SP

Dance on a corpse Weight on your chest You are the best You are the best Tendrils of memories Under the ground Lost what you found Lost what you found Fancy drums made Of human skin Sonorous skin. Sonorous skin. Beat it so hard Turns black and blue They have no clue They have no clue Hide your dark blood Under your skin Sonorous skin Thick leather skin Over your eyes There’s a blindfold You’re getting old You’re getting old Sonorous skin About to break For its own sake For its own sake Are you the best? Are you the clue? Imposter test Imposter test Put back the shards With sticky glue Always on guard Always on guard Under the weight Upon your chest You are the best You are the best

Today, I will die. I know it. Not by gunfire, or drowning, or starvation, or any of the unnatural ways of death. No. Today, I shall die of old age. I know it. How do I know it? I shall tell you. I shall tell you all, although I doubt you shall be around long enough to hear the end of it. The warning signs were always there: I was, of course, too busy to notice in my youth, and now am too frail to heed them. The signs of fatigue, of exhaustion, a certain constant trembling of my right hand. There was, of course, the inevitable sleeping in trains, and the waking up just a little too late. The final sign was today. My small cottage has started feeling larger and larger the emptier it gets. At first, I had a wife and three children. I had my eyes back then. Soon my wife died, and I started wearing spectacles. Then, one of my children went away to college, and I needed bifocals. Soon, all my children were gone: settled in life. And I, with old age and slow decay, became...

All of life is climbing stairs: climbing, climbing, climbing. Stairs only go up. Not down. Never down. They do not go sideways. They do not vary in length. They are not the kind of stairs that go spiral, so you can easily look down at how far you’ve climbed, because if you did, you’d start to feel tired and angry at not having arrived. Of course, you know somewhere inside you cannot arrive. Ever. Further, you don’t want to arrive. Not even at all. But what if there’s no arrival? This thought will only hit you if you stop trying to arrive, and start thinking about the stairs itself. But as long as there’s one stair ahead of the other, you are hardwired to keep putting one foot over the other one, and keep going. Yesterday, I met a man on a flight of stairs I have long since passed. He was sitting on a chair smoking his pipe. I asked him if he didn’t want to climb the stairs. Was he taking a break? I’ve reached the top, he said. Clearly, you’ve not, I said, look here, th...

Four lips. Three tries. Two views. One face. More fibs. She cries. Blue muse. One maze.

A long time ago, in another life, when I was still studying in the boarding school in Bombay, I used to take the train on the last weekend every month, back to Pune, where my family was. It was supposed to be a three-hour journey, but was almost always longer, as the train had a tendency of running late. It’s funny how now, when I think about what I used to think about on the way back home, I can recall each thought exactly, but not its significance: I would remember the smell of the garden, or home-cooked halwa , and every once in a while, my old grandmother, who spent her whole day worrying about my father. I think, in fact, I am certain, I remembered all these things with fondness. Yet, now, the only feeling I can still recall were the five minutes before Lonavla. I had first discovered the thrills of standing outside the open door of a moving train in fourth grade, when I happened upon a man in deep thought, standing on the edge, looking down. For a moment it occurred ...

Just one more piece today and no more, I promise. I won't have any more ever. Let me have just one. Please. I don't have to listen to you, not really. I'm the master of my own fate, aren't I? I am. I'll go to the fridge, then? No. I don't want a cold piece. I want a fresh one. Besides, I was saving that one for later. But not so late that a guest comes and opens the fridge. No. Then I'd have to kill him. Or her. Hehe. Whatever it is. Just a piece, then. Alright. I'll take a fresh one. I will. Watch me. Then I'll take the sharpest, cleanest knife from the kitchen and cut it in one go, quickly. By that time, my mouth will be watering and I'd be dying to slurp it up but I'd wait. Should I salt it? Or should I cook it? Spice it? Sprinkle sugar? It'll take too much time to decide, as always. So I'll just have it raw, trying hard not to gulp down the crunchy bone and the chewy phalange. Only then will I turn to look at my dri...

A hundred years ago, you and your friend decide to want to be actors when you’re both young. You both shift to a city where the industry thrives. You and your friend are new to this, but have heard of so many others who came here and lost their way. You decide to stick to your guns, and follow your dreams. You meet with people: directors, producers, other actors, and start to notice some of the sleaze around the place. One fine day, you and your friend decide that no matter what happens, you and your friend will never become like them. Time passes. One day, you meet with a producer who really likes you. You start to like him too. You don’t really, but if you try hard enough you can do it. The producer offers you a job on the spot, after an hour of talking and buttering him up. There it is. You’ve found yourself a real gig! You’ve made it! You tell your friend. Your friend says the theatre scene looks more attractive, and that you should try that out. You quarrel. ...

When I was younger I played a game. I felt extremely uncomfortable whenever I had a sensation on one side of the body that I didn’t on the other. For example, if I stubbed my pinky but only on the left leg, I’d feel strange and queasy inside. So I invented a game: a game of balancing points. If I stubbed the pinky on the left leg, the left side of my body earned a point, so I stubbed my right toe on purpose, to balance it up. This made me feel okay inside again, so I kept going, incorporating the game into my system until it was as natural as breathing. I played it until one day my mother found me vigorously slapping one side, and then the other. I explained to her that I was trying to swat a mosquito, and had accidentally slapped my left cheek lightly. When, to maintain the score of the game, I slapped my right cheek, I accidentally slapped myself harder than on the left cheek. Then, I slapped myself a little harder on the left cheek to compensate, and a little lighter on the...