Work, War and Worship

In between those various shades of grey,
Among those silky specters of dichotomy,
Around the path that renounces color,
Will you find your way?
Serenading a Silver Scarlet on St. Mary’s,
With a Vestige that keeps you on edge,
Amidst Fury, Fever and Floundering Glory,
Are you really still sane?
They say Ego is the Height of all parables,
They say Self-belief is Narcissus in his shambles,
They call upon their Gods and Goddesses,
To relieve themselves of their own senses,
How is this game even played?
If Arrogance and Glory really were talk of ambition,
Then why do Titans not prove themselves worthy of their ribbons,
If climbing the ladder got you flattered,
Why talk of rust,
Why talk of dust,
Why talk of sweeping away the rotting bust,
When laughing in the midst of damnation was all that ever mattered?
Now, Remember:
As time is but a passing glimpse in the eye of the Fire-ant,
As a toddler’s fist is softer than the brush of thistle and ale,
As vast as this Earth is being colored red,
As small as may seem the man with his hands folded under the shed,
Remember to be Humble.
As a monument is built with cinder, soot and sordid sweat,
Its Greatness is remembered not by its majestic mahogany,
But somewhere along it’s lines are the little details of intricate craftsmanship,
That can only be seen from within by the Person,
Only to be admired by the un-sequestered light of the universe,
In plant, pot and plasma.
This conquers the most important thing there is to be conquered –
Themselves.
Oh beseech!
Long gone is the sword of Alexander,
Long lost is the horse of Kublai,
Long rid has this Earth of Barbaric conquest,
She remembers not the Men that saw fit to take her as a Whore,
But she grows in her womb the People that see fit to take her as a Child.
Amidst the Truth, Lies and Truthful Lies,
Read between the lines,
The war outside your home is not outside,
It is in you.
Amidst the ramblings and fumbling of Egos and Alimonies,
See between the signs,
The wisdom lost because of this world’s rules is not their loss,
It is yours.
Amidst the competitions, glories and furrowed brows,
Hear between the lisps,
The battles lost in the disguise of small victories is not upto them to see,
It is upto you.
True ambition cannot be achieved,
If not for Faithful Veneration.
Shed away the lies, the flies, the dusty scribes,
Make reason and rationale your allies.
What is that is worth the fight?
What is that decides right is might?
An Iron-born in an ever-festering swamp?
Or the dewdrop that makes the sun shine twice as bright?
On the worst of days, on the brightest of nights,
Learn that learning is the Utopian Right,
Learn from your enemy,
Learn from your master,
Learn from your mother,
Learn from your benefactor,
Learn from your chapter,
Learn when they say you deserve to be ripped to shreds,
Learn when they cry after you clean their blood-infested beds,
Learn when you find yourself with all against none,
Learn when they take your Truth high up to Kingdom Come,
Learn, I beseech, with a folded hand,
Learn from thy mirror.
Because true Glory lies not in contradictions of opposite faith,
But in letting those roots hold you deep onto your spirit,
So let the stale stagnant fester,
Dip those drops of blood in the line of a transitive vector,
And within your own Sun you will find the Warmth to fend off Winter’s light,
Vidi, Vici, Veni starts with a look in the eye.
Amen.

Birdman (or The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance): A Review

‘Film is not analysis, it is the agitation of [the] mind; cinema comes from the country fair
and the circus, not from art and academicism.’  - Werner Herzog


Was Herzog being prophetic when he talked about the clash between these two
ideals in Inarritu’s Magnum Opus?

Birdman, as a film, speaks to us on multiple levels. At the forefront, it is a story
about a washed-up superhero-actor who is trying to get back to his last shot at
glory in a Broadway play written by Carver where he risks everything he’s got.

But, as the story moves forward, we realize that we’re not only watching this final
outreach towards glory in the life of an actor-trying-to-be-artist swansong but
we’re also watching all his subconscious layers of wishful thinking unfold
prophetically right before us.

