheets refuse to stay put in the circular air currents created by the ceiling fan.
4.00 a.m.
The room is hot and stuffy. I will close the writing and go out in the lawn and if the mosquitoes succeed in baffling me, I will climb my way up the stairs again and watch the last few strides of the sinking moon.
5.40 p.m.
Many people come to this cyber café due to reduced rates.
I come here for its location…just adjoining the railway track. There is nothing to boast about the beauty of the place but there is that wonderful sound when a train rattles past…and the whole place vibrates with the power of speed for a brief span of time.
*
June 22, 2000
3.20 a.m.
I am writing on a white sheet and have to try to keep my sentences look straight. Left to themselves, they tend to levitate.
One of my sleepless nights is about to end in a few hours’ time. I have been wandering here and there…from one room to the other, then out in the open, on the roof….
Music has not made much sense all this while.
I have watched the moon travel slowly on its westward journey across a hazy summer sky.
The breeze has been lovely all through the night, seeming to come somewhere from the beyond.
About an hour ago, I was talking to the night-watchman. He was pleasantly surprised to find someone to talk to at that hour. We chatted for a while and he told me about his life and family back in Nepal. I smoked a “Beedi” with him, much to his delight. It left an awful taste in my mouth and I have had to chew a few cookies after that.
The TV was not worth watching. I could not focus on any news. Most soaps are always new to me. MTV showed half-nude women and I realized that just before morning, when the night is very deep, the mind loses the attribute to respond to lesser instincts.
At 3.00 a.m., I opened my book-shelf and came across a very old book, published by UNESCO in 1958. It is entitled, “All Men are Brothers” and contains the life and thoughts of Mahatma Gandhi. Flipping through it, a couple of paragraphs held my attention. It was as if I could identify myself with what was written:
“I am not at all concerned with appearing to be consistent. In my pursuit after truth, I have discarded many ideas and learnt many new things. Older as I am in age, I have no feeling that I have ceased to grow inwardly or that my growth will stop with the dissolution of the flesh. What I am concerned with is my readiness to obey the call of truth…from moment to moment.
At the time of writing, I never think of what I have said before. My aim is not to be consistent with my previous statements on a given question, but to be consistent with truth, as it may present itself to me at a given moment. The result has been that I have grown from truth to truth….and what’s more, whenever I have been obliged to compare my writing of even fifty years ago with latest, I have discovered no inconsistency between the two. But friends who observe inconsistency will do well to take the meaning which my latest writing may yield, unless of course, they prefer the old. But before making the choice, they should try to see if there is not an underlying and abiding consistency between the two seeming inconsistencies.”
*
3.50 a.m.
My eyes strain a bit and I do not feel too focused….as if de-minded. Like many times before, I have turned to talk to myself and who knows, later I may see myself in my dream: spread out on the bed, writing on loose sheets, struggling to write straight sentences while the sheets refuse to stay put in the circular air currents created by the ceiling fan.
4.00 a.m.
The room is hot and stuffy. I will close the writing and go out in the lawn and if the mosquitoes succeed in baffling me, I will climb my way up the stairs again and watch the last few strides of the sinking moon.
2 comments:
one needs permission to see ur other blog.
miredmirage
miredmiragemusings.blogspot.com/
ghughutibasuti
http://ghughutibasuti.blogspot.com
Yes, the other blog is for selected readers only. It contains my poems and other stuff. If you are interested in English poetry, you are welcome to view it. I will need your gmail address to invite you for readership. You can write to me at csbhatnagar@gmail.com
Post a Comment