To the Lives of Ages

To glamorous beginnings. To satisfied rakes. To the knowledge of a thousand scholars did that age belong. To satiation of skin and intellect, and the swell of the sword. To power and courage and beyond chivalry. To idealism and negligence and blind faith. They lived in a sort of oblivion till one day matters came to head. That day they were undone and judged before a panel twice as ambivalent as their crime. They hummed the tune of a reminiscent death- a hanging, that which sophistication called an ‘execution’. It mattered little, the evidence that gathered dust. But the will to kill was strong. The age turned its primal ugly head at the miscreants. The age of love had suddenly turned to the age of hate. And lust. They wondered at the shadows their big buildings cast. The fair skinned smiled at their ignorance, the dark skinned boiled at their interference. They had middled their existence for the longest time. Right until they had to choose. Between life and existence. Between choice and fate.

They ran as fast as they could, past all the disguised pity and concern. They could’ve made a pit stop near the corner that read ‘heaven’ but the technically perfect welcome scared them off. The truth was they smelt a rat. They kept running towards the golden light of salvation, only to find that it was a big billboard of the sun. They’d copied everything, the bastards. From the windows of a once illuminous home, they blessed the children crossing the road to school. They waited in patience for them to return, but instead found that the children had taken leave to become rich and successful. And forgetful. The telephone hadn’t rung for twenty years. May be it was during all this hapless time that they’d turned the sun into a billboard. They stepped out in search, but found themselves utterly lost in a world of flyovers. They took the train down to their favourite restaurant. But instead they found a hollow hole, something that a war had made. When they asked questions and looked puzzled, the people threw an army of glances at them. They almost hurt and they almost bled. Their minds wept as they turned home, the snow of cold heartedness blinding their eyes. Once home, they found that Sanctity had turned whorish and zipped her pants and left. They tried to use the telephone to cajole her into coming back and strut around the house, if only for a little while. But the children refused to pick up. All they got was a plasticky blankness. They hadn’t seen it coming, though heard it often over the radio that played a song about a father, a son and a cat and a silver spoon. When it began to rain, the age finally seemed to be coming around. The fields seemed rich with colour again. But the flood won’t let them be. For days they sat on upturned furniture and waited for the skies to open and propel aid at them. They sat like that for hours, despondent at the thought of mopping their own tears. They’d never named hurricanes in their time. They only sound as fierce as females they were named after. Once the billboard was back, the climbed out of their hideouts and waved frantically in the fresh air. Soon the waving changed to a dramatic gesture of dissent and anger. The tiny white hairs at the nape of their necks shook with fury. They pumped the air with their fists and made victory signs. After all this was the age of ignorance. The last time they’d done that was for something they’d heard in college, while rolling a joint. It was for people on the other side of the world. The empire was spreading its claws, all over ‘Nam. Little did that help. Little would this help.

They ran past experience, they ran past old age, they ran past freedom. They stuck their tongues out at democracy. They mooned the flag and pissed all over the imperial lawn of patriotism. Such was their crime, in the glorious era born of the aftermath of a thousand deaths. Where they hang listlessly now, once stood the ruler of the free world.

Lovers

Geeta Prakash Dwivedi was miserable in her middle class existence. She watched the shadows take shape and fade away on the hastily painted off-white walls. She rocked the unsteady cane chair back and forth in impatience; its constant creaking was driving her insane. It reminded her of just how much was wrong with her life. She got up much too suddenly and the blood rushed to her head. She wobbled a little bit and then took a cautious turn around the tiny room she’d spent her life in. Geeta had grown and learnt within these four walls. Learnt to cook, clean, sew, mend and bandage. Learnt to weep with sorrow and indignation, turn coy at insistence and fierce on demand, flutter eyebrows and breathe heavy, like the matinee idol did. Dress and undress. Quicker each time and for longer. There was no time for leaky cracks in the walls then. The comfort of a thousand arms for eighteen long years had been her solace. The slow trail of fingers along the inner seam of her cotton skirt had rippled through her flesh. Imprint of five fingers on her neck, hands, stomach, legs, breasts, back. Slow motion of lust in the tiny blue room. Not for a moment had Geeta been afraid. It had seemed so beautiful, the shapes cast on the off-white walls on warm September mornings. She smiled to herself silently as she remembered the first bed spread she slept on was covered with pink petal impressions. Then she cried softly for falling out of lust, and falling in love.

