of love and terror...

MAKE IT NEVER...

This morning I wrote a song,

About a wind and the moments gone,

You know it’s dark, you know it’s blind,

When man shoots to watch another man die...

Oh Lord, how many more, how many more

Before i can say its over...

How many more before too many of us have gone...

Sipping on a coffee with curtains drawn,

When they shot at you from the tennis lawn,

You can cry, you can scream,

Before you know the end of a dream...

Lost in the wild, the wild of men,

A world full of blood, deaths, insane...

We get a couple of moments, or maybe one

To just realise what we have done...

‘cause we are what we turn out to be,

Lost in the wild, the wild of sea...

A moment of love, a moment grand,

Can take us down to the special land,

Take me down there, just down

Where everything’s fine...

Oh lord, how many of us, how many of us,

Before I can say its really over...

How many of us before too many of us have gone...

This is about the Mumbai Attacks...sad..horrible. Even though I never lit a candle for you, or attended a service, I love you guys and admire you to the core...

May you live forever...

- Sid.

SMALL-TALK.

You know you’re something like a vague puzzle
When you’re drinking wine,
I just don’t know how to talk to you ,
Sometimes in the night,
Sleeping between a memory and a dream,
I see you, down and under and a gleam...
But i know memories are good...
They’re good yeah...if you don’t deal with the past, baby...

So lets just roll down, together in each other,
Lets just roll down, together forever...
Cause baby, you mean the world to me,
The world, yeah...with rains of vengeance,
Lets just roll down, together forever...

You know where this takes me today, early morning,
And your hands seemed so good yesterday,
When you poured me the glass of poison...
The way you talk, it makes me sit and wonder,
If we’re there still, it makes me sit and wonder
If at all, we were ever there-
And the questions, the answers, the hatred...
I can’t take it all...no...nomore...
Wherever you go, just leave your address,
I don’t want to seek you out,
You make up my world...
My world yeah...filled with poison...

So lets just roll down, together in each other,
Lets just roll down, together forever,
Lets just roll down, all the way,
Where we dare...
Lets just hide...yeah hide...from the sunshine...

- Sid.

Dreams Inc.


I walk past the ninth stone when the world sleeps with whores,

Enchanting are the lights, when the dead marries a tomb,

I kiss the dark and the groping pills, when vision is lost in the haze,

Rising from the ethereal blues the night sinks in shame...

You lie in your bed with cigarettes and love, stuck in a misty storm

When your soul dangles from the roof of life, and strokes your lost pride...

I smile again inside the burnt cage, with a little spilt rum,

When I find you staring back at me through the tilted and glossy mirror,

You clutch the silence, you keep the vows, over a quick and painless push,

It was six in the morning and the bed was cold, when breakfast and death was served...

On a stingy night, you had felt the moon, and brought the glaciers down,

You played the music, you swam the seas, the day the seas were dry...



So I'm on the road holding hands with killers, and trying to light a fire,

Or I walk the greater lengths beyond the purple sky where enchanting are the lights...


- Siddhartha.

THE BOY.

lets start with a short story.

quite a long time ago, in the island of guadara, an unheard place in the midst of the great Pacific, there lived a boy. small and beautiful as the island, there seemed not a worry in the world troubling his innocent mind. embracing the warm summers and icy cold winters, with a music in his heart and a dance in each step, it was as if he was born out of the mighty Heavens, probably when God was in a jolly good mood...

smooth and easy was his world...happiness was unbound, and life couldn't be better. till one day he became curious. "what lies beyond the seas?"he asked himself. with not a soul to talk to (not that he was even aware of companionship), he could only ask so many questions to himself. and till today he could answer all. but this was different.what lies beyond the seas?how could he say?his world comprised of this small island. this was all he knew and all he needed to know...till today. 'cause now this indormitable desire of knowing the answer began to haunt him...in his sleeps, his nightly walks. the strong winds began to tempt him and lure him into the great Unknowns...unable to contain himself anymore, he finally set out in a pretty, little raft he had made for himself...in search of his answer. he finally set out to seek the unseekable, to know the unknowable...on an everlasting quest to feel the unquestionable Truth.

he still wanders in his pretty, little raft, braving the stroming seas and romancing the lost winds. he still seeks the unseekable and tries to know the unknowable...he still wants the Truth.

well, aren't we all? with a belief that refuses to die and hope that keeps the flame forever burning, aren't we all living the dream? the dream that is in truth the undying reality...

the boy lives on hope...that someday he will succeed in his quest. and so do we. its hope which beautifies the dream. the hope of a meaning.

after all, life is just a broken snatch of a vast dream lived by the Mighty One.

the demise...

