An Obituary.

I just stood there. A wraith like figure, oblivious to those present in the room. Oblivion. That’s where I was headed. Or so it seemed; at least back then. You were not a pretty sight, in a room full of corpses. But the people said you looked beautiful... even in death, vanity can’t let go of humans. The crooked timber of humanity and the life that flows in those veins. Your IPod lay besides me. Idle. Sting still persuaded Roxanne not to sell herself. But the headphones were missing. You were missing. And I missed you.

There are going to be plenty of meetings now. I promise I'll meet Kurt Cobain and tell him that “teen spirit” had been your teen anthem and fragrance. He has a hundred and fifty thousand fans on facebook, wonder what he’ll have to say to that. Then of course, grandma and grandpa would be there. I’ll tell them your story. I’ll tell them you were a great guy and that they should be proud of you. I’ll tell them that ma and pa will do just fine.

I sometimes get flashes of that solitary lamp-post casting its golden halo o’er the mango tree and the little dirt track of a path you traveled almost all your life. I sometimes feel like hugging that lamp-post. Holding on to it. Your life “swept me of my feet” a bit more often than i would have liked. A stream with devastating force. Literally and figuratively. The mango tree and the lamp-post that casts its golden halogen halo over it were probably the only static objects in your life. Rest everything was shifting faster than the mind could register.

Friends were friends no longer. Caste, creed, religion suddenly mattered so much to people. Teachers who would go out of their way to help you...and make sure you fared well, physically and mentally, now turned into professors who didn’t give a fuck as to whether you were alive or dead. And when you would ask dad,”why?”, he would say, practical life is a totally different ball game, son.

And that was all.

The fact that a pragmatic approach to life entails twisting and modifying age old morals and values in a vicious manner, was engraved on stone. Morals which were embedded deep in me. Destroying them meant destroying me which in turn meant destroying you. There was no one to prepare us for this...this life. And we were left scratching the walls of this immaculate labyrinth.

Checkmate.

A white cloth covers you. Your funeral attire was impeccable- kurta and pyjamas, something you had hardly ever worn. People were calling in. Whispering their condolences. They said you were a good man and that they knew you well all along. They were recalling obscure incidents that they had shared with you in some other life. They said they knew you were a good man. And somewhere in the melee i forgot to ask you...

Who you really were.

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Inspired by a piece written by a friend of mine. I know that little piece of his was quite personal...but i just couldn't help correlating between two very similar experiences...

Epitaph Of a Failure

Sometimes i wonder...or rather I feel that on my way up the ladder of life, i slipped somewhere...sometime back...about half a decade back, and ever since I've been falling down...down that spiral ladder and i know not whether that ladder has an end. Falling into infinity, spirally! A rather comical rendition of a deep-rooted hopeless, helpless feeling inside me. Will this ever end?

They say the human mind is a sophisticated mechanism. Inflict too much pain on a human and he will simply pass out, and hence become oblivious to any further pain that maybe inflicted on him. I draw an analogy to the human life. Humans, at least me. I've face so many failures all in rapid succession, after a period of basking in the limelight, so many failures that ...now i'm immune. I already know that my next venture is a failed investment. Any hope of fruition, however minuscule, is jeered at by me and is considered as another attempt to make a fool out of me. 'Cos i've come to know and believe with whatever faith i have in all things tangible... that hope is a fair but faithless illusion of my own self. And hence, is another failure.

So why even try to invest? Why not just lay to rest all the furtive attempts? Again i draw analogy with the human mind. A family of 4 in a car meet an unfortunate end by means of a freak accident. Roll back 5 seconds and freeze. The father/mother in the car are in postures which seemingly depict the fact that they both are frantically trying to devise means to fend the impending doom off their RESPECTIVE selves...not their kids or eachother. Survival is not a matter of mere personal choice, its reflex.

So despite the fact that my logical faculty is crystal clear over the fact that success is a card i should never bet along, my subconscious calling, blinded and impaired in various ways as it may be, obdurately scratches the charred walls of an immaculate labyrinth, hoping to find a way out, a way which probably doesn't even exist...Hope, a failure.

So my question to you my friends is...


What, then, is the use?