The wait...

Its still raining.

Three days. Time feels like a bubble gum stuck to the sole of your shoe.
I don’t know how long this will go on. Water runs around in little transparent
veins, sniffing out dry places and vanquishing them. They told me to wait and I waited.
I waited with all the patience that a defeated man ought to have. Waited in remorse, waited in guilt, waited in a drenched bunch of emotions.

The sky never breaks into a morning.

It goes from black to grey to black again. No sun. All that is there, is the rain. Plummeting with all its might, running amok, making a fool out of all that is living or pretending to survive.

“Soak in my might; don’t fight.
Don’t even think about it;
Its not gonna be all right…”

They told me that they would send across someone to get me out of here, get me to some
place dry. I lapped up their promises, a mongrel, and hungry since eternity. I knew they would lie. Making hollow promises comes second to betrayal in the human palette of psychological actions. But this time, they did a bend.

He came.

Carrying some clothing and some food supplies, he told me that he had been air dropped some two kilometers away. They were going to come pick us up within hours. There were other distress calls that had been detected from all across the terrain, and they were trying to get to as many as they could. He was talking too much. And he could use some respect for me.

War? What war?

I knew that I had been a commander in some forgotten part of my memory. I did not remember when the war got over; all I remember is that the gunfire and the bombs exploding in the vicinity slowly faded away. Then every sound was overshadowed by
the loud patter of rain. It did not allow you to talk or think.

Think about the rain. Think about me. Am I not enough?

He was still speaking. I stared at him, not really looking. He was getting louder, trying to cut through my defenses. I could see his lips moving, flinching like a maniac, his face streaked with water, mud and a lot more that I could not make out. I don’t like his way of talking. I am a Commander. I was one at least. Respect, please. Just a little.

He should not have slapped me.

Now there are two of us. I am still holding on to the knife. He lies there, his throat opened up like a fluffy pillow. His eyes carry the look of disbelief. Don’t tell me he did not see that coming. People with such low manners, ought to expect it sooner or later. There was a loud explosion a while back and I saw a flaming bird come crashing down into the forest. Seems like someone banged my fire exit . I have food now. And company. Not very lively, but surely well mannered.

I am still waiting…

THE WATCHMAN

Rusty lament through a weathered whistle.

A dark silhouette covers the waking hours
of the watchman.

Fathers make sons count stars on it,
sitting atop terraces.

Faces.

Nameless, shameful.

Races, vengeful;
of being eaten within
by the monstrosity christened Fate.

These faces roam the street corners,
devoid of variety;
You wouldnt remember either if you
crossed one.

The watchman sees them totter,
watches them pile upon the gutters.

Vermin.

He now pauses and smiles,
for he has seen this down centuries.

Ageless, the Watchman made them walk;
right into the bowels of cursed fate
and Hoped.

Hoped that one day,
the faceless man would look up
and see the stars,
the ones his father showed him upon forgotten terraces.

But he doesnt.

The watchman shakes his head and walks back
into the first wisps of dawn.
For The New Day, has begun.

Hateful Past Midnight

Aghast.

Or rather, amazed.

We stared deep into the half mooned' eyes
counting stars, counting skies
counting raptures, laughs
and Lies.

A social exclamation declares
we are two souls
forged to be one.

The burning sun
beats upon desires
Passion's naked fire
chooses to play Shylock.

We held hands
played "the whisper".
Lovesick juveniles
out on a death spree.

Our eyes wounded,
stripped and strangled the soul.
The soul does not question.
It waits for the end.

Patient.

The love is done.
The mush now bleeds dry
through half hearted gashes
on the wrist.

Why do I bleed
when I try to cut You away?
Why does guilt over remorse hold sway?

Within a day
Within a say
Within cupid's rotting clay.

The moment captures it.
And whats left behind,
is The Moment...

Repeat Telecast

Hello, lost reader! Since you have wandered in here and wondering what to do, there is this writeup which is waiting for you! It had been published before and taken out, and is back now. This is the original unedited version. Incase you want to see the one which did not win any prizes and is a more refined version of this one, then click here. Since I am in a good mood, there is another fresh story right where this ends, and wonder of wonders, its been added today as well!
Double whammy yo!! :)



Eating Out

It was just another night.Maybe not quite.