A lazy, windy afternoon right after the 2.50 p.m. classes, at the green benches. And nothing better if accompanied by the occasional guitar strums and jhalmudi. That was an ESSENTIAL part of college for us and even though I missed my classes at times (in other words, bunked), I would never really miss out on the ‘green sessions’. You see, that was the elixir of our college life. Even the advent of a stupid ‘CCD’ could not mar the fun of green benches.

And then, we are not the only ones. Through the years these green benches had become such an inevitable part of Xavier’s – from random lazing hours to sweet guitar tunes to the tense, nail-biting wait for part 1 or part 2 results.

I guess the green benches had seen all, tears of joy and sorrow, ringing laughter and of course the mending and breaking of many a heart (it would have been gross injustice not to mention this).

To those like us, wishing to hold on to these cherished memories, a word of advice – do not go to college anymore. To see the way all those moments of our college-lives have been brought down to a mere pile of rubble is simply sad. The damage is done. As for the people in authority who sat through this, it’s just they never understood the pulse of Xavier’s and probably never will. They are too insensitive for that. The question is, why do the students have to suffer for that? And why does a tradition like ‘green benches’ have to be compromised with?

The students’ voice was never heard. Not even when we, the students, raise our voices against a crime like this. And so at the end of the day, we have to see our fond memories in a heap of bricks.

For all you know, in the coming years there might be a ‘barista’ instead of a canteen, keeping with the ‘times’.

it's all a game...

it takes time to understand this really simple thing...and sometimes, it can take a lifetime...in case the point is still vague, and i'm pretty sure it is, i'm talking about a fight...

a sort of an inner struggle, which everyone at some point or the other has to go through...just that sometimes, the struggle lasts a bit longer...when the long nights seem a bit longer...and you pray for the endless summers(not applicable to tropical, humid climate) because you feel the cold...how vastly strange and meaningless a life would be without any waving emotions...it's just that, there lies a smile in every drop of tear...just as happiness is a shadow of loss...its a world of paradoxes, and paradoxes make up this charmed circle...and it's paradoxes again, which make up you and me...

the cause of the struggle might vary to each heart..what matters is this tiring yet oddly treasured struggle...

and it is then, that we need to understand the simple truth...simple yet very powerful...you see, it's all just a game...and the victory is yours...play along...just play along all the way...

to Ma and Baba...

when someone loans you money, you can say, "Thank You".

when someone offers you a seat, you can again say, "Thank You".

when a traffic cop lets you off without a fine, you can keep saying, "Thank You".

to someone you owe everything to, you can't just say, "Thank You"...

(p.s. courtesy: an old archies advertisement.)

lonesome blues...

Exactly 3 months ago, on one fine morning, I decided that I had enough of it...ever since every morning I’ve been thinking thus. But the point is, does it matter? Completely beaten, tired of the same sick, stale thoughts...and most importantly, craving for something new...it’s like beating your head against the wall, until either of the two gives in...really, come to think of it, are we all condemned like Sisyphus? Till as mr.camus says, the ‘final why’ arises?

Yeah...I hang up my soul to the ceiling above me and try to have a conversation with it. Worth it? at times certainly...when you are too conked up to think rationally(now that can happen EVEN if you’re NOT drunk). It’s like, you let yourself being pinned down and let others rape you emotionally. Maybe this arises from a deep lack of self love. And then you want to put an end to all of this...but wait, not so fast...remember, condemned like Sisyphus? So you can’t. And you yet again keep beating your head against the wall, have absurd, crazy conversations with your soul dangling from the ceiling...that’s a scary thought...was kafka right when he said, “the only meaning of life is that it stops”...life to kafka, some say, was extremely complicated. Nah...life couldn’t be simpler to the dear man. Depressing maybe, but certainly not complicated.

Walking the same street again, and not feeling the same. Instead what you encounter is a bunch of terrorising memories(cherished at some point of time), snatching you away from reality each time you want to cling to it. For me, I don’t even try...they will succeed, they are the stronger ones...the only way I can fight back is to let them do their job, and not mess around with them too much. What’s the use? If someday, they decide to leave on their own, I’ll heave a sigh of relief...but aren’t we condemned forever? A mistaken dream-mistaken for reality...shreds of laughter lace the sky...some moments turned bitter...and the ultimate losing of self...maybe never to be regained again

And then, what made me write all this?

