Things that struck me today…..um…. thoughts that….

1) Sitaphalmandi is quite a quaint name. (That’s where our college is)
2) CIEFL is just off tarnaka but yet it is not in Secunderabad. (It is in Hyderabad)
3) Sitaphals are sometimes sold at the mandi (sitaphal is the custard apple and mandi is the market)
4) The ladies drawn on the seats reserved for women on RTC buses are quite sad. In the sense these red women look quite unhappy. (You have no idea what I am talking about)

REGRET and NO REGRET

no more kjsdfjer

Today I took a step backward in blogging and removed word verification, to add to the commenters convenience and mine.
Congratulate me!!

I was watching Oprah the other day and Faith Hill was her guest and she was going to sing this song called “surrender” or something. And Oprah said something about how one has to surrender to god before the prayee’s plea is heard. And I cried like I do while watching Oprah. I don’t know why but I usually cry while watching her show and I guess I would be her ideal viewer. So anyway I was hit with this feeling…of inspiration I guess, and wanted to write a poem about someone on the verge of committing suicide. I dint put pen to paper till yesterday and I did not really finish writing the poem but realised a few things about the way I write. Wanted to put down the three versions I came up with. So anyway was told recently that my writing (or perhaps just my poems) lacks form and probably is too honest. And the thing with me is that I don’t know what form is….it needs to be explained. What is important to me is honesty, because I don’t know any other way. And think that anything I write at least on my blog is about me being me ….and thus honest.
So ..

1
Standing on the verge
One inch
And a journey will begin
A journey
Quick and hard will begin
And I will sacrifice
my precious body
to the pavement.
Standing on the verge
One inch
The road to this place
Has been long.
I almost forget why I am here.
Perhaps someone broke my heart
But now on the verge
I almost forget why I am here.

2
And now standing on a piece of concrete slab
I shiver
My feet cold
My hair flying
My hands behind me
Gripping the iron railing.
The city spread beneath me
For one last time.
Rocks and lakes
Spread beneath me
For one last time.
I shiver
My feet cold
My palms sweating
Give me a minute
My journey will begin
Wait wait
Don’t push
I am standing on the verge.
Give me a minute.


3
Tomorrow the city will wonder
Why did that girl commit suicide?
Tomorrow the city will wonder
Why did she want to die?.........

Golconda Fort by day and night.

I Love Puppies!!

my paternal grandmom's closest brother died recently. yesterday my dad and a cousin of his performed this puja called the shraadh. the same day this was being done in Calcutta, only on a larger scale. a lot of sanskrit mantras were being recited. the brahmin who conducted the puja supposedly did a wonderful job and was very clear in his enunciation and tried to explain what was being done and all cause it is so difficult to follw a hindu ritual, as everything has a purpose obscure to the common man. but i just realised someting as my mom and grandmom were talikng about it. THAT..... we hardly know whats happenning during religious rituals, so we feel certain basic emotions when such rituals are going on, and not more as none can follow the nuances of the whole long thing. what my mom and dad felt, and i guess were supposed to feel was respect and thats it.....thats it.
is it not amazing? that you can be sitting before the fire with a million offerings around you and you dont know what is being said and why you have to wear only that certain thing, but can feel what one should during the final goodbye to someone close to them.

the mantras and the offerings were actually meant, as the priest explained, for accompanying my grandad to heaven, and the mantras were spoken to narayan asking him to accompany him and also show that he was a respected man on earth...... i think....or well i like to think......this way it sounds so nice.


forgive the minimal use of capitals.

A not so winter night

The lonely bed we share

will bring us together.

Together in dreams

and if we are alone in the morning,

let's wait again for night to begin.

The Summer I broke Her Heart

I once knew a girl,
Who had,
Bright bright eyes,
Rich black hair,
And soil coloured skin.

I once knew a girl
Who would
Dance in the rains,
And then dry her hair,
Just outside my window.

This girl
Would sit at her window,
As I sat at mine
And hum and whistle,
And sob and sigh.

And this girl,
Cried all night,
And prayed all dawn,
Right outside my window.

I once knew this girl,
Who pined all summer
for the girl in the opposite window
A girl who didn’t seem to know she existed.

I once knew a girl
Who live in the house beside mine
And our windows spoke to each other,
Though we never did.

And this girl,
I was told,
Wrote poems about a girl
She once knew.

discrimination

i hate

I hate: Religious Fervour
Pre-judging
Discrimination on the basis of ......any difference.

