The Girl and the Diamond

Once upon a time, there was a little girl who was very sad. All her friends wore pretty dresses and looked like princesses, but whatever she might wear, she always looked ugly. Everybody would stare at her and talk in whispers when she walked by them. She wouldn’t turn to look but she knew it in her heart that they were laughing at her after she had passed by. She would ask her mother, “Mother, why am I not beautiful like you?” Her mother would reply in surprise, “But you are so beautiful, my dear.” “Why can’t I see it then?” she would ask. And the mother would smile knowingly and say, “… because you’re choosing not to.”

The little girl would only get confused, turn to the mirror and try to see where the beauty that her mother could see, lay. She smiled to see if she looked pretty when she smiled. She frowned to see if she looked pretty when she frowned. She cried to see if she looked pretty when she cried. And then, she cried and cried and cried for she didn’t look pretty whatever she might do. In the middle of all the crying, she didn’t realize when she had fallen asleep. She never came to know that all the tears which had fallen off her eyes were going to do something magical for her…

When she awoke and opened her sad eyes, her vision was blinded by something that lay next to her pillow – something that dazzled like a full moon. Slowly she sat up and took a close look at this magical object. When she touched it, it felt as though she had touched cool water. She felt a balm-like sensation run through the very bones of her body. It was a Diamond. A breathtakingly beautiful heart-shaped Diamond of the size of a heart. It felt so precious, more precious than anything she had ever owned in her lifetime.

As she stood in front of the mirror with the Diamond around her neck, she felt what she had never felt before. The Diamond shone like a star and when its light fell on her cheeks, it made them look like porcelain. They reflected the light to her eyes turning them into little Diamonds themselves, making her whole face come alive like a painting. She smiled and saw that she looked prettier than she had ever felt. She frowned and suddenly, the light went off her face, and she was again ugly as ever. Shocked, she broke into tears and the light was back. Her Diamond shone the brightest when she cried and she paused in the middle just to see how beautiful she looked as streams of tears rolled down her cheeks.

That day onwards, her life changed. The huge Diamond hanging from her neck made her feel like she was the most beautiful girl in the world. It touched her heart every now and then, tickling it, making her laugh and feel so desirable. When people looked at her, they were awestruck, for they had never seen such radiance, such absolute perfection on a countenance. When they whispered, she knew they were discussing her charm. When they pointed her out to others, it was only because words had deserted them. She was having the best time of her life. The Diamond made her complete and she was so grateful to it for that, “Thank you Diamond! I love you too!”

One morning, when she woke up, the back of her neck and her shoulders throbbed with pain – such that she had never known before. For long, she had been ignoring the subtle signs of imminent problems. When a sudden pain would shoot through her neck, she would make herself believe that she had slept in the wrong posture. When her shoulders would become stiff, she would think, “Oh, it’s been so long since I got them massaged.” But today, the pain, the stiffness wouldn’t go. She was in extreme agony.

And yet, she wouldn’t take the Diamond off herself, for it was all she had. “It has given me so much. It has turned the world around for me. I can’t let it go. I can’t leave my Diamond.” So, on she went with the Diamond still around her neck, but slowly, the sensation of exhilaration that it had brought had been overtaken by the overbearing pain in her neck.

“It has given me a lot. I can’t let it go” she would kiss it every night before she went to sleep, hoping that the agony would be a little lesser the next day. But it only increased with each passing day.

“At least it makes me look pretty” she would smile and think, but somewhere deep within her, the pain was churning out rivers of tears – tears which she wouldn’t acknowledge, tears which she never showed the way out to.

One day, she realized that it had been months since she had looked at herself in the mirror. As the thought gripped her, she ran to the mirror, her neck feeling like it would fall off any minute. When she paused to look into the mirror, the light from the Diamond blinded her. But gradually, as her face emerged from behind the dazzle, she saw a pale frail face with eyes that looked like stones. The Diamond still shone just as brilliantly, but her skin had stopped reflecting its light. Her shoulders were drooping and her neck was a disturbing red in colour. In that moment, the tears inside her found their way out and flowed like they would never stop flowing… “I’m sorry, I’m sorry” she kept saying, not knowing whether she was saying it to the Diamond or herself.