Lonesome Blues.
I fill up this page with some unwanted scenes,
The sparkling wine of music flows, though forever,
When the rains are here, I shall lie to the glory of my lover,
Whose love evergreen shall this mortal soul drink…
Tonight I draw upon the grave sweetness,
The fevered heart receives in shame and pain,
To the merrier moments I plead in vain
To stay, stay and drown these days…
If I were looking for a greater joy,
In the depth of this womb, dark and blind,
It was to end in a futile cry of the mind,
An effort to see through the Greater Ploy…
If I were to swim the strangest ocean,
And I were to sail away with the slow dreams,
Let me hold your hand to go beyond the smallest streams,
To feel the warmth, for the dawn of heaven…

I seek for no answer; is there none?
Tired eyes stare at the unexplained sun,
Of greater deeds lost and undone
In the charmed circle of lonesome blues…


-Siddhartha Chatterjee.

shadow of the storm...

Shadow of the Storm.

You know girl, there might be a way out of this,
And Sunday might be just the day you missed,
You know why, u never looked up and down and right...
And as you walk along the sea, it could‘ve been you and me,
But you know, you’re miles apart the light,
You’re lost beneath the skies, because you’re free...
The waves of life just touch you once
There’s no other way, no other chance
But you can try to change the road you take,
Or can’t you just change the smile you fake...
You know girl, the time is never really gone,
The seas are never calm, just a shadow of the storm
That’ll rage inside you, cause you never saw the bit that was torn...
And while the nights were long, this time it seemed a bit longer,
And the words are just a way, you see your world today,
But you know, these things could have been a bit better...
It’s just a dream, some dream gone wrong,
It’s just a moment which has taken too long,
It’s the time, I couldn’t set right,
The lights were too blinding and bright...
But girl, you’re way beyond this now,
You stole a life you’re living, don’t know how,
You know why, you kissed the winds with just a little doubt...
But girl, there might be an end to this,
And Sunday might be just the day you missed,
And the seas are never calm, just a shadow of the storm
Inside you...you’re lost beneath the skies because you’re free...

- Siddhartha Chatterjee.

the fighters...

Life was moving slowly, slow and steady...the weather had been good for the past couple of days. It even rained the other night, quenching the thirst of the not-so parched earth, cooling the nature and lighting up a fire in many hearts.

Happiness isn’t exactly the way I would describe it, but a general air of acceptance hung around. The usual mundane work, struggling against the self to sit with books, searching desperately for a bit of desire to go through them...yeah...that’s the way it was...when it struck...

Like the cold, depressing wind out of nowhere, it was as if a million dementors had been set free to feast on my soul and feasting they were...that’s how the news came...exams for more than a month...from the 10th of april till the 14th of may... what have we done to deserve this? A bunch of students like us, who never hurt a fly(figuratively)! The hangover of exams is bad enough, and then if it is for a month...I’d rather give up my soul before the ‘dementors’(read: examiners) can snatch it away...

Just that there’s another way of looking at the whole thing...fight back!! Like producing a patronus...and a whopping strong one at that. If you’re looking forward to break our spirits, and imprison our souls, we are the freedom fighters who’ll keep fighting for the freedom from the exam blues. And so party every time we take an exam(thank god for the long gaps in between). But come what may we won’t let this helluva one month get into us...we will NOT let the dementors suck our souls to satisfy their hunger.

UNITED WE STAND...DIVIDED WE FALL...

macher jhol...

A Bengali meal without ‘macher jhol’ (fish curry) is incomplete. The ‘mach’ holds the lives of many Bengalis, and though I dig mutton(kosha mangsho/kochi pathar jhol), chicken, pork and beef, there is nothing like a brilliant ‘macher jhol’. And this happens to be one of the many things i miss after i came to Delhi. Many a days, I slept dreaming of ‘ghee bhaat’, ‘alu shedho’(boiled potatoes), dim shedho(boiled eggs), alu posto, mushur dal, murir ghonto(a specialty comprising of the head of a fish and rice), parshe mach( a type of fish), pabdar jhal, chingrir malaikari, shorshe ilish, ilisher paturi, doi mach...the list is hopelessly long.

Ever since I was a kid, mach had been my favourite along with many other dishes. I’ve never been much of a quantity person than a quality one...in other words I might not eat much, but I love to eat good. Back in the days of Durgapur and Kolkata the realisation never actually dawned that how would life be without the traditional Bengali ‘macher jhol’...now i know the answer...staying in a hostel where they NEVER EVER serve you fish(save for the few ‘bird flu’ days, and that too badly cooked fish), made me realise that yeah..life without ‘macher jhol’ is like a bird without wings...well, I am this passionate about the dear dear ‘macher jhol’. and with no offence to the food habits here, man, 'rajma chawal', and 'ghatti ki subji' are poor or rather no substitute for a well cooked ‘macher jhol’...