He had first appeared with a broken guitar under her balcony, singing a love ballad that didn’t rhyme. He had then appeared in that tiny room and seized her without pay. She had never felt so used, so corrupt, so filthy. She’d never felt so satisfied. Then on, Manoj’s face appeared in her cracked bathroom mirror every Monday and Wednesday. Sometimes, he spent Saturdays with her, tangling his longish fingers in her scented love locks, biting her lips and drawing blood. He always spat it out, with little pieces of masticated betel nuts. He always had his way with her, making all the other girls, of the little alleys and big dreams, jealous. Geeta guarded over him with audacious authority, while he wasted away on her blue silk bedspread, making deer and dog shapes with his hands, on the off-white walls. When they lay together, he measured every inch of her body with his longish fingers, warbling a strange mixture of Shakespeare and Ghalib. Geeta pulled his hair and pinched his cheeks, like an errant schoolboy, which always annoyed him. He would turn away and knock her hands aside in mock disgust. They would lie like that for hours, without moving closer or farther away, without sex. The next morning, Geeta would always find no one under the blue covers. All day, she was tempted to think it was a dream. Till he returned in the evening for chai and sex. Geeta was his mother’s age, maybe even older. Age felt weightless, without gravity. They never spoke of it with concern.

Soon enough, the illicit honeymoon began to wane and campus politics took up all of Manoj’s time. Now he played other games. The lover died a natural death at the hands of the politician and Geeta was smeared into her off-white background and blue bread spreads. She still waited and poured several cups of tea into dirty, cracked porcelain. But he seldom came, and when he did, his starchy white jarred against the walls. Geeta was intimidated, even scared as the sex became strictly business. He never stayed for more than an hour, he never chewed betel nuts in warm September sunshine. He never used Shakespeare again. He never undressed her anymore. The last time he came, he left a rose and a five hundred rupee note beside the cracked mirror. She lay like stone within her blue confines. She couldn’t rush after him. She was too ashamed and he, too important. And then one night, she caught sight of him, walking into another arched gateway, where Geeta had often seen a livelier, fuller, a younger version of herself.

Three years later, Geeta’s bread spread hadn’t changed. But all around her cracks and leaks had begun to fill her mind. Her green bangles caught the warm September sunlight, but she had no one to share it with. One by one, her patrons had left, for fear of offending Manoj Tiwari’s mistress, whom he hadn’t slept with in years. Geeta was older; her cracked mirror couldn’t lie very well anymore. She climbed down the wooden steps and practiced the art of luring, something Manoj had killed in her. Make hasty eye contact, smile slowly, indicate the ware. After all, the roof needs to be mended. The leak was ruining the blue bread spread.

Lie Down NOW

Five fingers stretched across a table top.
Measuring the width of all that’s lost.
Seamless dresses flutter in the warm wine summer.
Heat ripens the need to get closer, over beer.
Long fingers and big hands and four feet and broken shoes.
Exploring different positions for a comfortable end.
Roll the windows down, it isn’t as dark yet,
To cover all that you try and hide.
Shake my hand and walk out and don’t turn back.
Lest we expose the distance we’re trying to cover.
Run back though. Find and borrow.
What was lost in words, we’ll fit into sentences.
If it makes sense, so be it final for consumption.
Or we’ll ruminate.
A little further, beyond the windscreen and the ugly shadow of a building,
We’ll get lost in the labyrinth of we and us and me and you.
Don’t get lost. Forewarn the instinct.
Think hard, you never promised.
Aren’t you clever? Smirk if you will.
I’m going anyway.
Almost ready?
Yeah, thought as much.

when we cry

She'd decided she won't care. She wouldn't react. She wouldn't smile her usual smile. She'd be as collected as possible. Hold herself back. Not let go. Not allow herself to cringe at random pieces of conversation later. She wouldn't act like she was thirteen all over again. Or gloat over everything he said. She wouldn't laugh at all his jokes. She wouldn't crack any of her own. She wouldn't steer the conversation from its course to topics she wanted to touch. She'd allow him to breathe. Space out her sentences. Use a full-stop in her speech instead of disarrayed phrases, co-joined with semi-colons. She would shake her head at appropriate intervals. Use big words like 'substantial' and 'precisely' and 'obliquely'. She wouldn't be surprised when he looked away in the middle of a sentence. Not stare at him directly while speaking to him. She decided she'll talk at him, not to him. Assert a position of power without letting him know.

