Tuesday, December 8, 2009

To write is to right!

No dramatic opening lines. No interesting topics to write of. Nothing! No! not even nothing or emptiness or a sickening hollow that I may turn into words. No! only the absence of anything, the absence even of 'nothing.' That is what today has me bothered.

I have always thought a world of my abilities to write. What was it that I used to say to the ladies - "my words will always be magic!" was it? And today? Today I fork out the lantern hidden in my satchel and try to light the fire that burnt out in it long ago for the sole purpose that I may set forth along some path in search of those elusive words of mine. But is that the answer? Or is it even the right question?

Its just not my words that have lost the magic, you see. Its all words that seem to have lost their magic to me. Earlier I'd read a piece of prose/poetry and I'd have images dancing in front of my eyes, would have thoughts running through them neurons of mine at such speeds that if I started writing I would stop only for the lack of paper or because an overzealous friend wanted to have a consultation. But today I read a piece, thought-provoking or otherwise, a beautiful play of words, of inflections and tones and of images and emotions and what do I feel? Nothing! (again that absence of even nothingness that I was talking about.)

Why has this happened I question. An earlier me would have gone up to roof (I dont even know what the roof of my apartment looks like and I have been living here for 6 months now) and raged against the heavens and the sky and the elements until I had the answer. I would have gone on silently or screaming or both until I had the answer. But now? Now I dont even know how the roof looks. Why? I ask this question to a placid computer screen and I expect a response. Brilliant!!

I dont even remember how I found inspiration those days. I mean, I never had to look. That lantern in the satchel burnt bright but never needed to be used. And today I need it and it has died out. I didnt write ever for others' sake, I know that for sure. And often I didnt write for myself. Seldom I wrote for writing's self itself but most often I just wrote. No hows, No whys, No whats and certainly no ifs. Then what changed? What went wrong? When did I start traversing the path to today?

I thought maybe I was trying too hard to find the answers. Maybe all I needed was to walk away from it for a while and I would be able to do it again. But it didnt help. I walked away but I failed to reach anywhere.

And suddenly, voila! As I violently strike the keys on the keyboard it strikes me - that maybe I didnt walk away at all. Maybe I have been writing in my head all the time but have been rejecting my words everytime. Maybe what really is happening that while in the past I wrote I didnt judge, I wrote but didnt criticise while today I judge what I write, I criticise and I then again search for the very words that I have just rejected.

The roof it needs my presence today I suddenly am aware, not to rant against the elements but to rant against my ownself. Oh world please pity me for I have started to write, not for myself, but for you!

8 comments:

  1. You should always write for yourself...

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  2. well sometimes i write for no one, only for the writings sake! but i'd definitely say one shouldn't write for others.

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  3. How about posting ur poems..i ve heard so much abt em, btw how come u never wrote in college magz..i had gone through sum old issues while editing..read sum of didi's ..

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  4. i wrote in all the college magz in the time i was in college. maybe u didnt read them. maybe i'll write down one of hose articles. might write my poems. dont get hopes high they are over-hyped.

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  5. we live in fear
    of ourselves
    of the world
    that inhibit free expression
    does poetry come from an attempt to cover up the truth........
    Is it because we dont want to accept us as we are..........

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  6. maybe for the ones that live openly. but for the man who lives behind a mask poetry may be the only time he is truthful!!

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  7. and then we veil the truth in poetry
    and everyone draws his/her own truths.........

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  8. sometimes the mask remains in the writings also!............... but words elude us sometimes coz we fill our mind's attic with so many so called 'worldly' matters that, beautiful but 'apparently' useless things like thoughts don't find a place there!

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