Tangled Forever

Her jet black, Rapunzel-like hair,

Trickled down the tower of her soul.

But they were tangled and confused,

Just like her mind.

Her castle was filled with people,

Who wore fake smiles and fake masks.

In this ocean of heartlessness,

She had learnt to live alone.

Or so she thought.

One fine day,

When she was on her way back to her kingdom,

She met a wanderer.

The wanderer was just not like her.

Her hair just reached her shoulders,

And her smile beamed the confidence that lay underneath.

They became friends instantly.

The princess got back to her castle,

And all she could think of was the new friend she had made.

Even though she was new, she was real,

The princess felt.

As time passed,

The wanderer and the princess became friends,

Untangled each others’ minds,

And enhanced each others souls.

They stuffed their stomachs together,

And broke their hearts too,

Their passions wavered,

But their comradeship never faded.

They grew up and their paths took them to different places,

But their hearts stayed together,

And kept them connected.

They spoke every single day,

Not through the telephone,

But through their connected minds.

She’s so girly

The jet black, silky hair trickle down her shoulders, and her dark black heels make noise as she walks. Her tight pink dress shows off her lean figure, and the pink lipstick on her soft lips makes her even more attractive than she already is. The kohl, kajal and eyeshadow make her eyes bright, but somehow hide the shine of her inner self. Her hands and legs have undergone the painful procedure called waxing. They call her a ‘perfect girl’. But the desire to do more makes her doubt how perfect she truly is.

There she goes. Her overgrown pixie cut hair lingers over her eyes, making it difficult for her to see the world.  The tag of her loose, plain white t-shirt says, Zara Boys-14. Her HRX running shorts end just above her knees. Her eyeliner-less eyes have a glimmer of unconventionality. Her purple Nike shoes, with her grey socks are a total fashion disaster! The hair on her unwaxed arms sways proudly with the wind. She’s been jogging, so her luscious pink lips have a mixture of Vaseline and sweat applied on them. They call her a ‘tomboy’.

For her, she as girlish as one can be.

Who is a girl after all?

Is being a girl about how one looks? She doesn’t think so.

For her, being a girl is so much more than that. Being a girl is about having the strength to define oneself. Being a girl is all about having one’s own personality, which is determined by one’s own thoughts, and not by what the world thinks of her. Being a girl is about being confident, strong and a fighter. It’s about fighting with one’s own muddled conscience, which sways between the thoughts of the world, and the thoughts of her soul, while defining herself. The world may dictate the rules and way of living to her, but she is one who breaks all these boundaries and creates her unwavering self, and moulds herself they way she wishes to. She doesn’t allow the views of society to contaminate her imperfectly perfect self. She just wishes to be herself.

A true girl is the one who dresses up and applies makeup to satisfy herself, and not to impress the world around her. A true girl is the one who understands how beautiful her soul is and embraces her true inner beauty. On the other hand, if a pair of boxer shorts and a pixie haircut make someone feel good about herself, then that is her ‘girlishness’ defined. Girlishness is all about feeling about who you are.

Over time, being girly has been associated with wearing pink, using makeup, dressing in skirts, dresses or blouses, taking an hour to get ready, and shopping. I really think that as the world around this is changing, the outdated and restricted definition of ‘girly’ needs to undergo a change. Girlishness needs to go beyond one’s appearance and its time that being a girl becomes something beyond applying pink lipstick and wearing a pink dress. Its time that being girly becomes about embracing one’s inner self.

Princess

 O my dear princess,

This isn't a fairytale,

This is life.

Your luscious blonde hair don't reach for your knees,

And your baby pink gown is seldom seen.

The only corset that binds you is that of society.

Your glass slippers don't crack, but your heart does.

No charming princes,

No fairy godmothers,

No magic.

Just you.

Each new day comes with a new challenge,

Not with a new dress.

Your weapon isn't your gullibility,

It's the sword of your robustness.

The witch of doubt arrives each day to haunt you,

And you fight back with perfection.

So my dear princess,

Be the warrior you are.

And fight your battle everyday,

With the world.

And with yourself.

Home

The fragrance of warmth touched my heart.
And the doors of glee opened.
The arms of familiarity wrapped around me,
And the angel of dwelling kissed my forehead.
The bed of dreams floated towards me like a vision,
Translucent and vibrant.

The rustic green walls were all the same,
But their shine was new.
The snapshots on the walls appeared real,
As real as the memories they encapsulated.

