Loss of innocence

The crazy times
have taken the children head on.
O' you children of the modern depression!
Where do you go when your little feet
are tangled up in chains of illusion?

Satyam, you were taken away
at an age where you failed
to understand the value of your life
by those who were too young to know
that children were meant to play.

Instead they played with fire
with money and greed,
Where are the little joys?
They were shot in the head
by the child's new toys-
the gun.

And your picture flashes
in front of a million faces
who switch to another set of moving images
in a matter of minutes.
Spare a thought for the killing of prudence
Shed a tear for the loss of innocence.

Shoot that man

He's filed an obscenity case
or a PIL against every free face.
From Rakhi to Mallika-
he's got them all bound.
An unhappy soul, set him free.
Let's get him down people.
Just shoot that man.

He's beaten up the "loose women".
Demands them to be slaves.
A control freak on the "loose".
Let's get him down people.
Just shoot that man.

He takes the shutters down-
public demonstrations and burnt cards.
He's a violent lunatic on the prowl.
Let's get him down people.
Just shoot that man.

lines

Creating,
lines
where there are none.
Drawing,
boundaries
to simplify
what the mind
cannot comprehend.
Forms and shapes
from the confines
of the horizon,
paint
an illusion
of a mind
that fears
the boundless.
And the mindless
chains
dissuade
the mind of
a free fall.

In the heat of the afternoons
gone by thinking of you,
I take solace.
In that air
that at least brought your voice
to my ears, parched for caressing words
gone unheard
and the caring hand gone unseen
by the mind that knows not
what it means to give up
on love.

For love’s sake

Don’t sleep,
don’t wake.
Lie there somewhere in the middle
Don’t use the word ‘make love’
For love’s sake.

Don’t ruin
the fun
of not going all the way.
Don’t give it a name
What’s undone is done.

Don’t think
of us as lovers.
For love can get all fake
So make me yours for this night.
Be my friend for love’s sake.

Everything's not alright

Everything is alright
And everything that’s not will be
And you and I will live
in hope forever.
Yawn…go to hell eternity!

Bumpy roads, patchy lanes,
shooting dogs
And dying rats.
It’s all the same.
Another day of hope
Another day of attacks.
Born and gone in a whiff,
thrown in a shit hole at the door-step
Of a minister’s house.
Then where is it that you live hope?
In the government?
Or a poor boy’s grouse?

It takes ten to prove,
ten years to convict,
Ten days to escape.
Ten seconds for you and I
to kill but we die,
and justice is raped.

Everything’s not alright
Neither outside nor inside.
For we live by the same old thought
And fall prey to same old casteist plot,
smelling of the same old inaction,
mistrusting the power of dot.

Desperate

Desperate, foolish, distraught.
I lean on someone who leans on me.
I have seen you across that line before,
at the point where light sends back a reflection.

Utopia

From the space between two wishes of my mind comes the dire need to make ends meet.
The ends- one of the real and one from the realm of the extraordinary.
The space sucks me into my own desperate world of Utopia.

27

I fear not joining the 27s
There's this thing
about approaching the line
between a groupie
and a rock star.

I wish I was more
Of the tattered spirit
hanging on the tattered jeans
of Cobain,
eligible to join the 27 club.

If only I was wasted
on dope,
and rose high
on the thin white lines
running in the air.

If only I got low
on booze,
woke up every morning
to the sweet smell
of beer.

If only I got laid
more than I bargained for
and woke up every morning
to the breath of
new skin.

If only the spotlight
was so bright
that I'd be blinded
And the noise
of the crowds so shrill
I'd break.

If only I lived so fast
that I'd cover the ground
even before reaching
the finishing line.
If only there'd be so much
to live for
that I'd die grabbing it.

If only I'd be caught
napping on the border
If only I'd be caught
in the crossfire-
of darkness and light.

Then I'd be a Morisson
Or a Hendrix or a Joplin.
For
real rockers don't die early
They only cross the line.

On the road again

It's a crowded space.

Single out my mind.

Give me a few more seconds

to get myself out of the grind.

Get me some good old-fashioned cash

to load my cannons

and take off

to the dream I'm dying to live.

But the time's running out

and the road's long and winding.

And the destination I need

is the road I take.

For thats where I belong

- on the road;

waiting to be back home

on the road again.

music funda

There is always something to learn and a lot to live for. I met the legendary Pandit Jasraj today. It was a humbling experience really. He asked me not to interview him if I haven't listened to his latest album. He asked me come back later, whenever I am free but only after I have experienced the music. "Don't treat it just like an assignment. Experience it. Experience and knowledge will always make you richer," he said.

As journos sometimes you become so mechanical. You just keep doing stories after stories. I do try to enjoy the music and the musicians I interview. But it's great to have some soul in what I write.

Fire! Fire!