And she promised herself that she wouldn't look disappointed when he got up to leave.

As it happened, in the end, she did nothing at all. Did everything that was forbidden. Did everything she'd wanted not to do.

We'll never grow up. We're condemned to the live in the bubble of chemical romances. Look through the glass windows and make up your mind. And at the end of it all, 'wonderwall' will always play at the back of your heart, making you sick with sadness, till you choke on your own foolishness. And blackness will abound. Forever.

'the word is on the street,
that the fire in your heart is out'

Capital Rock (as written for the features section of The Pioneer)

The peace signs silhouette against the dark winter sky, swaying side to side to the reverberations of the electric guitar. The sky turns a neon blue as the cell phone cameras flash in contrast. The crowd responds with an ‘encore’ and roars with satisfaction. There are snatches of old classical rock doing its rounds along with tiny flasks of whiskey. The song in the air is ‘smells like teen spirit’ and the men on stage are longhaired, brash and brilliant. The guitarist keeps motioning to the crowd to scream louder as he turns his attention to the lead singer, belting the best all that is rock into the mike. The crowd cheers wildly and the smell of smoke and dope is inhaled. The floor is strewn with tickets of the show and bottles. It is rocker’s paradise and delirium incarnate. No, this isn’t Aerosmith in Times Square. It’s our very own indigenous Parikrama at a Delhi University fest.

Rock music, frowned and looked down upon by rule abiding ‘older’ generations was initially a western import, a hobby fostered by the rich, the bold and the brash. A quick start up pack to aggressive rebellion, rock was the religion of the youngsters who decided that turning bad was the ‘in’ thing. Metallica, Megadeath, Iron Maiden cassettes were played till ad nauseam in the back seats of Maruti Vans and anonymous bars.
Cut to 2007 and welcome to our very own subaltern rock movement in sadi dilli. No it isn’t only butter chicken and Daler Mehendi that gets Delhi on to its feet, it’s a whole movement that has accosted the youth in all its entirety. There are gigs, almost every night, at neo-urban hip joints like Café Morrison and the crowd is more than obliged to come listen to their favorite ‘Indian’ rock band heat up the scene.

Rock Roots

They start early, they do. The picturesque lawns on campus, the sprawling acres are witness to a cultural amalgamation, which is far removed from books. It’s musical fermentation that eggs these rock prodigies on to pursue a talent that isn’t traditionally accepted.
“DU campus shows present themselves as major opportunities for groups that are looking to make it big in the Delhi Rock Circuit. It’s a chance to get noticed and gain in publicity. We play at almost every rock show on campus and the response is phenomenal. The encouragement grows everyday as more people are being exposed to rock music.”says Adhir Ghosh of the campus band, Five Eight.

Most bands that have turned professional and have become reputed names in the Delhi circuit got a head start to their career from influences on campus. “ Even five years back, campus rock shows were a rarity. There were these staple annual competitions everyone would look forwards to, like IIT and NSIT. But all that has changed and the willingness of people to explore ‘nu’ rock and other alternate sounds have caused the Delhi rock scene to leapfrog into a genre of its own.”says Rahul of Joint Family.
And this isn’t just an enthusiastic rocker speaking. Amongst the burgeoning rock festivals in the country, many are held in Delhi. Delhi based bands have swept all three Campus
Rock Idols tours, which is the biggest amateur rock competition. Prestorika in 2004, Superfuzz in 2005 and FTN in 2006.

And even though the love of rock may find substance under strobe lights in a stage show, its roots lies in the heart of a teenager, lurking in the darker passages of school life. “Kids as young as twelve now play in homegrown bands, discovering art in attics. Rock has that big a following and it’s growing everyday. Most of these semi-professional college bands find their beginnings in school. That’s where you find your core group.”adds Bharat of Cynaide.


