I had my chance
I had to work daily in office. I had no chance of writing poetry or literature in office.
I fell ill and the disease was diagnosed to be “Denghi”
I was put in ICU and I had to be on the bed without getting down from bed for 10 days.
I was feeling bored and I asked doctor,”Give me pen and paper. I would write quatrains for small children.”
Other doctor also heard and all others started laughing.
“You can take rest, after the disease is cured you can write whatever you want”
“After disease is cured, I have to go to office. There I can’t write. These 10 days chance I have got. God has given me this.”
“So you wish that diseases should attack you, so that you can keep away from office?”
Everybody laughed.
“Anyhow disease has come and I am utilizing chance,that is all. It doesn’t mean that I love diseases.”
Everybody laughed.
They gave pen and paper and I wrote up to the contentment for 10 days. Then I was kept in general ward for 5 days and I had my chance again for 5 more days.
I applied those to poem competitions and got a prize
Joy in Independence
Sunlight filters down in gentle rays,
Beaming like sunflowers in bloom
The sky, translucent cerulean,
With nary a cloud in sight
Clear signs of a picturesque day
Standing tall, and with mocha eyes
Set on the road ahead,
I walk forward
My mind set, and my heart at peace,
I embrace the future waiting
Beyond the golden horizon
The Sundowner
I found him naked on the hilltop, his hilltop, the same one as always. He stood silhouetted in the specked turbulence of a blueish-orange sunset, his clouded eyes fixed with wonder upon God’s rotating canvas. Pearly, unkempt, and uncut hair blew on the evening’s breeze like cottony threads about his clouded eyes, framing them against translucent skin road-mapped with criss-crossed veins and wrinkles. Like a scene from the “Opera Glorious” his arms raised their rippled skin to the heavens, his bony, branchlike fingers stretched wide to touch... what?
I was a young man, my values fixed, my world “real”. I believed back then that I was embarrassed for him, but I was not. He was the lucky one, he was beyond indignity. It was I who was embarrassed. Shame flushed my face. I hurried up the hill, my steps unsteady in the tall grass. I wondered as I climbed if this sunset was foreshadowing my future, if his ending was to be my lot and legacy? Were these the golden years I had to look forward to? There could only be sadness in losing a trained and exercised mind, and if one as sharp as his could falter, why not mine?
As I neared I called to him. “Dad?”
He did not answer. Instead he began to dance, his arms postured as to hold a love long lost. He raised his voice in an uncharacteristic falsetto, singing a forgotten song that tickled the deepest depths of my memory. Young I was, but not harsh. There was no one around, no one to witness his folly, so I halted my intrusion. What was the harm, to give him a moment of tranquility when so few were left to him?
He danced the early stars into a high, cobalt sky. Pink and gold clouds stretched away like a path into the darkness of the coming night. His dancing feet found those tinted clouds, and those bare feet grew emboldened in their soft downs. His movements became swifter, his eyes shone brighter, his chiselled features turned boyish. I saw something of my father then that I never had before, something that only his mother, or a youthful lover, ever could have seen. His eyes looked into mine with a wide eyed innocence from out the dawn of a new and pristine reality.
I wished then that it was me dancing in his arms, that I might feel his joy myself, but in my heart I knew who it was his arms held. In my heart I knew who it was awaiting him at the path’s end, and knowing who it was made my heart sing in that same, old fashioned falsetto that he was singing in, harmonizing to his happy memories.
My shame and my fear left me to roll away like the tears from my eyes. I no longer worried what people would think of my father’s ills. Why worry about those digging holes when you can instead raise up to the sky? Suddenly, I wished that the world would see him dancing, that it could see him dancing naked on a hilltop, on his hilltop, as I did. I wished they could see, as he was showing me, that there is such a thing for us as Peace.
Suddenly I hoped that his would be my lot, and my legacy. What more was there for me to hope, but that I might follow along in my father’s path to everlasting joy.
Shame tossed aside, I stripped free of clothes under a silvery moon and stars, and we danced to a falsetto song.
Joy is...
“I can’t… I don’t remember… What… What is… the feeling of joy?”
She stared at them, mouth hanging off as if she were planning to swallow them whole. “What do you mean? Are you not happy?”
The half-hearted shrug they gave would have looked in place on someone dying. It was a shrug of pure indifference and disinterest that it could have only been a deep breath. That shrug compelled her to look into the eyes that were so aptly focused on anything but her. Their eyes reflected sadness and anger but also fear and loss.
“Joy is…” How do you describe joy to someone who’s forgotten its feeling, its love? “Joy is the feeling of sunshine and a warm breeze after a long and harsh winter. Its that first breath of fresh air as you walk through the park, hearing the screams of children as they race each other on the playground.”
“How is that joy?” they demanded, desperately.
“It’s that moment of peace when you first wake up in the morning, with nothing planned for the day. Joy is the feeling of hot chocolate and fresh-baked cookies on a snowy eve. Joy is hearing the church bells ringing, proclaiming a couple’s love. It is the taste of a homecooked meal with the people you love. It’s the rush you get when your favorite song randomly plays on the radio and you whip the volume to breaking point, singing and dancing like nothing matters. That moment when you finally come home after a long day only to be attacked by your pets, who are going wild at the site of you.”
“When did you become a romantic?”
“You asked what joy is. This is what it is. It’s little bursts of light that shine even on the darkest of nights.”
“Stars. Just say stars for goodness…”
“Joy is completing an arduous project and feeling pride in that work. You can’t separate joy from the terrible or wrong as then joy would never exist. Without joy, you would only see the worst of everyone you met.”
“This better not be a lesson on that Buddhist nonsense.”
Her eyes burned their already shattered soul. “It is not nonsense and it isn’t Buddhist ideology. If you are going to be so rude as to insult a philosophy, at very least, use the right one, and you better not be insulting a philosophy or religion. Ever. Got it?... Anyways, the concept of joy isn’t one that you can simply just define in three words and be done with it. It involves imagery and all that because joy is that burst of light that you save and cling to when things go wrong. You asked me what joy was and I was giving you an answer. Now, I’m going to help you get through this depressive episode–be it through counseling or just being there on your worst days– so that you can try and explain what joy is to me without being a romantic.”
A ghost of a smile brushed their lips. It wasn’t a huge toothy grin or an amused smirk. It was just a faint smile, one that hadn’t existed on their lips in what felt like a lifetime. To her, that was a burst of pride and brighter than the sun. She would help them see the joy in life again, even if she had to wait years.