Waiters shuffled around like exotic insects while dim lights created haloes around the heads of the people who sat, uncaring of the world which eroded around them like neglected birthday cakes.These people sat and cared for sins over sanity,for sex over salvation; a sea of ripe filth which was beyond redemption.No one noticed when two rather well-dressed people walked in and sat at a table in the corner which was empty. "Two glasses of Chardonnay please", one of them ordered. He was dressed in a white suit, complemented with a white tie, and his eyes exuded brilliance which was almost unearthly. His blond hair almost shone. "Not very angelic...", the other guy mused and passed a half hearted smile. He had long hair and was rather peacefully dressed. There was a calm on his face, something which seemed to echo the solitude of centuries. He looked weary. The waiter arrived and placed two flute glasses filled with a clear liquid which bubbled slightly with subdued brilliance.Both of them picked up the glasses and looked into each other's eyes. "To humanity", they chorused and moved the glasses towards their pressed lips. And then it happened. The glass in the hands of the long-haired guy started humming and vibrating softly. Bubbles rose from below and burst on the surface in a soft hiss of expensive wine spray. The color of the liquid started slowly dancing, almost psychaldelic, changing into a fine azure. The other guy stared with a look of resignation over his face. The liquid now started thickening and the bubbling abated.It finally rested, a glass full of crimson, peacefully settled on the white tablecloth. During all this commotion, the guy in the white suit had managed to get up and slowly move behind his partner. He nudged him and they both slowly slipped out of the restaurant. All that was left behind was a startled expression of a common waiter staring at a wine-glass filled with clear blood on an expensive white table cloth. Both of them walked on the road outside with dim street light streaming at their faces. Finally the guy in the white suit spoke,
"Dont you think it ought to be the other way round?"

An Open Conversation

He looked down, what looked like miles below, cars zooming past signals, ants running amok among scattered crumbs. The moon, of course had no business interfering, so it stared,nonchalantly and continued to shine upon a dismal world.He wiped away a tear that seemed almost on the verge of stepping out of the comfy confines of his eyelids."Only I am allowed to fall;from grace or from the top of a building",he thought and thats when the past came hurtling back, an unruly engine without a driver.His life was the way it was supposed to play out in the movies;his girl dumped him for someone richer, he lost his job to recession.The latest was his landlord finally asking him to vacate the house.So here he was, talking to himself, playing out the movie of His Life.This is how it was all supposed to end. He would jump off this building, stop traffic for sometime,till a few screams later, someone would finally scrape him off the sidewalk.Quite simple actually.Infact...

" I wouldn't do that if I were you", someone spoke from behind him.The shock almost knocked him off balance, into the screaming nothingness below, but he just managed to right himself.He couldnt let his death be an accident.It had to be a well thought of exit from this world to the next.No accidents please.

The man was standing in the shadows and was not clearly visible. He wore a shirt and pants, all shadow colored, not revealing anything about him. Besides, when he had come on the terrace to end his life, he clearly remembered himself being alone.Then this must be...

"Yes I am the Devil himself", the man said and moved forward. He was now standing in the dimmed neon glow of the single bulb that flickered on the terrace. The man was, no offence whatsoever, ordinary.He looked like he could use some maintenence but being in hell was far from it. So our very own "suicide man" asked the question that would probably be bubbling in some cornerof your brain now,

"You dont Look like the devil."

"If you had expected me to come with my tail and pitchfork, I am sorry to have broken your heart", he retorted, smartly fishing out a cigerette from his pocket and lighting it. The glow from the match revealed what the bleak bulb could not; two pointy little stubs sticking out of his head. That proved it then. This was the devil. The suicide man believed it and he did not need a certificate.

Smoke rose up, forming a little stinky cloud of cigrette smoke, as he continued," I decided to give you more time you know. A few setbacks and you want to come storming, right up my ass!Whatever happened to perseverance and 'things get better'?Couldnt we all use a little more time?"

This was starting to get a little weird for someone who had come up to put a period to his life's sentence.He stared at the man who claimed to be The Devil and wondered if this was all a dream. He looked down at the traffic which was still moving just as he had left it.He finally mustered the courage to ask him what had been troubling his mind,
"Wouldnt you be happy to have me as a part of your army? Or maybe in the league or whatever you call it?"

"Accomadation is a problem everywhere sonny",the Devil said slowly, rings of smoke drifting out of his mouth."Its this new thing that I have started.I try to reduce as much traffic up there as I can, and ask people like you to hang around here. A little bit of effort and things start getting chirpy. Trust me, its happened to people before you, and there is no reason why it wouldnt happen to you!All I am saying is stick around for a while and if you dont like it, then you anyways have a one-way ticket to my place!"