Cerebral, smooth and scintillating. The film begins with a shot of Riggan/Birdman
from behind wearing nothing but his white underwear. From that point onwards,
the entire film is shot in the form of a single take, a technique first established by
the master of suspense, Hitchcock himself in Rope (1948). This is meta-filmmaking
at it’s finest. The theme of the unhinged, uninterrupted  rhapsody of Broadway is
transcended, all across the silver screen, as night changes into day and day
dissolves into night as our characters laugh, cry, explode -revealed in front of us -
all of this smoothly tied to the central dilemma of the main character – I don’t
exist. I’m not even here – Riggan/Birdman

Michael Keaton, as you may know, was the first Batman on screen in the 1989
version directed by Tim Burton. Lauded by filmgoers and critics alike, that film
was a resounding success and is still watched by fans of the Caped Crusader.

Although, the funny part is that after Batman, Keaton completely fell off the
radar, much like Riggan in Birdman. It’s almost as if we’re watching the actor and
character become one in another surrealistic technique of metamorphosis taking
place on screen in an absolutely riveting fashion.

The screenplay is tight and crisp, complemented by some brilliant performances
by Emma Stone as the drug-addict daughter and Edward Norton as the egotistical
actor trying to get his spotlight any which way he wants, both posing problems for
Riggan’s final swansong.

All three of these able actors, Inarritu as director and writer have been nominated for the Oscars which are to take place in a week.

Also deserving notable mention is Zach Galifianakis as the lawyer-friend, Naomi
Watts as the debutante actress and Amy Ryan as the supportive ex-girlfriend.

All in all, Birdman is a masterpiece. It’s the sort of film that grows on you long
after you watch it and stays in your head hours after you leave the auditorium.

The questions it poses and the statements it makes are best left to Interpretation.

But that’s the beauty of the film. It allows you to make your own choices. Just like
Birdman. Touché?

Recollections

Each part, part of the whole, yet none without a greedy hole.

'Art is my life. Ambition is a fuel.' - The vacuum. Oh the Vacuum. I could see the absolute look of flummoxation and emptiness on their faces. How something so huge in all it's magnanimity could be a part of one's existence, how would one understand. It was clear that none of them had ever felt such happiness, such love for anything in their lives. Instantly, pity replaced hate, and I was ready to forego anything inconsequential they wanted me to.

The Artist.

Selling your soul has become fashionable. In a different era, it would've been unthinkable. In a different world. But that's not to say that I wouldn't have done it, even then. Even then. Take nothing away. Nothing.

 The Executive 

I take time from other pieces. I want it, I sniff it out. I consume it, I leave it, I put them into my own structure of the condescending Jigsaw stream of life.

 The Jigsaw Puzzle Solver 

Th-Tha-Tha-Thank-Thankyou-Thankyou-F-F-For your kind words..your kind words. They w-w-would, th-th-they w-w-would certainly beeeeeeeeee tak-tak-taken into the highest form of CONSIDERATION (Without a stutter, that last word.)

The Stammerer 

Self-pity is the most natural emotion wallowing within humans in times of crisis or chimera. (Am I a reincarnation of Freud, she asks?)

 The No-nonsense Woman 

People stay miserable all their lives, not understanding why. They say "Oh I hate this, but I love that" I say 'Noo! You're gonna suck at that too, cuz you didn't learn nothin'. How do you expect Salvation when you're ready to ignore education every second of your life?

The Optimist 

I have given my life to the Dream. I want nothing more. I'm happy. I'm no more than a fluttering fuck found on a slippery sidewalk.

The Sleeper 

I will bring your world to it's ruins. I will burn it till nothing's left of it but charred remains of soot and dust. Then I will dance in the middle of the wreckage sucking exactly the same black candy and intaking exactly the same amount and nature of cholesterol as you are, now. I will then ask you to look me in the eye. You will call me mad. You will only be half-right. And then? We dance.

The Madman 

How is it that the nature of your conquest only extends to burning flesh, breaking bone and tearing tissue? 

jigbobjigbob

jigjig

jig

The only thing that ever meant anything to you was what you considered your worst reflection. Now, in a moment of passion, or if you may call it 'weakness', you break it. It turns out to break you, forever. And irreparably.

jigjig

Because what you don't realize, motherfucker, is that in my fantasies, I am beautiful. And you are Ugly.

