World of Small Things

This bridge to the bus stop knows my frenzied footsteps well. It’s a dance I do everyday.  But today it stares at me like a stranger, it’s never known me to halt midway.  Faces pass by in a flurry.  They all have someplace to be.  In its last breath the dying winter tells me, even January is making haste to leave.  Maybe even I should head home now, the sun is getting low. But I want to stand here and let life go by, I feel no need to hurry.  From its tinsel towers I’ve watched this city preen, on the ground I’ve heard its people scream.  But from this bridge I see life itself, in the river of tarmac and gasoline. For is this life not a highway, where stillness is met with death?  Where the soul is too nervous to look around, too wound up to take a breath? I know life is a highway, because it’s been mere moments since we met.  But before we can let ourselves be seen, you’re another memory to forget.   And though life is a wide open highw...

Dear Reader,  There’s something grotesque afoot on the rain-drenched verandah floor.  A broken wing of a dragonfly is erratically wandering about, as if in a frantic search for its now flightless, maybe lifeless owner. The obvious perpetrator is underneath - a contumacious ant, coloured bright red by a churning rage that refuses to be confined in such a mortal being.  I silently cheer it on. Not unlike a dragonfly and its wings, time too is unpredictable and menacingly beautiful, feigning stillness by moving blindingly quick. The spirited ant reflects our fate - a frail creature battling a gargantuan foe, celebrating every inflicted wound, even a severed wing.  Knotted veils of rain now drape the landscape, peeling it into distinct layers. Within a few moments, a feeling of ineffable warmth envelopes my senses. Reality refracts and smudges into painterly realism. The painfully metallic scent of the world is replaced by the intoxicating fragrance of nostalgia. The eve...

Dear Reader,  The clock has struck eleven.  A thin yet austere blanket of clouds has materialised over the once starry sky, like algae on a stagnant pond. I can feel the stars stray farther away into the unknown as the wisps of pale violet consume them.  But the goddess of love now shines brighter, exuding her enigmatic allure.  I have found a neat corner on the verandah for this rather unexpected session of documenting absurd contemplations. Accompanying me is a modest white pillar which is subtly conveying its disregard for 'meaningless' imagination. I am tempted to engage this silent gentleman in a discussion about reality, escapism and the meaning of it all.  The harsh surgical glow of a fluorescent light dramatically bathes the rocky broken soil of the front lawn which is now occupied by a lanky, drowsy stray dog which was intermittently breaking its nap to peer at me with curious, melancholic eyes.                ...