And what about these moments when I feel beautifully stunningly unbearably vulnerable a thin transparent film of fine dust made of blowing light. I ask what of these moments when i am nothing but a vague outline traced over with a pencil, visible on a precariously tilting lilting paper page. I am the house of cards. I am the distant applause. I am the muted conversation. I am this jaipur night where the kids talk about Farmvile and read out smsed jokes. The older ones drink green glass bottled beer in the far corner. White skins and brown skins and all skins in between clap for Clapton in malkauns sung by Amit brown skin Choudhari.

Now I want these kids who are laughing silly about mispronouced words and fart sounds to stop annoying me and shut up.

I need to rediscover the rhythm and beat and flow of my words tap into wild mind and recover the images that exist only in dark shadowy corners one day I will be brave enough to venture in there and reclaim fearlessly those broken words and fit them into liquid sentences without faltering and feel them take form in the molten core of my imagination I will not pause and I will not shade my shy words with the curved shielding palm of punctuation the tyranny of the complete sentence I will allow myself to fall weightlessly into the spasm chasm of effortlessness where rhyming chiming words find each other where you are nothing but a spectator a limber limbed athlete and it may not make sense and simply sound good to a tabla beat beside a sexy guitarist in a red shirt and the disco lights will flash as paragraphs create themselves I will turn composer I will catch the poetry of city chaos in little toy cups and store them and label them and stack them in wooden chests which I will not bury finally I ask what to make of the pungent smell of alcohol and if you dont know the word pungent does it remain the nature of its smell?

Jaipur diary (Literature festival)

I love the chair wars. When there are 2000 people and 500 chairs us respectable middle class folks reveal our not so respectable side. Never do we raise our voice or create a public scene during the subtle scramble for seats. We instead deploy the Raised Eyebrow. We mutter spitefully under our breath. Biting remarks loud enough for the occupant to hear. disgusted head shakes. Nasty hisses in the ear. Underhand tactics.

I want to write about a six year old girl. She got into the metro at chandi chowk. The doors closed and her parents were left on the platform. she screamed and she wouldn't stop. she was shaking uncontrollably with terror. she continues screaming and doesn't even pause for breath for she is trapped in an alien land, dangerous, unfamiliar and terrifying. Her screams drown out very other sound and every other movement. all that exists in this silent vacuum are the convulsions of fear. All else is calm. You read a paper, I think about dinner and he texts a friend waiting at the coffee shop. But her screams continue. The girl is now clutching desperately ( for she is drowning) to the woman who asks her to get off at the next stop. But she cant hear the aunty who carries with her faint traces of mummy. The flowing salwar kameez or maybe the softness of skin. The intense life threatening danger she senses is alive to her, like a large lumbering monster that only she can see and feel I turned to see her on the chawri bazaar platform looking around wildly reaching out to the aunty. When I wake up in the morning tomorrow I know I'll remember the look in her eyes.
Pure, distilled terror.

Only a mother whose child has been snatched away from her knows the true meaning of suffering, she says. wet-eyes in the winter cold. he died in her lap. she felt his heartbeat, his dharkan, stop under her hand and knew it was over. he was special. he was hers. he is dead. three of us sit over the hot plate, leaning into its warmth. she finds solace at hostel where she works and talks to us. it helps her dull the pain. the yaad. When some of these girls leave hostel they take with them a piece of my being. khaleja. rone sa lagtha hai. Jab tum jaogi mein zaroor rongi. they all remember with much tenderness many of the previous inmates who kept aside food for them or gave them shawls in winter or asked for their ashirwad before leaving. kamala didi notes that some girls after they return from home dont even wish hera good year ahead but just ask for kamara safai. The one word that is repeatedly used is majboori. again. and again. Majboori hai.

She refers to her husband always as rakesh ke papa. he works 10 hour shifts at the metro for three thoudand rupees. Arthi is her papa's laadli. the thought of her inevetible and fast approaching marriage is greatly upsetting to him. he fights with rajwati accusing her for being in a rush to marry her off. slow down. whats the tearing hurry? But she knows there isnt much time. ladka chhooth jaiga. Aisa rishta phir se nahi aega.

I like sitting around with them. gupshup. bath-cheeth. They are very liberal with their love and affection. scolding me for not eating. for being pathli si and kamjor. for wasting my baap ka paisa by not waking up for breakfast. how easily they slip into the maternal role. eat well. sleep well. keep healthy.

dinner. rooftop. sam's cafe. paharganj. we ask for the bill. old man hears billi. old man sends waiter holding a brown confused cat to our table.

today was a spectacularly cold day. Overcast, grey, and foggy. The circular bookshop janpath sells books at a 20% discount. A lady wonders if life of pi is good. we show each other books we like. Behind her is a sign that catches my eye. Boyyourtoy@gmail.com. male escorts. The auto driver doesnt know where agersen ki baoli is. We are approached by Munna. Munna tells us he know every inch of the conaught place area. every gali and every modh. he is the only one who knows the short cut to the baoli.

Agersen ki baoli.
lodged between non discript apartment buildings and government staff quarters is a seven hundred year old rectangular tank which is connected to a large well. Not containing a drop of water the structure stands bare and beautiful. We walk the various pathways and find concealed stone steps up to the mouth of the well. loveliness.

So many little leftovers from the past lie folded in forgotten corners only to be explored by wandering tourists and pigeons. Munna gets curious and walks around the insides with us. bas bahar chord deta hoon to undur kabi nahi dekha hain. In the auto he tells us his lambi kahani. there is no time so he tells us the shortcut version of his journey from banares to delhi. two ten year old friends ran away from home. from school. from the abusive alcoholic father. they worked in restaurants, as shoe shine boys and finally auto drivers. thees sal ho gaye hai. he has his own beevi bache now.

Jama masjid rises from the ground more dreamlike than before. If i touch it, it will melt away into the fog. An optical illusion given life by our collective imaginations. The cold is mean and nasty.

Wow. So nicely I used to write in 2007 and 2008. Without fear I created sturdy sentences and strong images. My brush strokes were firm and determined. not timid. not apologetic. Something happened in 2009 when I wasn't looking. I lost something along the way. Didn't even hear it drop and roll away. didn't even rummage. or question a passerby. Have you seen my perspective? I seem to have lost it.

I read about the Partition. our history is drenched in blood, our past etched into our flesh. and then we wonder why our wounds fail to heal. our bodies carry the within them only the memory of pain and the distant stench of a rotten bloody past that we will never escape. The fact of murder and rape and homelessness. The ground beneath our feet exploding into unimaginable choas. disembodied limps tossed everywhere. The bawl of children.

our children. their children.

Delhi Diary I

They say Delhi is one of the oldest cities. That its history runs deep. Following the epochs which are piled one on top of the other, one is led futher and futher away from the present. Digging in the backrooms of time you watch the city re create its shape and form. again. and again. death and reencarnation the endless cycle. Jama Masjid monday afternoon. The only thing constant century after century must surely be the sound of frantic pigeon flutterings and the precise colour of red brick against sun.