*Looks away from mirror*

The Mirror-Seller 

Come here, boy. See what a mess you've made. You know what happens to bad boys, don't you? They don't go to God's bed. They don't sleep on his soft cushions, right next to Him. He loves you, don't you understand? Don't you see? He loves you. Don't take a chance now. And don't become ravages against a savage, unfair world. But oh well, the Church dont have to teach you that. Wash away all this filth and muck from outside. Get dirty inside. But don't. Hey, nothing's dirtier than what we have..

Now you better Clean Up Before She Comes. And don't forget to finish your vegetables.

The Priest 

I can smell the seeds of rice popping inside my mother's house. If I die during war tomorrow, I don't want to be remembered defending my country, I don't want to be called a martyr, I don't want Glory, don't want to be remembered for keeping the constitutional ideals safe. I just want to remember this smell. And goddamn, I'm ready to give my life to protect it.

The Patriot 

What I did, what I did. None of it was to destroy the fabric of the country. I was never breaking down the moral barriers of your nation. Only your mind and the idea. Only to make you believe that out of destruction and destruction only, will Creation come through, pure, distilled and of the highest form. Now I will make you a drink from the ashes. Your ashes. And we will drink to it. Won't we, Father?

The Son

Celia, watch over the patients while I entertain myself and dissolve myself into my non-gratuitous, glorified, murder-fetish sentiments. I call them sentiments, my dear Celia, and not fantasies, because they're just as natural and frequent. But wait...oooooh! You wouldn't wanna hear about one now, would you? Hey, wipe that expression off your face! Off now! I will roast this victim tenderly on a spit only to pour cold cream on it, then turn what's left into my pet hyena's dessert. Why? Because I'm not hungry!

The Cannibal 

I lay my premise on disgust, brother. Just like you. But the hieroglyphic fog of the past blinds your vision like electric darkness. And yet, everything is clear. Now now, Brother. I know. I only wish.. If only I could wake up from the dead, I would show you what it's like to truly come alive. So embrace me, Brother. I wish we never end.

The Brother

I pray with all my heart on which the radiant sun's light still falls through the gaps of the twilight trees and which is yet unblemished by darkness, avarice or sin that you may find what you are looking for. With all my heart, I pray.

The Prayer

He eats his breakfast, drinks his milk, takes his shit, reads his Osho, goes to work, stresses his body out, puts on weight, drinks some more, makes love half-heartedly and cries himself to sleep all the while trying to subdue himself all along, thinking that one day this fulled, spiritual, philosophical progression will explode and make him transform into a modern Buddha!

The Commentator

Your mind is a sprawling, Venetian, Histo-Architectural landscape. Enhance it. Every brick has a thousand whispers. Every street has a million souls. And you can never stop exploring. You can always build more. Enhance it.

The Secret-Finder 

Don't wanna stop, man. Want to go up. Want progress. Want pace. Want life. Want her. Want him. Want this. Want that. Want it all. The only thing that goes down the drain is 'Shit', man.

The Driver 

More needs to be done, more needs to be done. Fuck! Neutralize toxic with toxic. Kill poison with poison

The Environmentalist

Sometimes, when I meditate. I see two monks, flying towards and away from each other. In a rhythmic fashion while the sun rises, amidst the grey blacks of human resilience. I want that image imprinted on me. I want it to be the last thing I see before I die. I'm the man who craves to see silence in an explosion.

The Yogi On Concrete

Even when the mastheads are the strongest, the men most skilled, the captain most courageous and the destination most precise, well you know whats most jolly about the whole journey old boy? We will still languish on towards the un-sturdy waters! We will stil flow with the winds! Still go where the current takes us!' - as they ride along into the sunset.

The Sailor

See.

because

The Executive (2). He's seen the devil. 

He's seen the devil's innards while he was jacking off in a self-agonized depreciation of ecstasy. 

His soul is so much the cleaner for passing through all of that perversiveness.

The Assistant

I want to create my own religion! And It'll be the best religion ever! It'll be the religion..of...CANDY!