I Fear: ''

ugh!

I came accross the V person yesterday, and was for almost the first time in my life rude when i meant to be. He kept asking me cheerfully how i was and i instinctively said a cheery 'hi' and then regretted, so when he continued i abruptly said "see ya", and i guess he got the message that i dont want to speak to him. Dreamyeyes said that why show him that you were upset by his behaviour. but the truth is that i was upset and for once I dissed him. and it felt wonderful.
i think.
i hoped.

Anonymously

When all words uttered

have to be measured,

when years have to be counted

and words.

when years are memory,

and words dont fill the blank,

I will call

and pretend to be someone else,

and start anew.

as i welcomed spring

outside my window,
i see pretty pretty spring,
unfolding for me.

i sit in my room,
and welcome spring.

outside my window
i see pretty prety spring
and there
amongst the blue flowers,
she sits with mud on her knees.
her pink dress unbuttoned
till i can see
her chocolate skin.
till spring can see
her chocolate skin.

but

her eyes are blind to that sky
her ears deaf to that bird.
instead she sits with mud on her knees
instead she sits with fingers between her legs,
welcoming not only spring,
but her own season.

google google

Check out the logo on the Google.com.
Happy Birthday to Louis Braille

Iron Jawed Angels

I watched this movie on and I think by HBO called the ‘Iron-Jawed Angels’. I was so thrilled to be seeing this film that I forgot to have dinner. The movie started in 1912, and captures the struggles of Alice Paul and the passage of the 19th Amendment (woman suffrage) to the U.S. Constitution.
The history
Alice Paul was chair of a major committee (congressional) of the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA) within a year, in her mid-twenties, but a year later (1913) Alice Paul and others withdrew from the NAWSA to form the Congressional Union for Woman Suffrage. This organization evolved into the National Woman's Party in 1917, and Alice Paul's leadership was key to this organization's founding and future. Alice Paul and the National Woman's Party emphasized working for a federal constitutional amendment for suffrage. Their position was at odds with the position of the NAWSA, headed by Carrie Chapman Catt, which was to work state-by-state as well as at the federal level.
Despite the often strong acrimony between the National Woman's Party and the National American Woman Suffrage Association, it's probably fair to say (in retrospect) that the two groups' tactics complemented each other: the NAWSA's taking more deliberate action to win suffrage in elections meant that more politicians at the federal level had a stake in keeping women voters happy, and the NWP's militant stands kept the issue at the forefront of the political world.

The movie:
In 1913 Paul joined with Lucy Burns to form the Congressional Union for Women Suffrage (CUWS) and attempted to introduce the militant methods used by the Women's Social and Political Union in Britain. This included organizing huge demonstrations and the daily picketing of the White House. After the United States joined the First World War, Paul was continually assaulted by patriotic male bystanders, while picketing outside the White House. In October, 1917, Paul was arrested and imprisoned for seven months. Paul went on hunger strike and was released from prison. In January, 1918, Woodrow Wilson announced that women's suffrage was urgently needed as a "war measure". However, it was not until 1920 that the 19th Amendment secured the vote for women. Iron Jawed Angels, inspired by a pivotal chapter in American history. Hilary Swank plays Alice Paul, an American feminist who risked her life to fight for women's citizenship and the right to vote. She founded the separatist National Woman's Party and wrote the first equal rights amendment to be presented before Congress. Together with social reformer Lucy Burns (Frances O'Connor), Paul struggled against conservative forces in order to pass the 19th amendment to the Constitution of the United States. One of their first actions was a parade on President Woodrow Wilson's (Bob Gunton) inauguration day. The suffragettes also encountered opposition from the old guard of the National American Women's Suffrage Association, Carrie Chapman Catt (Angelica Huston). The activists get arrested and go on a well-publicized hunger strike, where their refusal to eat earns them the title of "the iron-jawed angels." Although the protagonists have different personalities and backgrounds - Alice is a Quaker and Lucy an Irish Brooklynite - they are united in their fierce devotion to women's suffrage. In a country dominated by chauvinism, this is no easy fight, as the women and their volunteers clash with older, conservative activists, particularly Carrie Chapman Catt. They also battle public opinion in a tumultuous time of war, not to mention the most powerful men in the country, including President Woodrow Wilson (Bob Gunton). Along the way, sacrifices are made: Alice gives up a chance for love, and colleague Inez Mulholland (Julia Ormond) gives up her life.