The road to rock

With the exception of Turquoise cottage, Delhi was a metro that sorely lacked a ‘rock’ joint as they’re now famously called. There was a huge indi-pop culture, a dance music culture and even a jazz culture. But rock music was considered the domain of doped, anti-establishment individuals. All that has changed now, as rock has come into its own and found its own standing. The opening of joints that promote the culture of live performances all over Delhi have led to a rise in rock performances. Café Morrison, Pragati Maidan, Dilli Haat, Blues, Thai and Chinese Café in Gurgaon and Elevate to mention a few, are the new haunts of rock enthusiasts. Anil Chaurasia, the manager of Café Morrison is in complete agreement, “ Earlier, the demand for rock music was restricted to annual events that were typically known for their ‘rock’ performances. Now the genre has spread. Now we have a live performance every Sunday night. The number of bands that entertain in our café now is close to 250. The response is good and so is the business.”
Sunayana Wadhawan, the drummer of a Delhi’s first all girl band, Who’s Jim, accredits this rise in rock to the various rock shows organised in the city. “ The Great Indian Rock Festival and Campus Rock Idols are the reasons why a lot of bands are born in the first place. The opportunity to showcase talent in front of an audience is complete high in itself. Winning one of these means being able to open for a hugely popular international act. This is incentive enough and in such situations, monetary concerns become secondary.”
Bands like The Superfuzz and Level Nine, who’ve been playing in the Delhi rock circuit for a while now too seem to find the scenario an amicable one. The initiative of organising rock concerts earlier lay only with Rock Street Journal, India’s first rock magazine. But there are a dozen other companies in the fray too like DNA, Gigpad.com, Prospect AM and Only Much Louder, that now organize stage shows for various bands and are willing to promote them.
“Getting a good gig, even two years back was next to impossible. If you wanted to play in a pub, the only people you could contact were RSJ. Now it’s much easier as a lot of these theme pubs are open to entertaining their patrons. It’s a steady progression.”adds Nikhil form Level 9.



Un-covered

‘Copy karte hain’ has been the common consensus on Indian musicians for the longest time ever. Rock in India began with bands playing covers of internationally acclaimed acts like Aeromsmith, Deep Purple, Iron Maiden. “ The demand was for covers and that’s what were played. People were never exposed to original Indian rock and thus didn’t know the vast body of potential that lay in originality.”says Randeep, the bassist for menwhopause. Menwhopause were the first indigenous rock act to perform only original tracks. “At our earlier concerts, when we’d play our original stuff, people would go into a stunned silence. But now that they’re familiar with our sound and style of music, they sing along to the music. The diversity of shows have helped tremendously in showcasing original talent.”says Anup Kutty of menwhopause.

Taking their cue from established bands, the new blood too is taking to playing original compositions at gigs. “It’s really un cool to play covers now. The audience may still relate to covers better, but a metal band’s worth lies in their ability to compose their own music.”adds Nikhil from Level 9. Delhi’s audience has turned over a new leaf as ‘cover bands’ slowly turn passé. “Earlier, people would go especially to listen to bands that covered Megadeath or Aerosmith well. That was their specialty. Now your genius lies in bringing in crowds through original compositions.”adds Adhir.

“There is immense potential in the new crop, both metal and non-metal. Now they can create sounds that can become crowd-pullers and genre in themselves. People too have become more experimental and are willing to give new bands and their music style a chance.”says Anupam, composer and sub-editor of RSJ.


The ‘rocking’ audience

The beelines outside Turquoise Cottage grow with every Prestorika performance- a glaring testimony of to the fact that Delhi officially has a rock audience. “The patrons of rock in Delhi are well versed with their stuff. The response to our music has improved over a period of time. In fact, all the aspects of being in a band have become rewarding in one way or the other.”says Nikhil of The Superfuzz.

Delhi is well on its way to becoming a mature audience. People have diversified their tastes from death metal and thrash to incorporate new sounds like ‘nu’ metal, grunge and jazz influences in rock. “Heavy metal may not be passé just as yet, but the audience has learnt to appreciate variety. Contemporary western influences like Slip Knot, Limp Bizkit and Rage against the Machines have lead to a completely new alternative sound becoming popular. The growing numbers of pubs and bars have only aided our cause.”says Bharat of Cynaide.

And what does the devoted fan have to say?
The economics of rock too is major cause for people to turn up at events like Campus Rock Idols and Great Indian Rock Show. Better organisers, more money and maybe even a record deal can motivate the new-age rockers to strike the right chord.
“ The success of established bands like Parikrama and Orange Street has encouraged the younger generations to take an active interest in rock music. They now know that recognition isn’t a million light years away.”adds Sunayana. Even though the commercial viability of rock bands is still pretty low in comparison to mainstream pop music, metal bands are cutting deals with record labels and their fan following is growing by the day.