The Child

You wake me up from my 'almost wet-dream' to tell me about the idiosyncrasies of 'something as stupid' as you are then you will cry like it's the 'world's greatest tragedy' playing out right here and we're 'all fools', aren't we?! Fuck you and your Vanilla Ice-Cream! I've had enough of your shallowness!

The Frustrated Expert on Frustration

Do something routine, not-routine, exciting, often, aftertastey, worthy, bubble-gummey, sunshiney and at the end, say 'Hm.'

The Popsicle

Hey, you're a woman, I'm a woman. You're a man,I'm a man. Only one option. We'll have to make do on the train. Not in the secret swallows of our rooms. Here, on the train. Disguised as food, because there's Cameras everywhere. Chemical infiltration, some sort of colon-area affected state of requiem and curfew. Now, take your clothes off.

The Teenage Criminals

When drunk, I try and douse my feelings, then I try and recall if I remember feeling anything. As I remember, the other's feel more and my feelings come after I feel their feelings. Oh too much feels. Go to sleep, with music.

The Disgusting Fellow

It's just that all the human appreciation, the good, the bad, the karma, trillions and trillions of bacteria infest in remorseful impetuousness, they care for you, not the others. Nah. They make this earth clean. They clean it's dust off for you. They don't allow you to show your insides to everyone. They literally would eat your shit, that's how much they love you. This Earth, existence, more than anything else, but at the end of the day, it's all zilch. Only bacteria.

The Realist

Am I supposed to look awkward here?

The Homophobic Spaceman

Not just me, think about it. A lot of people need you to advertise yourself on the screen. It's never been more connected. You have changed so many lives, baring it all. All of us have, through you, of course. We're all connected. Please don't get nervous. It's all a part of the game. You're born naked, you die naked, right?

...right?

The Broadcaster

Everyone has different ways of looking at people. Mathematicians, look. Mathematicians look at the universe and especially people, as patterns. Walking patterns of numbers. Psychologists look at us as unsolved mysteries, enigmas, fountains unfounded. Scientists as walking, thinking, packets of water and Carbon. Philosophers.....well, who the fuck knows what a philosopher thinks, who is one anyway?

But me? I look at them as Stories. Walking Stories. Locked Doors. Hidden, deep, underneath..

The Seer

I see people. Yet I don't see them, shitwit. Nothing exists, right? Hey! I'm only joking.. *Sigh*

The Philosopher

Everyone has a part to play. Everyone has a twist to add. Everyone has their addictions, weaknesses and everyone has their opinions. If only they hold their truth first and cast their judgment in advance, I'd know the truth.

The Seeker of Truth

I know there's fire. But I like the burn.

The Addict 

I don't mind. I don't mind it at all. I'll pay to hug you. So maybe, chances are that, you, won't stay lonely at that moment. Well, if I can remove your loneliness for one moment, that one moment, I'd pay for it, out of my own pocket. Maybe, someone, maybe, one day will come to you, will come inside your life and rid you of your loneliness. Maybe someone will permanently rid you of your sadness. But, if I can help, if I can get rid of it for you, for just this one moment. Just this one memory. I'll pay for it. A warm embrace, a magical hug, a touch, and a bonfire.

The Free-Hug Giver

Here's to the start of another journey. Let me have the chance to walk in and face the aura from distances away. To behold it, in all it's glory. To sing of it's infinite, eternal greatness. Let me feel awe again, so I know what it is to be humbled. To know how small I really am in this universe, and yet how infinitely greater. And then, flip the coin.

Write your songs. Let them be odes to you, Titan.

Belive.

Trust.

Love.

And jump.

Continue to terrify me. (Do.)

Holding Closest.

Bon Voyage!

The Companion

For as long as I can remember, you have been the customer in my life. The way I feel about you threatens all my other business transactions. Threatens is not even a strong enough word here.

I love you, buyer. And I own you. I always shall. And i'm never going to be willing to stop selling. I never can. You make me too rich. I hope the recession passes soon and the boom comes back in, and stays forever. No-one has ever made me feel as wealthy as you have. And I realize that. I can never lose you. I won't lose you. Promise. 