Living the days like this, I once happened to go to C.R.Park, during my early days in delhi. C.R. Park(Chittaranjan Park) as the name suggests is the Bengali settlement in delhi with many Bengali cuisines scattered here and there, ‘babumoshai’ and ‘ma tara’ to name a few. That day when i had pabdar jhal at ‘ma tara’, I could at least locate the lost bit of life...since if not home food(I can’t expect heaven after all) the food was superb and the pabdar jhal was awesome. Some complained that 80 bucks for a pabdar jhal was too much...but I thought it was worth it..at least after days of having ‘rajma chawal’, I could finally breathe again.

It was a long wait indeed for a amazingly satisfying ‘pabdar jhal –bhaat’, but each moment was worth the wait...Long live ‘macher jhol’!!!

to be (a fool) or not to be...

It was sometime back, when I came to know this guy called Shujoy. He had wanted someone after so long; after what seemed to him like ages...and well, one and a half years is definitely not a short span of time. after all we aren't historians, you see...

the question is, was he wrong?was this unjustified? well, different people might think different ways and to each his own. dash it all, there ain’t an answer for every goddamn thing on earth.

it all began on that chilly afternoon at momo's point(a popular student's hangout),when he saw her...and he wanted her. he just felt that she could drag him out of the shit he was crawling in…and bring him out clean. he doesn’t know her name, what she does, where she stays…in short, he doesn’t have the slightest damn clue about her. just that he happened to see her at an eating joint. he visited the place twice after that with absolutely no darned work to do, just to pursue the dream he had dreamt. Tens and thousands of girls – cute ones, ugly ones, fat ones, slim ones, he suffered them all…but that dream just remained a dream…

I sometimes hear them say, life gives you just one chance – grab it or leave it. well as for the one 'chance' all he could do was to curse himself that why on earth didn’t he go up to her that day? But hey,before i hear you guys say, "jackass", lets hear him out. you see, the thing is, she was gone...and yeah...it happened just like that…within a second. One moment he saw her right there and the very next moment she’s gone. Was that a fair chance?

I don’t know if at all this is possible…after all life isn’t a cliched bollywood flick. And reality hurts…hell, he knows that, doesn’t he? But yet, knowing and being fully aware of all this, he still wants her, by some miracle…by some goddamn miracle. Are all his ideas about love so false…so wrong, so bloody screwed up?

hah, now the question is, do we care?i mean, beat this fellas,the jerk went to the same restaurant twice after that for abolutely NO work...and mind you, he didnt go there to HOG...I mean, how silly can a person be??what does he have instead of a brain?something filled with rosy, romantic thoughts?did he seriously think even for a moment that he would see her?one face amidst the teeming , millions of students?ok, now give me a break...i wouldn't even call hm a die-hard romantic...just a dumb jerk...

hell shujoy, what you actually need is a real great clean-up of your brain..so long buddy...

shantiniketan trip...

when 13 super crazy freaks decide to get together, what results is something like the shantiniketan trip. with an awesome place to stay(thanks to bibo) with an amazing slope on the roof(makes u wanna fly), the shantiniketan trip was FUN right till the moment we crashed back into our respective homes(sabya and I at ajoo's). barbeque with bacardi rum, 'mangshor jhol'(chicken curry),maggi, 'kacha shobji'(raw vegetables), shonar tori( resaurant), 'moving star' and 'merging steps'(when miki and I were flying), 'assistant police commisonar', 'logno'(sacred hour), 'netted blouses', 'mohua'(local liquor)...I guess we did it all. even at the time, when we had to return, we were still sitting on the terrace over a few drinks at 6 p.m., while the train was scheduled at 6.15 p.m. although bibo's place was quite near to the station...but nonetheless...the way we ran for the train...(two of us even had to speak to the driver of the train to wait for a minute or so!!!)..all in all, we had the time of our life...and life was never better...

dust and bones...

to the intellectuals and pseudos, friends and foes, simple-hearted and snobs, lovers and ditchers[:P], all in all we're just another brick in the wall...

to the painless joys and shreiking pleasures, the sweet, vague wanderings and endless waits, the weird dreams and weirder realities, the soaked moments in the rain and shades in the sun, all we are is dust in the wind...

"Naked silver shines on thine eyes,

Smiles the heavens to see such a joy unfold"...

burn me down...

