The Rain Song

these are the seasons of emotion and like the winds they rise and fall

this is the wonder of devotion..i see the torch we all must hold

this is the mystery of the quotient..upon us all a little rain must fall....

It feels like Zeppelin's The Rain Song. You realized the tuning needs to be changed to something different. Something new. Something better for that moment. Then you find the rain song. It's awesome. Seems like the best thing that could happen. The rhythm stirs your soul through and through. You keep listening, keep strumming a thousand times, all the while basking in the heaven where the sun and rain light up your heart. But at the end of the song you're left with that same feeling you so often get when you're left in the wake of great joy. That moment when you realize that you just had the time of your life. And that life from then onward will rarely have such moments for quite some time. And so you go back to the standard tuning.  It still sounds good, for a while. Eventually though you have to look for another tune. Another rain song. But it seldom comes the same easy way. You find it after all. But it comes with a choice. A choice either to leave it all behind, looking for greener pastures or just stick with your old melody. You take the first one, with a heavy heart because it means that only memories of the previous rain song will remain. Because the strings will never catch that tune again. They might sound good, even better maybe. You never know. In times like these, time is your only friend, your only enemy. You keep recalling all the stuff that last rain song was made up of. That last chord, that last drink, that last dinner, that last smile, that last photograph, if only they could last for just a little while longer. It's not leaving your safe cocoon that scares you, it's the feeling of forgetting and being forgotten that does. Time is a wicked old doctor, the best healer they say. When you see it from the future all you can see is that you sang it and then lived on with it, made new memories and let your past go with ease. No matter how difficult it might have been at the moment, from far ahead it must look smooth, as it always has. Still, when you know you are in that moment, it hurts. It hurts to look ahead and it hurts to look behind. You wish you could stop right there, not move at all. Alas the song must go on. After all the pushing and shoving from within, you get ready to move on. And while doing so, you try to relive some of the glory moments of that last song..where you rolled over the floor laughing like a mad man, moved your hips like you'd break dance MJ to death, sang your heart out to the heartless, played till you got more blisters than Hendrix on your fingers, drank the world upside down and smoked the hill up to start a forest fire, all in good company. Great company actually. As put by Stephen King- No good friends, no bad friends; only people you want, need to be with. People who build their houses in your heart. 

Jump of a lifetime

Date: 26^th February, 2012

Exhilarating. That’s the word. There’s nothing that could compare to that feeling, that moment when you are about to jump off a bridge! When it comes, you are all up for it. That’s what you’ve been waiting for so long. All those seconds right before the jump seem like an eternity. You can’t wait to get down, get it over with, it seems. You keep smiling and keep calm, but deep down inside you’re screaming, “Am I crazy? Are all these people crazy?”

Then the guy calls you out. You step forward. He straps you up with the harness on your chest and legs, all the while chatting you up to steady your nerves. You sit next to the edge, not entirely. Another guy comes and shoves his camera in your face, asking you to express yourself. You mumble something that might make you sound cooler than you are at the moment later on. You turn to see the guy before you has jumped! (Oh boy he ain’t dead, is he?). Your legs don’t seem to be a part of your body anymore. Yet they keep shaking. And now it’s your turn. You stand up and move. You stoop a little under the bar of the bridge and move out to the edge, slowly. You take a tiny step forward. It isn’t enough. The “guide” asks you to move, a few more steps he says. You do as he says. He says not enough, move. You do. “That’s it, okay”, he says. “Nothing’s okay here buddy”, you think. “Ready?”. “Not at all.” “Three..”. You keep staring at the horizon ahead. “Two..”. “Mom, Dad, Sis’s, Friends..I love you all”. “One….JUMP!!”

Your heart skips a beat the moment you are in the air. You are earth bound. There’s nowhere to go but down. Blood starts rushing up to your head in the next moment. This is it; this is how it all ends, your life, and everything. You are going straight for the rocks or the water, or just waiting to feel something, some sort of impact. You are still in free fall. Then after the longest three seconds of your life, you feel the rope. Oh the almighty rope, the gift of God. Upside down now, you look up. The rope stretches, and then recoils. All of a sudden you start moving upwards. You get your voice back. You scream, not a loud one it seems. Closer to the bridge, not close enough. The gorge on the sides seems to be getting closer than you want it to be. Wait, you are going down again. Again a rush of blood to the head, but somehow it feels good, so good. You wave your arms in joy, a little fear too perhaps. You are sprung back up and back down a few more times, and the seemingly new life in you makes you smile all the while.

The bouncing ceases after a while and the rope is lowered slowly but steadily. The river and the rocks become distinct. You haven’t still come to terms with life on the ground yet. You hear someone calling out. Then a long bamboo stick comes into view. You recall the instructions; grab it with all your might, letting go could be a problem. After turning the stick in an acute angle, you are brought down by two good fellows and laid on the mattress. The rope is untied and you are unharnessed. The bridge seems like a mile up in the sky. Did I just do what I did? It seems incredible. You watch the rope that brought you down being pulled upwards, and the water drum that held your weight mid air coming down. As you get up and wave at your friend who jumped earlier, you can’t wipe that big smile across your face, and the desire to get up there and do it all over again just won’t go away!

Inside I'm Screaming

Inside I’m screaming

My gut writhing in pain

The mind let it down

When it was calling out loud

A glimmer of hope

Seems too farfetched now

As the sands of time stop never

To blow hard and fast

Like an earthquake

That destroys all in a moment

A moment of triumph

Crushed by another of a mere choice

Call it fate, call it destiny

Inside I’m still screaming