I had always thought of what would happen if I burn my hair! (it's all a part of my paranoia for my hair) The other day I did.
I had a candle in one hand and tried to take a call on my cell phone. My front hair was up in flames. I dropped the phone. Tried to put it off with my hand and then rushed to the basin to splash some water.
I was almost in tears. I thought my almost damaged hair will finally see its end. I kept pulling out burnt strands of hair for the next 5 mins. Thankfully not much damage was done! It's something else to live your fears. It's a small example of how by facing your fears you can overcome them.
Anyway...but the bottom line is that now I'm like dying for a haircut!

WE WANT FREEDOM!

Today I felt like I was back in school. Farhana got yummy food for lunch. My colleague Ravi got a guitar to office. He played the good old college anthem- Hotel California. To top it all our "Head Mistress" left early. It felt like we were back in junior college or something. Actually, it's like a jail on other days, with the jailor to watch over. So we put up a notice on the soft board. A sign of protest (yes it does remind me of the rebellious college days!) which read "Give us back our freedom". And we all signed it. It's a great day!

For him, whoever he is

I sip
from the romance
of the evening,
a far cry
from the moment where I found you.
I know I dug into your arms
feeling your heart beat.
And you held me close
making me your own.
It's then that the aroma
from your breath
seeped into me.
And that is when I looked up
searching for me
in your earl grey eyes.
I still sip.
I sip from you.

Where do you go?

Don't know when it all started. I have been craving for a trip to Europe. It's quite wierd for someone who's never set foot outside the country to claim to love travelling. You meet so many people who say they love travelling but when you ask them which places they have been to, they don't really have a list. Sadly, I'm one of them.

I day dream about various places across the country and the world. Read about them, imagine myself in those places and feel good thinking about all the good things I could experience when I travel there.

But the way I have been hung up on Europe is not funny. I have already half-travelled to several cities there. Through books, maps, online articles, couchsurfing.com, info on rail passes, flight tickets etc. I have even started to prepare a budget. When I look at my bank account, there's nothing there to fund this huge ambitious PROJECT EUROPE. But somehow I know I'll go- 'when where and how' are not relevant here.

Love handles

“Love handles are hot,” a friend told me. Why? “They cause pain when you squeeze them. There’s pleasure in that. So the whole idea is quite sexy as bitter sweet pain is sexy. And so love handles are hot.”

“You mean they are sexy when making sex…oops making love,” I tried to say.
She laughed.

I was like, “I don’t think men find love handles hot!” So she quickly replied, “No they do.”

A guy friend was quickly called on to testify. And he said. “Yes love handles do look hot on some women.” I was zonked. I thought to myself. “I have a chance with all my bulging fat!”

But when she gave him the pain theory even he was zonked and wondered why he even became a part of this strange conversation.

Layers

There were thin,
very thin,
layers,
beneath the skin.

Layers of hues
that were shut out
by a colourblind love.

Layers invisible
to the naked eye
that wants to see
only what it believes.

Srcape them,
one by one.
They are nothing but a veil.

I know with each layer
of your skin
more blood will ooze
from within me.

But now take off that veil
and let me see the face of truth.
For each uncovering layer
reveals the real you.

Hottest Olympians of all time

Here's something I put together...

Nadia Comaneci
Age: 47 years

The Soap opera ‘the young and the restless’ became associated with her after a TV program— ABC's Wide World Of Sports— used it as background music for montages of her routines. Composer, Barry De Vorzon, renamed it to ‘Nadia's Theme’ after her.

She wrote a book called ‘letters to a young gymnast’ and launched an album.

She launched her own music album in Bucharest.

Nadia Turner, singer and actress, and American Idol Season 4 Finalist was named after Nadia Comaneci.

Lance Armstrong
Age: 37 years

He dated singer-songwriter Sheryl Crow and the couple even got engaged before a sudden split.

He also later dated fashion designer Tory Burch, Ashley Olsen and most recently Kate Hudson.

Armstrong owns a house in Austin and a ranch in the Texas Hill Country. Neighbours of his ranch property claim that Armstrong polluted a local swimming hole when he was creating a dam on his ranch.

Since retirement, Armstrong has focused his efforts on the Lance Armstrong Foundation, which provides support for people affected by cancer, and on other interests

Sebastian Coe
Age: 52 years

Coe was featured in the Brass Eye (UK television show) spoof documentary on pedophilia unwittingly accusing American blue-eyed soul singers Hall & Oates of not only being the same person but also of being child abusers.
Post-divorce a handful of glamorous women have been seen on his arm.
He is a multimillionaire, a worldwide ambassador for Nike, owns a string of health clubs with a membership of 20,000 and is a member of the East India Club in London.
He has a very large collection of jazz records.

Steffi Graff
Age: 39 years

With her father dominating her personal life until the Graf tax scandal in 1995, Graf often declined social invitations and made few friends on tour.

Graff spent much of the 1990s in a relationship with race car driver Michael Bartels.

She eventually found that she had more in common with tennis superstar Andre Agassi, whom she married in 2001.