Exhausted, she sat on her bed and slowly, almost like a ritual, took the Diamond off her neck. Even as the pain lifted from her neck, a huge weight set in on her heart. She took the Diamond in her hands looking at it forever, she kissed it and as she did that, a tear drop fell on the Diamond. The spot where it fell turned into a tear and gradually, the whole Diamond became a blob of tears and flowed out of her hands. She howled to see what she had done to the Diamond, even though deep within her, she knew that it was her very own tears which had turned into the Diamond that night long ago.

“I’m sorry” she cried out aloud. Only, this time, she knew that she meant it for the Diamond.

For you... Dear Thread

(Something I wrote almost 10 months ago... A lot has changed... A lot hasn't)

I was trapped inside myself.
You became my one thread to the world.

I was cold and shivering.
You became my yarn.

I was parched and the well deep.
You became my rope.

I ached to hear the music of joy.
You became my strings.

I lay in the darkest of nights.
You became my wick.

I knew no directions, nor the path.
You became my halter.

I am foolish maybe… that I have picked the scissors.
But do know, my dear Thread, that as I cut you off
I cut away my World.

Perhaps I need to, perhaps I don’t.
But oh dear Thread, do know, that I must become
All that you became for me.
I must become my own yarn and rope
My own strings, wick, my own halter
And it is only then, dear Thread, that it would make
For a good Knot.

Today, however, will remain a sad day
Because I’ve cut away my World.
Because when I was trapped inside myself
You were my one thread to the world.
In many ways, you WERE the world.

Safar

(Something I wrote for my father on his retirement. The English (literal) translation follows after the original piece in Punjabi)

Nadiyaan, pahaad te registaan

langh taa gaye ne par aane vi ne,

Saal maheene din te pal

bhull vi gaye ne par yaad vi ne

Kayi rahvaan sang tu vageya eyn

Kayi chhavaan heth vi rukeya eyn,

Ohnaa raahvaan laage lagge rukkh

tur vi gaye ne par khade vi ne

Paaley vich tu dhupp baneya

Jad challi loo, tu aa varheya,

Tere har mausam de mitthde phal

digg vi gaye ne par lagge vi ne

Tu kuli vi eyn tu neta vi

Tu rabb vi eyn te banda vi,

Tera har kirdaar te saare roop

mamooli ne par ehem vi ne

Ikk cheez layi bas duniya to

te modi kayi guna kar ke,

Tere pyaar de bhare kayi dil

chhutt vi gaye ne par naal vi ne

Turdi si teri sadak hi hun takk

Hun tere turan di vaari ey,

Kayi rang, mausam te lain-den

mukk vi gaye ne, shuru hoye vi ne

The English Translation

Rivers, mountains and deserts

have passed by but are yet to come too,

Years months days and moments

have been forgotten but are remembered too

You have flown along several roads

Have taken shelter under many shades,

All the trees along those roads

Have walked by but are standing too

In the winter’s cold, you became sunshine

When the hot ‘loo’ blew, you came and rained,

Sweet fruits of your every weather

have fallen down but are growing too

You’re coolie too, you’re leader too

You’re God also and man too,

Your every character and all the roles

are ordinary but special too

You took just one thing from the world

And gave back several times of it,

Many hearts filled with your love

have left you but are with you too

It was only your road that walked till now

It’s now your turn to walk,

Many colours, weathers and gives-and-takes

Have got over, but are beginning too

My Angel

I’ve been thinking of how to start writing this for over 3 days now. And as you can see, I opted for one of the most unimaginative openings. Well, I don’t write very often. In fact, my writer’s block is my closer buddy than my writing. But never earlier have I had to wait for so long to be able to get the first few words, never earlier have I felt so inadequate in writing about a subject, because… never earlier have I written about a perfect human being!