Reverse Rockology

This time around, it isn’t Pink Floyd performing live in Banglore. It’s Parikrama playing at the Download Festival in Donington in 2007. Orange Street were the first ones to pioneer this reverse trend by performing in Sweden, Norway, Estonia and UK. International recognition has only spearheaded the attempt of rock bands to spruce up their act and play more genres to produce a completely different sound.” If you’re true to you art, then the audience will support you throughout. They will come to see you play anywhere, be it a pub, a five-star or even a garage. What matters is that you loyal to your style and sound.”adds Anup.

Rock is turning to slowly turning to religion as bands like Cynaide and The Superfuzz gear up for their album launches. Who’s Jim, AVR and Five Eight have already been featured in the weekly episodes of a yet-to-launched channel, Metro Nation. And the ticket prices for Prestorika are slowly hitting the sky, for the love of rock.

It’s been a hard day’s night. And we’re just getting started.

whether the weather will?

I try and embrace the morning. I have to let go in disgust. It chokes me, surrounds me with its empty stickiness. I regret my action almost immediately, quickly retrieving my outstretched arms. I recoil in horror at the prospect of stepping out. Showering just to sweat. Profusely. By this time the heat has built its aggression around me, in my hair, at the back of my legs, in crevasses I didn’t know existed. I shut my eyes, fall back into bed. Maybe solace can yet be achieved. I discover the redundance of drawing covers, finding them unnecessary and unhelpful to bridge the gap between sleep and uncomfortable dozing. I have no choice. Heat, the adversary, wins the dying battle. I get up, swing my legs around, let my toes touch the temporary coolness of the mosaic. And then all promises disappear.

I wait and wait. A car ride that must be undertaken. A car AC that is refused usage because of lack of petrol. Two women in the backseat, coping.
They shut their eyelids as their kajal runs in crazy streams down their powdered faces, merging with rivulets of sweat. They clutch anything that even remotely promises temporary relief. Handkerchiefs, Air India face wipes, water bottles. I look on. Tar turns to mirage. All possible forms of human transportation lines up, to get to offices, where they’ll encounter more lines, sweat more. But right now they must tackle the sordid heat. Splay it all over their bodies and their families, five to a scooter.

I look away in guilt. I found my escape. I’m the tiniest demographic of the AC age. The AC pervades the senses, fills them, rides up to the right places. The old monument soothes the parched eyesight. Stone meets smooth stone. Respite inhaled. Guilt exhaled.

Yet again the city turns traitor, abandons you to whimsical stirrings in the sky. There is a silver lining and there isn’t. Clouds peek from behind celestial mountains of cement, fill the gaps with the intermittent blue sky. Soon the blue vanishes, leaves only dark angry grey. One flash of brilliance streaks across, running parallel to the skyline, parting the sober drape of clouds and reaching down to the bridge, where they’re still waiting, the mere mortals, five to a scooter.
The sky has turned itself inside out, revealing to me everything that it normally hides. A car ride again. I’m in the back seat again, enjoying my exclusive demographic advantage. The knot of guilt forms as people run for cover. They’re drenched again, for different reasons. The day draws to a close quickly, the darkness ushered in faster than otherwise, shuts the door to all possible positive feeling. Atleast the heat could be explained, given shape and dealt with. Unprecedented rain is like the limbless beggar at the traffic light. You don’t escape it, give in, jingle a few coins. You fall out with your will. A hailstone hits you flat in your face. Your surprise is unchecked, comes out in broken syllables that make you sound like your two years old. You think the world is coming to an end.

The bed seems like a battered island, I’ve traveled many seasons to get to it. Once again the same covers, clutched tightly now, the rain has worked. I look at the little red mark the hailstorm made over my knuckle, as if to mark its existence. To remember it, I write it down. A three o’ clock, the sky is calm. But my mind isn’t.