Burn Me Down…

In the middle of the night,
You turned off the lights,
There is no one beside, when I burn…
Leaving the lost way,
I still can hear them say,
And then I feel the ray, of the sun-
There is no one beside, when I burn…

Burn me down, with your heart,
Burn me down, I'm torn apart,
Burn me down with the glow of your eyes…
Burn me down, in my pain,
Burn me down, when it rains,
Burn me down with the touch of your lies…
Burn me down, today,
As you burnt me, yesterday,
Burn me down, 'cause I'm burning again…

Wrapped up in the sky,
And the vision of the blind,
I still can hear you cry, all alone,
When you had your last say,
When you told me, "go away",
And I searched for a way, back home,
'cause then you felt the ray, of the sun,
Is no one there beside, when I burn…

Burn me down, with your heart,
Burn me, I'm torn apart,
Burn me down with the beauty of your eyes…
Burn me down, with my pain,
Burn me down, when it rains,
Burn me down with the touch of your lies-
Burn me down, just today,
As you burnt me, all these days,
Burn me down, 'cause I'm burning again…
Burn me down…

Somewhere deep inside,
I thought I saw a light,
When she came into my life, and I burn…
Touch me with your eyes,
In the silence of the night,
Tell me you'll be mine, 'cause I burn-
There is no one beside, when I burn…

Burn me down, with your heart,
Burn me down, I'm torn apart,
Burn me down with the glaze of your eyes…
Burn me down, burn today,
As you burnt me that day,
Burn me down, 'cause I'm burning to die…
Burn me down, with your kiss,
Burn me down, in that bliss,
Burn me down with that warmth of your smile…
Burn me down, 'cause I'm burning again-
Burn me down…

- Siddhartha.

fly away...

Fly Away.

Like the angels aren't there, I've lost my protection,
And it seems so far away, I've lost her somewhere in the way,
She's smiling at me forever in my hallucination…
I walk the dawn, I've felt her sometime in the morn,
Hold a mirror, someone has to see my reflection…

Fly down, fly away, fly away like you don't know me,
Fly away like there are no memories,
Sometime, somewhere I'll hold you in the rain,
And you fly away, like you never knew me in my pain…

Like the wind ain't blowing, and the stars ain't up,
And though the ways are closed now, but still I hope in vain,
She kisses me in the night, when the moon ain't up,
As I hold the rain, I feel her somewhere in my pain,
Hold a candle, since the sun ain't up…

Fly away, fly away, fly away like you don't know me,
Fly away like there are no memories,
Someday, somewhere maybe I'll join you once again,
And you fly away, like you never knew me in my pain…

And I sing for you in the lone evening, when the stars ain't up,
The life comes back down the stony way, when the stars ain't up,
And since you wanna fly away of my world, the stars ain't up,
As I hold the rain, I feel her somewhere in my pain…

Like the angels aren't there, and I've lost my protection,
And it seems so far away, I've lost her somewhere in the way,
She's smiling at me forever in my hallucination…
I walk the dawn, I've felt her sometime in the morn,
Hold a mirror, someone has to see my reflection…

- Siddhartha.

and this is love...

And this is love…amidst the foggy days and the thick haze…
When I find a solace in your soft arms, protected and liberated,
When we surrender together to the bliss of our beings-
And this is love…so pure and undefined,
As I lose myself in the beauty of those eyes…
And the briefest moments eternalised by your smile…

-Siddhartha.

deliverance

DELIVERANCE.

The rest o' the life will be forgotten in my pain,
The rest is no joy for the dead and weary soul,
The old and nice time all spent
Half in sorrow and half in apprehensive rain...
The lake swells up in desire,
It rages in its own frustration swaying its wild hair,
Follow it not to the dungeons dark and steep,
Methinks, i lie with the serpent on the pyre...
And when it comes storming and shrieking,
The other side of my life ceases to live,
The other happy and damned joys
Fails to make this heart a-living...

Hope once more, and raise the head,
Strike the monster and fill it with dread,
Hurt it now as you had bled,
Let it fall in the dungeons' depth...
Rise, Rise and Rise again
And rise as you had never risen before,
Live today since the world's at your feet ,
Live like there's no tomorrow...

Follow it not to the dungeons dark and steep,
Methinks...I lie with the serpent...unnecessary and unaccomodated...

it's alright...

why don't they speak up?do the lack the courage, the hardcore guts or is it because they're plain indifferent? and then, why do you care? a life, is all you need...simple, life...since it's not so simple after all...