The lights are dim again. The music I like to play low. No need for wit tonight, just some vacuous talk would do. And yet, even that fails me. I sit still and feel my body go hollow from inside. Quietly and slowly, the storm tears everything apart.

It was cloudy and the moon barely managed to light up the sky. The silver beach lay behind me as I waded into the water until I was waist deep. I had this strong urge to walk on further. The water was icy cold and the sky near the horizon was inky black. A few stars glimmered in the west and almost called out to me. The waves crashed into the rocks behind and there lay a forest beyond.

They were all sitting in one corner and the faint sounds of laughter drifted across in the salty air. I had walked to the other end of the beach and stood there as the water and wind chilled my bones. Somehow all the laughter and the jokes and the fun vacation seemed a little distant in that moment. All I wanted was to sit in the red sandstone fortress. In the uncomfortable heat and grime and savour that moment of silence that spoke a million words. To walk in those lanes and start from the beginning and play out everything all over again.

Rain

The rain fell through the entire night. Speeding and slowing down as it pleased. I slept an intermittent fitful sleep and everytime I woke up I heard the drops sound on the leaves and the brick walkways outside my balcony. A mish mashed patter of soft sounds. I thought of you and how I almost had everything perfect and then somewhere down the road I began losing you to my fears. I remembered a similar rainy night a few months back. It was stormy and thunderous then and I couldn't sleep. I felt warm and fuzzy that day.

There aren't too many memories, you can argue, and I'd agree. Probably there are just a few of them playing out different variations in my head, seeming to be numerous. All with different possibilities and outcomes; pleasant ones and almost dreamlike, from the recent past. A time I hold to be the best in my life yet. I don't know where this is going or where I want to go with it.

A night by the beach and cheap liquor I need. Hopefully I'll be prepared to face the downpour better.

Reminded of an excerpt from The Motorcycle Diaries...

I heard splashing on the boat
her bare feet
And sensed in our faces
the hungry dusk
My heart swaying between her
and the street, the road.
I don't know where I found the strength
to free myself from her eyes
to slip from her arms
she stayed, crying through rain and glass
clouded with grief and tears
Wait! I will come
walking with you.

-Miguel Otero Silva

"I wonder..

why I miss
the choices I never made,
the days I never spent,
the lives I never lived,
the dreams I never dreamt,
the memories I never had,
the pains which I never endured.

It is not that Life seems meaningless without you,
Or the world any less grotesque
Or science any less profound or art uninspiring and religion any less hypocritical
Or literature less intricate and philosophy any less boring.
It is not that Life is nothing but the occasional burst of laughter rising above the interminable wail of grief

Maybe,
It is just that we met,
and somehow lost an era we almost had."
-Dawn Thomas
one of the best I have come across, strikes too many chords and thus shamelessly reproduced

wishing to...

go back in time. read gibran and poems which talk of my life better than I'd myself had ever been able to. live in the kca and know that I can walk to the fort in under 10 minutes to see the prettiest sunset followed by a frothing sea lash away at the rocks below in silver moonlight. spend sundays eating pizza and watching tv. eat reshmi tikka biryani at cafe noorani for the n-th time. set off aimlessly from home and end up reading my book by marine drive. be on the early morning flight to delhi , look down at the mist covered views of bombay and feel the chill in my spine as the sun rose above the clouds illuminating the entire sky in an explosion of brilliant orange. just know that the day ahead would be one of the best memories i ever had. run across the red sandstone corridor of the masjid, walk in the crowded lanes behind it and have another lunch at karim's. stand outside delhi airport waiting to go in in time for my flight wishing this wasn't the final goodbye.

i want to go back in time and then freeze it there, press play and then stop, rewind and play again. each time i'd do something different and enjoy every moment of the million possibilities. and never come back to now.