And mind it! That’s not a tall claim! Perfection has only one way to prove itself – that it should seem perfect each time you come across it. Time, place, mood, notwithstanding. If I calculate, my total number of meetings with this man would perhaps not be more than 5-6 – on an average, a meeting a month ever since our paths crossed the first time – and each time, I’ve found him to be more perfect than ever.

* * *

In Sep 2007, I received an email from a name I couldn’t quite place anywhere in my memory. Apparently, he was replying to my “Coming Out” mail – a mail that I had sent out to a 100-odd important people of my life, telling them who I really was, and expecting a miraculous acceptance from each one of them. [Reminds me: I must put that mail up here sometime…]

I got some 30-40 responses. The rest chose to remain quiet. This man, however, who was not even a recipient of the original email, had got to read it by a mere chance. Co-incidence! – One would think… But today, as I look back at that co-incidence, I can almost see Mr. God winking at me, and almost hear Him say – “Your angel was long due… Co-incidence is what?”

* * *

How else would you describe this? A little girl used to play with a littler boy in her village. The two were very fond of each other – almost brother and sister. But as the boy grew up, he went abroad to study, and as life would choose for it to be, they lost touch. This boy, after 3-4 decades, now writes to the daughter of that girl – the name of the daughter being ‘Monsoon’ – after having read a “Coming Out” email from her, which was not even meant for him!

Sumu, let’s call him! That’s a variant of the name he often gives to those characters in his stories which are or could be manifestations of his own self. By the way, he hates the name I’ve given to myself, and I’m afraid, if he ever reads this, he might hate the name I’ve given him too!

* * *

Sumu is a 53-year-old man – a writer by profession, and beautiful by countenance. I know, I know! You wouldn’t normally use that adjective for a man, but believe me, seeing him, ‘beautiful’ is what you’d want to say too. It’s a different matter, however, that beauty that lives beneath the skin often chooses to reflect outside.

I grew so fond of him in the first meeting itself that subconsciously, I started to look for similarities in the patterns of his and my life. His stories helped me in that analysis. He, like me, as a child, used to pray to God to let him die before his parents, for he wouldn’t be able to bear their departing. I, like him, had left home for education when I was 17 years 4 months old. We both had had our hearts broken (more by fate than by the ones we loved). Of course, his pain was many decades old, and mine, just half a decade.

Yet, looking at him today, I wonder if I would ever be able to be half as successful, as content with myself, and as positive a person, after having lived alone with such an intense heartache for 30-odd years! Sumu is an extraordinary person… And our similarities end here – for I’m too ordinary in comparison.

* * *

He lives with his octogenarian parents. A flourishing career possible anywhere from Delhi to Russia to the US behind him, he doesn’t once turn back to long for what could have been. Apparently, the choice between caring for his parents and an independent life of his own, for him, was no choice at all… His father, somewhere in the second stage of Alzheimer’s now, defines the axis of every subtle movement of his eyeballs. His mother, who is mirrored in the beauty of his entire persona, shares the deepest bond with him… a love that has no space for expression in day-to-day life, but that completely pervades the air around them and somehow, engulfs you into its cozy balmy embrace – as if here, you would always remain protected from the miseries of the world that lies beyond it.

From buying the weekly ration of vegetables to deciding the daily menu, from managing a newspaper office to writing for his own satisfaction, from being a delightful host to an excellent cook, from having countless friends in every corner of the world to being a friend to even his subordinates, from being a son that any parent would die to have to being my dear Sumu, I’m yet to discover a single flaw in this man that I’ve known almost on a daily basis for over six months now!

* * *

If there’s one thing that you think you could do for a stranger like me writing a strange blog like this one, I ask you to pray for Sumu. Please ask whichever God you believe in to send somebody really special in his life – somebody who would hold his precious heart and look after it for all times to come…

And you, Mr. Angel! Welcome to my life! You’re late!... But I guess, I was not worthy of having you before this anyway. Not that I think I am now… but alas! Now that you’re here, I’m afraid you’re pretty much stuck with me!!!