Never diss the weather.

moral lessons

he threw the egg up in the air. it travelled a distance upwards but fell to the ground with a sickening crunch.
he threw the next one at an unassuming bald old lady, sunning herself in the delicate winter sunlight, playing an imaginary piano. it splattered into a thousand little tiny microshells that glistened momentarily, before gathering as a shoddy mess in the old lady cotton front. the ones that remained on her head seemed to stick out like miniature versions of highway restrooms his dad took him to, when they drove away for the weekends.he ran across the length of the terrace,burning the tips of his toes and his soles on the squelching tarmac. he stopped momentarily to smile at his newest(and ironically oldest) target and then pressed it between his lips.

the next egg found its way to the freshly pressed laundary room. he splattered the yellow yolk all over the stubborn white. the white seemed pious in its virtuous brilliance. he spread the yolk with his stubby fingers, dividing it equally over all the enire army of bedsheets and pillow cases, judicious in his execution.he then proceeded to laugh at all the detergent advertisements. he grimaced at the faint smell of raw egg that was beginning to travel up his nose and build permanence there.

the third egg went towards a sadistic attempt to mash it into the barbie dolls' blond hair. his sister had just washed her dollies, combing their tangled plastic hair with a tiny blue brush. instead of leaving their hair in shambles, he twisted and turned them into tiny, neat buns, matted with yolk. she would smile, atleast at first, as he let out a dry laugh. the laugh hollowed through the pink plastered room, bouncing off all the lilies on the wallpaper and hit his own ears. he was startled. he looked around and saw himself in the mirror. his reflection seemed grown beyond its years, almost like an adult, with the first sign of grey wrinkles. he hurried away, the smell of rotten egg now overpowering him, always a step ahead.

his father's new tie, his mother's green satin, the maid's best apron and his dog's bowl. the yolk seemed to coagulate and conjugate to form tiny and large patterns over everything, drawing inferences of the wisest men. and there was always that stench, that seemed to have caught him unawares, and invaded his mind. so much like blood, he thought.

ofcourse they didn't appreciate his art.

he protested. when they seemed bent on punishment, he took the last egg in his hand. almost ritualistically, he crushed it between his palm. the yolk trickled down his arm as he generously conditioned his red t-shirt with it. and he protested," See..i'm no different!"

it didn't amuse them. he didn't think it would. and as he walked away towards his room, he thought to himself, tomatoes.shampoo.wires. smile.

yashan hates bus rides

little yashan hates bus rides. infact he detests them. the sickly stench of metal in a hot humid south indian after noon gets to him. he prefers the cooler climes of north india.born out of north indian tradition, he adores food in all its manifestations.though he is partial towards strawberry icecream on cold winter evenings.he calls people by their characteristics rather than by their names.he idolises a guitarist with cracked lips and a tendency to be rude.
little yashan is quite insolent himself. he roams the corridors and bangs into walls, and quotes robbie williams.he hates american pop, especially boy bands but listens to them everyday.

little yashan studies all day long. he longs for drops of jupiter.he hates to travel and loves to sing out of tune. he doesn't sing on the bus though. because he hates bus rides.yashan loves the foot ball.its round like his head .little yashan knows who hit which goal in which minute of which world cup, but he doesn't know what nutella is.litte yashan loves to grumble but he calls it arguing.

yashan will grow up to love and be loved. because he hates bus rides and free speech.hence forth, we shall only call him that- young yashan.

SOCIAL ACTIVISM

The idea of a silk route,
through the tunnels of an infamous memory.
The mirthless dust paves your road;
to discovery.

You tread through its complex patterns, often
in circular mazes,
wondering whether the futility of your two-bit existence,
may at least find mention,
in an incoherent obituary.

Your written word is dead.
And you voice too loud to be heard.
Appalling apathy;
Did those yellowed leaves of your newspapers teach you not to feel?

Is your life a reflection,
Or is it a mockery.
Mockery of all those pearls you were to find,
on that Silk Route.

The clamour of a faceless minnion comes to haunt you ,
A mutlitude embroidered with narrow graves of ideals.
And you had wanted,
to block those holes in the wall,
with your numb fingers.

Could this have turned out differently;this emaciated emotion,
Can those yellowed pages turn into black and white,
Can all that clear sky turn muddy again,
Please.

for all those who aren't strong enough to own up to a weakness,a fault or hurt....

watch that light,
take that road,
in my shoes,
it wont be long, now,
till you see me,
at the end.
holding up a sign board to solace