Udaipur: Stepping across cultures
Narrow lanes where only a car can pass through at a time climbed up to hotels and shops in old Udaipur. It made me do two things: fight with claustrophobia and try to get a glimpse of the famous lakes.
The largest lake in Udaipur, Lake Pichola, is blocked from view by hotels, shops and houses; [...]
Chosen
Chosen spans the lifetime of a woman who, at sixty-three, discovers that she wronged her mother all her life and thinks her guilty of her death. (As the work is in progress, I cannot disclose details.)
Chosen is a literary novel, and will be close to 90,000 words. Right now, I have completed one-fourth of the [...]
The Rise of the Dawn: A novel by Shruti Chandra Gupta
The Rise of the Dawn tells the story of a young man who becomes a social handicap because of his need to avoid his past. His dead sister, tyrannical father and loving mother find a way to reach him; through dreams. After years of living in isolation, it is the love of two women that [...]
The Window
From the window the hot wind charged into the room, stung Kesha on the cheek and comfortably spread out like an unassuming guest.
‘Close the window!’ Rishi said from behind the newspaper.
‘With so much smoke from the parathas, we will either die of suffocation or get killed by the heat,’ she said, slapping a ball of [...]
When a bird swam
Her voice rose, traveling to the farthest corner of the room.
“You just don’t understand papa. It happened in Germany, Africa, Afghanistan, Nicaragua. And it will happen here! The scent of freedom can never be trampled upon or confined in prisons. The Sukarmis . . . ah! The very name is glory, they are fighting for [...]
Crack up the sky, crony
No matter how much I try, whenever I enter abba’s room my nose shrinks with, I hate to acknowledge, a little pity and contempt. Well . . . that is not the whole truth. It is much more than that. All I can say is that the two emotions clutter my heart so, that I [...]
The Morning Walk
No. I won’t touch His feet or kick this ill-mannered, smelly – look how it is staring at me with those pitiful, rheumatic eyes. My heart burns every time I think about them.
“Get off! Get out of here! You defeatist dog, you scrap of life, you insignificant insignificant beast! Why do you not hold a [...]
The Rain
The sound of newly born droplets crashing upon the thirsty earth. Rag-pickers on the road ecstatic and she, shrinking with pain. She stuffed cotton wool into her ears and squeezed her eyes shut. Her bundled limbs wanting to get back into its mother’s womb. After long sleepless nights spent imagining the wicked rains fall down [...]
K2: The B&W Prinuper
The trap had been laid. As soon as she came pouring out of her mother’s womb. Such was the concreteness of the omnipresent cage that every time she jumped, she hit her tiny head hard and collapsed on the floor with an egg-sized bulge on her head. By the time she was at school, she [...]
Where winds do not spurn
What is there in this air?
That plays with me,
And leaves me in my loneliness.
What strange land is this?
Where piercing voices and angry eyes,
Can turn flesh into stone.
The city seeped into me
I walk looking over the heads of people,
From where has this city seeped into me then?
When greedy eyes were beholding raw flesh,
And some overworked tongues were poisoning the air,
Where every body had become a threat,
And every mile was crossed with thousands of incests.
I had walked on the wet earth,
With bare feet,
And a sole thought.
Moonlight
Multitudes of people stare on every path,
Every turn ahead brings forth the same road,
On which the same foggy dream had flashed colors,
Throwing ideas into the dizzy mind.
Is it change,
As you had said and I believed?
Or is it moonlight,
That has shaded all colors to one?
Just Words
The desolation is complete,
The heart forgets to respond,
The mind heavy with liquor,
The hand is writing,
Words.
Words which had been forgotten,
When the pumping of the heart was too much,
When the mind was defeated,
And the heart cheated.
Judgment Day
Bright orange clouds rush to fill the sky,
The earth darkens, quivers; fearing the worst,
And He riding high on a golden chariot,
Like ether, unseen but felt,
Glowing with such energy,
That mortals beneath shake with awe.
‘O Lord! The judgment day has come’,
One of them screams.
There is no dark corner left to hide.
The celestial light has conquered,
The darkest corner [...]
Impressions
The crevices laden new,
Beneath the horny sea,
Ridding volumes high,
Taking a note shrouded,
From under the myriad.
Soren thought with his tongue,
Picking thorns for the washerwoman,
Carrying pages in print,
He rolled down on matted feet,
Syllables gathered dust.