 The bitterness of my cup of coffee,
Had vanished by the aura of benignity it carried.
My window pane wasn’t broken anymore,
The passage of time had fixed it.
The old chair let out a new creak.
And the torn curtains gave me a glimpse of my soul.

It was then that I realized,
My home wasn’t a building of four walls,
It was a building of four million memories.

The fierce eyes

An atheist. That’s who I am. I am the one who doesn’t pray or doesn’t like a tika on her forehead, or even the one who goes to pujas merely for Prasad. I never really question my judgment of being an atheist, for I never really feel any emotional or as they say “spiritual” connection to God, or rather shall I say idols of God. As a lover of history, I find solace and my emotional love only in historical monuments. I simply feel mesmerized when I go to any, and just exult and submit to even the not very attractive, but certainly the most beautiful monuments.

Its Navratri, and the festive season in India is in full swing. I am a huge foodie and usually attend festivals to relish the Prasad. My favourite festival of all times is Durga Puja. I have an affinity for Bengalis I guess. Be it their literature, their music, their culture, or even their food, its all a part of my heart. I go to Durga Puja every year to admire the gorgeous pandal and idol, and obviously, munch on the yummy Fish and sweets.

Every time, Durga Puja for me is about how delicious the Fish Fry was with the mustard sauce, or how the sandesh was super soft and simply yum. But this time, it was something beyond that. Something I didn’t expect it to be.

Everything was the same this year, the pandal, the food, even the location. I guess there was just something different about me. The idol, as usual, was surrounded by many other devis and our dear Ganpati bappa. When I stood at the door of the pandal, I could see just Durga maa and the devis surrounding her.

With a majestic crown on her head, and a garland of bright red flowers embellishing her neck, she sat comfortably on the fierce lion, looking stronger than it. Her ten hands each held a weapon, but the most powerful one was her eyes. Big, bold and vigorous, they stared at all who surrounded her. She didn’t look girlish, but she was certainly feminine. With her unafraid eyes, and her blood-like red garland, she merely gave vibes of female strength and power.

As I moved closer, I saw something new. A demon. Who was crushed underneath the mighty Goddess’ feet. He didn’t look afraid really, had a slight frown on his face. But Durga maa clearly overpowered him. I looked into the idol’s eyes. I felt afraid, to be honest. The strength in her eyes was penetrable even into the heart of a girl who didn’t believe in her.

I came out of the pandal and satisfied my hungry palate with a sumptuous meal of Fish fry, chicken biryani, cham cham, rosgulla, and sandesh. I enjoyed it a lot, as usual, but couldn’t get the stunning yet fierce eyes of the Goddess out of my head. I just couldn’t place what I could relate it to.

Well, it did strike me in the end. The mighty and vehement Goddess is a reflection of the women today. I have been reading a lot about the #MeToo movement in recent times, and am a huge supporter of the same. I realized that all the women standing up for themselves and protecting themselves against the hopeless harassers, are so much like Durga Maa. They have the power and the strength to stand up against all those who outrage their privacy, their modesty, their self-confidence. They have the guts to crush all the demon-like men under their feet. They are stronger than the fierce and rigid lion-like society, which attempts to overpower them, but always fails. They do sit on this lion, but with their head held high and their demeanor and willpower forcing the lion to retreat and surrender to them. That’s who Durga Maa represents now. The women of today. The women for whom fear in non-existent. The women whose ferocious eyes penetrate into the ‘physically strong’, but mentally weak hearts of the men who dare to confront them. Durga is strength. Durga is power. Durga is today. More power to the #MeToo movement. And ofcourse, Durga maa ki jai!

Agatha and Sophie

She was terrified.

She was petrified.

She couldn’t let her best friend die!

Sophie lay beside her,

Storian speared through her heart.

The war around her ceased,

But the war within her perpetuated.

She stared at Sophie,

At the witch who was a princess,

At the witch who had saved her life.

Agatha didn’t know what to do.

She didn’t know how to save her.

She wrapped her dying friend in her trembling arms.

And tried in vain to fight the staunch wound,

With a bed of tears.

Her friend didn’t deserve to die,

For with her last breath,

Agatha would cease to exist too.

Sophie’s eyes flickered with life.

Sobbing and shaking,

Agatha kissed Sophie’s cold forehead,

Hoping that the magic of love would take away the evil death which resided in her.

The dead ground wept.

And Sophie’s silent heart faded.

The bright blue Storian turned a dull grey,

And Sophie’s luminous skin allayed.