The couple have many homes, but prefer to spend much of their time in Las Vegas.

Mark Spitz
Age: 58 years

Spitz is a motivational speaker and travels to Japan, China, Hong Kong and most of Europe since he began in 1973. “My middle name is Mileage Plus,” he says.

His iconic moustache was his hottest feature and was seen as a sign of notoriety as most competitors opt to swim without facial hair, often shaving their bodies completely.

In 1991, he appeared for a sports event sans moustache. When quizzed about the absence on TV show he simply said, “it had become too grey.”

Chemist EH Bronner maintained that Spitz was a prophet. He is mentioned in Bronner's fifth MORAL ABC which appears on each bottle of Dr. Bronner's Magic Soap. Spitz sued Dr Bronner's over this reference.

Dara Torres
Age: 41

At 41, she’s the oldest woman to participate at the Olympics.

During her retirement from swimming she has worked as a reporter and announcer for television networks, NBC, ESPN, TNT, OLN and Fox News.

She also hosts a golf show called the Clubhouse on the Resort Sports Network.

She has been a model and in 1994 she was in the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue.

JAYNE TORVILL & CHRISTOPHER DEAN
Age: 50 years & 51 years

Dean's first ice partner was Sandra Elson. They began skating together when he was 14 and competed as ice dancers for a few years. However, despite becoming British Junior Dance champions, the team parted, as Dean and Elson did not get along well.

Dean was in the police force till 1974, when he decided to quit his job completely to concentrate on ice-skating, and so did Torvill.

Even after retiring the pair continued acted as coaches, choreographers and performers in ITV's Dancing on Ice.

They returned for a second series and third series after the 2007 & 2008 UK series of Dancing on Ice Torvill and Dean took the show on the road for a British tour.

Summer Sanders
Age: 35 years

Summer married Mark Henderson in 2001 and then World Cup skier Erik Schlopy in 2005.

Summer admitted to having a teenage crush on Kirk Cameron.

Summer published the book Champions Are Raised, Not Born: How My Parents Made Me A Success in 1999, which is a tribute to her parents.

A mother of a girl now, Summer launched the Similac Moms Alliance, an online community for moms which gives tips regarding important mothering issues.

Anger

When I get angry I get so dramatic. Dramatic is an understatement. Probably, melodramatic suits better. Rather, scary is more befitting. So loud, unbearably ugly and stupidly weepy! I would cringe if I saw an angry me from a distance. Recently, I got so angry I yelled. I'm sure our neighbouring building shook. But my opponent was strong. He didn't budge. I hit my cheek, hit the wall and yelled at the top of my voice. And even then when my opponent didn't give in, I walked off slamming the door behind me. I lost. I was weeping. I wept for a long time. Then the anger subsided and my breathing got back to normal.

But the point is, no matter how I expressed my anger I lost. I wish I had just let things be. I get scared of myself when I'm angry. That's why I hate anger. What overtook next morning was a calm I hadn't felt in ages. I was numb. My hand was hurting so was my cheek. And I'm sure even that wall felt some amount of pain.

I now wish I'd rather have kept calm before. Blowing off the handle doesn't help except add drama. It's all so funny to me now. I can now see myself moving in slow motion. My hand rising slowly and then coming down on the wall. Once, and again. Tidhish tidhish...in slow motion...Indian television style. I would have garnered the highest TRPs.

Accept it dear, you could have handled things better.

I smell you

Yes, I love perfumes and deodorants. I’m not faffing. I bet you can come within one metre of my radius without cringing!

Another proof is my cupboard. You open the door and at any given point there will be at least 4-5 different deodorants in there (thats how much I can affored). I feel bad when I don’t have the money because that means that I can’t have a better variety of deos in there. My room mates think that I have become a fashionista just because I have a couple more deos than them! Ask me which brands I use, and all I’ll manage is my most famous blank expression. So immediately I don't qualify. But I still maintain I love variety as far perfumes go.

While I can’t get too close to people with body odour for obvious reasons, what intrigues me more is the millions of fragrances around us. While people who stink have different stinks! People with fragrances have different fragrances too. Very often when you pass by someone in office, you get a hint of fragrance from them. I often begin to guess the fragrance. She smells like peach, he smells like lemon, while this girl smells like berries!

I love axe ads. You use axe and women will cling on to you. You use the new chocolate fragrance and all the women will want a bite of you! That’s a great concept and innovative thought process. I do feel sexy when a man asks me what perfume I’m wearing even if he doesn’t immediately want to cling on to me or bite me. Imagine walking down the street and attracting people with your smell.

Someone had once told me that when you get attracted to someone or feel positive vibrations it also means that you have caught on to that persons smell. Like dogs I guess. I don’t know if that’s true but it sounds interesting. I wish I went out and men came looking for me. Do you think I attract too many men because I often mix my deos (two deos at the same time) or use different deos every other day? I’m not complaining. Heehee…