The Bubble

Have you ever felt a soul searching, numbing blanket of silence which envelopes the world of your existence? a silence so profound in nature that it shuts out all the noise, emotions and feelings and leaves you clean, calm and tranquil. All the heaviness is gone and your world is devoid of joy, grief, rage or fear. You are like steel or the silvery beams of moonlight on a starless night. It is not the air, but it is you who are cold. The waves of chill are emanating from you. The air around is so clean and thin that you have difficulty breathing. Your lungs don't get their usual dosage of dust and grime. Your system feels cleansed. You can feel every part of your body. You can feel every strand of hair swaying in the wind and every drop of blood gorging through your blood vessels. The pure silence is anaesthetic and yet you can sense the charge around you. It is as if an electric current has revved up your nervous system and for once you can feel the ever elusive spirit that everyone seems to talk about. Your eyes are still and sparkling with the light of reason and logic. You see things as they are and not as you want them to be. The pretence and the cloud of hypocrisy is gone and everything around you is naked and material. The colour has vanished and the world is bathed in a clinical glow of white and grey. This is a poet's worst nightmare. It is naive of you to think that this state will last but you are too involved to even comprehend an alternate state of existence. But then you are jolted back into reality. The noise pricks your bubble of silence and all the noise, dirt, emotions and colour come rushing back into your life. You feel heavy again and the energy and the soul has gone back into hiding. You feel gravity and your eyes have lost their sheen. There is not even a faint lurking of a smile on your lips even though you know that what you had experienced was pure bliss. The memories are fading into oblivion but you won't mock it's reality by giving it a tribute of emotion. The moment is too pure to taint it with feelings. The only thing that matters is that you know it exists and you have experienced it, even if it was no longer than a single heartbeat.

The Metro Ordeal

Calcutta had witnessed the infusion of the metro rails for the first time in India. It is something which is synonymous with the city. Travelling in the metro rail at 9 in the morning can be quite an experience. The city of joy has always sported the element of human touch. Whether it is the chaats, lovingly prepared by the vendors with their hands or whether it is the bustling population, or the shoving and pushing during the time of durga pujas. The human touch has always been a hallmark of this city and metro rails have added a new dimension to this. In the mornings metros can be the best and the worst mode of transport at the same time. people are squashed together in the compartments like a stuffed up soft toy and there is not an inch of vacant space. you will be pushed, felt, groped and strangled to such an extent that you that you are left feeling abused. You enter the metro smelling and looking mint fresh and by the time you get down at your station it looks like you have been through hell. Sweaty, obese, grimy men with stinking breaths are pressed so hard against you that you can almost feel their heart beat. Drops of perspiration trickles down their bald head and gets absorbed in your clothes. You have long ago learnt the art of fighting your nausea and the urge to throw up. But the skill of retaining your sanity and consciousness when someone farts is still alien to me. You want to scream but there is no vent for your pent up disgust and scorn. the sadists look at the ladies who are obviously in more pain and discomfort and wallow in their own selfish joy. Whenever a station comes, just pray to god and take what comes like a man. You will be pushed, shoved and jolted from your position. A handful of people get down while a barrage of men are waiting to get in. you would have stopped resisting now. Drenched in sweat (yours and a million other people), with your hair matted against your forehead you are one of them now. I simply don’t know how girls put up with this. When they enter the compartment everybody wants a piece of them. God help the girl who is even mildly attractive. The girls just cover up what’s important while the rest are left to the mercy of the crowd. Some women are war veterans. They just beat their path through the crowd hurling abuses, pushing and shoving people left and right. While the meek are left to wince in pain. It is a war out there and only the fittest survive. I have survived till now but the war has just begun…………