Her cheek was wet with Sophie’s blood,

But Agatha continued to cry,

Until the blood vanished.

Sophie’s dead heart lived.

And her spotless skin glowed.

The deadly red blood evaporated.

And the tinted soul returned.

“Sophie?” Agatha murmured with difficulty.

“Aggie!” Sophie answered with a faint yet lively enthusiasm.

They smiled.

“Who needs princes in our fairytale?”

Sophie exclaimed.

With the strong gush of wind,

The Storian blazed with new life,

And returned to its tower in the sky.

The two girls retreated.

Smiling at each other constantly,

Their bodies shimmered and shone,

Gradually turning translucent.

Tedros ran towards Agatha,

For he didn’t want to lose his princess.

But it was too late,

The eternal fairytale of the princess and witch,

Culminated without a prince.

This poem is based on the book School for Good and Evil by Soman Chainani.

School ke din-2

SST, or the long Social Studies, was, for me, a class I looked forward to. But since half of our class was of engineers, and the other half of doctors, the whole class wasn’t particularly fond of this period. This was the period where our dearest Geeta ma’am would put in all she could to make the class interesting and interactive. We used to have all sorts of innovative activities and our andar ki teacher used to be introduced to our dear XC.  There is one activity in particular that I remember; it was on my favourite chapter, The Indian National movement. It was a complicated one, so to be brief, we had to pass around questions written on a sheet and had to write the answers in 1 minute. We were in teams. And my team just rocked. Even the SST haters turned into curious and active people, who gave many answers. The best part was Dibya and I fighting over a date, which had a difference of merely a year!

The next class was English, which was our stress buster. Amit sir used to be our “dream teacher.” A master storyteller, who transformed every cheerless Ali into a determined Patol Babu, and who used to treat the not-great-hunter Mrs Packletide as a person who was as brave as Julius Caesar. He was the perfect mentor for an aspiring writer like me, for he didn’t just teach us the school course, but taught us much beyond that. He always encouraged us to be unique and think outside the box. He taught us that even sky is not the limit. He was, is and will always be our coolest teacher. We have had our share of funny moments with him, but on serious note, he has truly changed the way we all look at our lives.

Next up, we used to have Hindi. Well, not everyone really likes Hindi. But I must say, Shraddha ma’am certainly tried her best to make it interesting. The most memorable Hindi lessons were the ones when we learnt the particular chapter- “Tattara-vameero katha”, which was essentially a typical Laila-majnu type love story. It was written with so much prem-bhav, that our class of science and maths geeks just couldn’t figure out where the logic in that was. It described how Tattara and Vameero just stood and looked at each other for one complete evening, without talking and fell in love. That’s really bizarre. Then the end, in which Tattara breaks the island into two distinct landforms, and Vameero goes berserk was just crazy. I mean, if Tattara had the power to cut the Earth into two pieces, couldn’t he just run away with his beloved Vameero? So this Tattara-vameero was the new Priya Varrier in our class. It was viral, and everyone was really interested in making fun of it, and making ‘verbal memes’ on it. Ketaki had made one which I remember now. She asked everyone which Bollywood song would play when Tattara would break the Earth. When nobody had the answer, she started singing the song ‘Dharti hilade’ from Ajab Prem ki Gajab Kahani.

Apart from all these lovely classes, a time I really miss a lot are our lunch breaks. The perfect way to describe all of us during this time was the song, “Chahe koi mujhe jungle kahe..”  Foodies and bhukkads like me used to roam around the country i.e. our class. Others used to go on international trips i.e. to other classes to search for even more interesting dishes. We used to not just eat, but also jump around and unleash our wild sides. We used to do really lame things, like playing badminton with chalks and newspapers, or calling random people and in their response to ‘Kya hua’, we used to reply,nothing. There used to be spontaneous Shinchan dances, with some terrible songs, which self-proclaimed singers used to sing. It used to be like our little party.

Once school was over, we used to proceed to our buses again. Now, this back-to-home journey is the part I miss the most. We used to cherish our day and talk about it to each other, and Srija had some or the other complication and confusion from the day and used to be frustrated, and we all used to make her smile. Sometimes, we used to eat, and especially Srija’s tiffin was pounced upon. When it had chicken biryani, it was difficult to distinguish the chicken from the rice as most of the chicken was eaten. Then ofcourse, there were the lame jokes and unique conversations. And well today, the only bus I sit in is my dear bus number 166, and the only tiffin I eat is mine, and the only thing I truly miss is well, my school.