HERE'S A FRESH BAAAAAATCH!

The Milkmaid

Epilogue - 

The Conversation With The Reflection. 

He stands there.

He is strong.

He starts to speak.

He only gets stronger.

A man who seems to know all there is to know, own all there is to own, conquer all there is to conquer and go as far there is to go. Tell me. Can he be called God?

No, says the mortal.

Why

Because he does not control, says the mortal.

He looks.

When He looks, you dare not turn away.

All he asks, is all he has ever asked of them.

That one word.

Really? 

Aunt Nora

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Random creative writing entrant from ages past. Just to start with. :)

As he looked upon the obelisk rising high towards the stratosphere, he had something in mind. An emotion. He couldn’t quite figure out what it was. He had caused enough destruction via his ignorance. Now even if he wanted to feel sorrow, he couldn’t. The Gods had punished him enough. There was no point in digging dead graves anymore. 
He was a God. Enraged with the folly of his contemporaries, he had decided to let loose his anger and break through upon the atmosphere his perseverance and his enigmatic displeasure. The dam of his preserved emotions – which was the ultimate code of the Gods -  had been broken. Now Uttarakhand was drowning. Could it be called his fault? 
He thought not.
Not after the citadels of power conspire towards yourself.Not after the framework of the famed psyche of the immortals is nothing but soot and cinder.
At the end of the day, there were 3,000,000,000,000,000 planets, and counting, in the universe that had life on them. Although it was agreed, efficiently, in the orient that there were more gods above, but what separates a cyclone from a random fart?
Life that was simple, pragmatic and efficient. Not the mess that Earth had now become.
But Earth was special.
It was the first.
The First.
He now remembered the first time he was hailed as a talent. The Gods were pleased. Shiva wasn’t present, but Vishnu was there. Oh yeah, Vishnu himself. Brahma had given his consent. Narada had called him ‘The next big thing’ in infinite creation.
He’d soon ascended faster among the ranks than time could keep track of. The ill-devised war against the Asuras happened soon. The Thunderbolt, right after that, felt even sooner. Right at the height of his power, he had ensured that his name would now be etched across the echelons of divine service in the pantheons of time, among those legends.
Or so, he thought.
The conspiracies followed suit. 
The perpetrators were underestimated.
The fall was imminent.
Like all ruling motifs are perverted abstractions of idiosyncrasies, it was a misunderstanding that led to his fall. 
He could not help it. 
He wasn’t known as Indra the Emperor of the Heavens for nothing.
He couldn’t help storming out of the assembly in disgrace. 
The Gods were present there too. But this time, there were frowns on their faces.
All it would’ve taken was one moment of calm.
A specialized effort on peace and meditation. A nude musing on the big picture and it's nerve-syntax, 
But who can really comment about the efforts of the Immortals in a neutral way except them themselves. 
All it took was one moment.
The Void was a special passage that ensured the ignition of the weapon into the haunting, black expanse of the Universe.
The Thunderbolt could’ve gone anywhere.
It reached Earth.
More specifically, Uttarkhand. 
Madness followed suit.
Destruction.
At the click of a hand.
As he walked barefoot in the long grass towards the rain-tempered rocky openings of an echo that would now be preserved into infinity, nobody recognized him, as he reached the memorial site of the man in whose memory the obelisk was dedicated.
A few people stared but that’s all. Some god, deservedly.Sure.
He looked at the stone.
This was in memory.
In memory of a man who had sacrificed his life to save 300 fellow humans in a Superhuman effort of strength and courage.
Questioning his conscience for the first time, Indra the Immortal wondered about the supreme notion of justice that operated amongst us in the throes of creation.
The obelisk was a metaphor.
A stone made of granite, grey-colored. 
On the stone were inscribed the names and salutations of those 300 survivors that had been saved by this titan of a man, amongst many others. 
Underneath was the name – “Indra Kumar”, a common man.The namesake had instead reached Kingdom Come.
God and Man were one.Truth's wardrobe was now undone.
On his mind, the Lord finally realized the lingering emotion as he shed a tear.
It was awe.