His things were all over the place when she had spoken her final words, " you could do better you know. Better than this atleast!"And then, with a swooping motion she had crashed the vase that had been standing like a dusty sentry at the corner of his roomfor years. The sound echoed in his head like a hollow drum. He shut his eyes tight and when he opened them, he was still standing in front of The Devil in overalls,smoking the common man's cigerette.

"Ok, how's this for a deal;you dont jump now, and I dont tell anyone up there that you were a sissy. Infact no one needs to know that you committed suicide.If you let it go for now, I would pass off your death as a heroic attempt to make an old lady cross the road, whenever you die. That way you get a double deal!"

Funny.Maybe that wouldnt be the right word, but really, who cared? He had come to end it all, and here was the Devil, trying to take him off the ledge like a cunning insurance agent.Had he not been there, his existence would have been a myth by now. Ash to ash, dust to dust.

But the last one finally struck home. Here was a chance of living off another week,maybe more, and then entering the next place in style.He would give it his best shot and hope things to work out.If it didnt, he already had, as they said "the devil on his side". So he spoke,

" All right Mr Devil. I like your proposal. I am not going to kill myself right now. Instead, as it happens in the good stories, I would try to be a better person or whatever they call it. But if that doesnt work out, you know you would have to stick."

"You have the devil's word my boy. Now go before I change my mind", he said and looked up to a sky where someone had left out a neglected bunch of stars. Withing seconds, our suicide man, was gone from the terrace, leaving the smoker to his own tending.

He stubbed out the cigerrete and reached out for his horns. "Almost real", he smiled to himself and took off the hairband carefully, so the horns would not be damaged.He stuffed it in his coat pocket and walked towards the door, mumbling to himself,

"I wish being the janitor of this building was a little easier..."

The Unknown Chronicles...

I won’t lie to you.

It does feel strange looking at your own grave.

You stand staring at a gravestone which bears your name and pronounces you to be "finally at peace with yourself". And that, when you stand and stare at it, loose, moist mud dribbling off your back, creating micro mountains for the lesser creatures that dwell in the inner recesses of the planet. A gaping void, like a blind eye, stares right back from under the gravestone. It held me till a while back, but not anymore.

No, I am not your friendly neighborhood ghost.

The wind carries the smell of the dead; I beg your pardon, the people who have Passed on. Here, Time seems to be a forgotten face on a crowded bus, the features of which blur with passing moment, never disappearing all together. I am still standing and staring at the arms of death which seemed to have held me long enough to make the society believe that I had finally left it. You would not ever have the opportunity of doing what I am doing, because you are not like me. That is better than saying " I am not like you", don’t you think?

No, I am not some mean, stinky spirit that you could exorcise, Hollywood style.

The people who buried me here were people like you; weak in spirit, withering in body. They belong to the School of Fireflies; born to die in the luminescence of a lighted bulb within a single sunset. They would call me a freak of nature; Au Naturale Frankenstein. I have witnessed this foolish burial act down the centuries,being tirelessly repeated like the waves of the sea. Ironically, they never find out what became of me after I get buried. In natural circumstances, you wouldn’t actually wonder; but this sure doesn’t sound that Natural anymore, does it?

And no, I am definitely not your dead grandmother who you call up at every séance and ask foolish questions.

I live upon the life stream, and believe you me, it is not found in the stars. I have been this way for a long time now. The friends I made, the bonds I forged, are gone; rusted canons in a crumbling castle. You might think that I have a fairy tale life, with "happily ever after" tattooed right into my fate, but that’s not it. Like the tombstone that does not belong to the buried in the afterlife; I can never "belong". I don’t live Forever. Forever is just a long, long time for me.

I look up just as the moon makes an appearance, my guardian angel during centuries of solitude. My body becomes cold and the blood in my body seems to be drying up. The moment of truth is almost upon us. I can feel my canines, sprouting like wings on a new born butterfly on a shiny spring morning. Only, it is night. My body craves for the life stream that runs so freely in you mortals. I will be gone and my memories would die with your mortal mounds that you so fondly cradle. The moon shines bright as I go out to take one of You to fill in the Void that I have left on the ground.

I am. I was. I will be. Forever.

[ The post below shall be added at the end of the day or by tommorow early morn. Thank you ever so much for leaving comments on a post which doesnt even exist! I am thankful to every single reader who steps in here.Comes from the heart.]

Eating Out...

Hello,

This post has been removed till the 15th of July for reasons
to be revealed on the same date. For the people who read
and commented, thank you. As for the rest, your patience
is requested and appreciated.

Scribblers Inc.

P.S.- The blog is back in action....Spread the word, start the fire!! :)