What a nail-biting, highly strung, cricket world cup final! How many days has it been? It seems like it was only yesterday. I’m not a cricket romantic, because I only watched the matches where India played and highlights of other matches. Because gosh, it’s time consuming and heart-breaking at times! So I always sat with a book or two to watch the matches, for 6 long hours on 9 different occasions. That is 54 hours of cricket! What’s wrong with me? I could almost hear my teacher’s voice, saying “Practice your guitar!” But you’re sitting in a different city, leaving me striving. I’d hear my dad say, “Prepare for the exam that’s coming” but no, that’s precisely what made me a worse guitarist. And all these things always ran in a loop! So I came out of it!

I almost didn’t watch the final match, being sad over the fact that MS got run out by Guptill and Matt Henry taking wickets after wickets! But I’m glad I decided to watch the match, and in the end, not even question the fact that Kane Williamson is a superhuman. And even though I was supporting New Zealand half-way through the match (upon being triggered by the fact that people were underestimating New Zealand!), I was still awestruck by Ben Stokes. He really fought like a warrior, didn’t he? But oh future people! Don’t just memorize the fact that England won the men’s cricket world cup 2019, because NZ definitely has one hand on that cup.

You wonder, when Trent Boult stepped over the boundary line after almost getting Ben stokes that is there such thing as fate and destiny. The overthrow by Martin Guptill, the substandard umpiring, awarding of 6 runs when 15 were needed from 6 balls, when NZ had everything going for them, their world crumbles. The smiles wipe off, the scores tie.

I’m an emotional fool, but I’m not being emotional because it was the “underdogs” who lost, as technically, no one lost. So why does one team get to celebrate while the other rue the day? Then the dreaded super over, just six balls to decide who wins the world cup. And even then, both teams showed their resilience. Especially New Zealand, instead of feeling dejected, when Jimmy Neesham hit that six, I honestly thought that nothing can stop this team from winning that cup. But well, the scores tie again. And a very unsound rule regarding the boundaries did shatter that dream of NZ.

Why am I so sad for them? Because they don’t deserve to lose! This humility, perseverance and their kind-heartedness is so infectious and so rare that I can’t stop wondering what and how in the name of god have you preserved such good qualities in this dog-eat-dog world?! One bad person ruins my day, one stupid conversation – and I start drowning in the whirlpool of my problems!

I know all is said and done, but I learnt that it is important to do what you love to do. Regardless of the failures, regardless of what anybody says, regardless of the probability of you making it. And most of all, realizing, that nothing is certain. Not even winning, when you ARE winning. You keep holding on.

Tar of memories

Yesterday, I decided to accompany Joy out in the balcony while he waited for our mother to come home. I carried the book which was coming near its end, making me read every line of its last few pages, twice. Believing that on doing so, its words will graft onto my memory, like mathematics formulae which have never left me.

The weather was a bit gloomy, and the air had an eerily nostalgic smell to it.  And the flecking paint of the balustrade eerily reminded me of our derelict house in Delhi, which is now partitioned and divided.

It had a similar balcony, the house. And as kids, I and my brother would spend an inordinate amount of time hanging from it, watching the passers by walk through its extremely narrow lane. Joy watches every person passing by with the same inquisitiveness of a child, shifting glances from one person to the other, searching for a familiar face. And I guess that euphoria of finding a familiar face in a sea of unfamiliar faces has never left me. It has interwoven itself with intangible things which do nothing but make me feel nostalgic. A complete waste of time it is, I’m told- to live in the past, to seek familiarity, to search for smells, to search for places, to search for love.



And so Joy waits, while I’m overcome with nostalgia- of what will never come back to me, will never be mine and pacify me. A text jolts me out of my reverie; it’s the same as ever, now come to join in the mire of my own complacency and lassitude. I’m stuck in a rut, a cycle that never ends. And he must inevitably be a part of it, an interloper I’ve so carelessly fallen in love with.



I’m jealous of this little soul, who tirelessly waits for my mother to come back, without any promise that she will. I’m jealous of the house that stands beaten in the middle of a market, capable of igniting a forgotten past. Because here I am, being overpowered by it all, hiding behind the book lined walls of my room. I’m collecting these memories, as evidence of what I was denied, of the promise that was never kept, of the harsh games of reality, to be shown in the court of life. But Joy waits loyally, expecting nothing, wanting nothing. Maybe that is why humans are sad little creatures, stuck in the doldrums of memory.

Joy, as you wait, I’ll wait with you. And we’ll forget everything else (and I literally did forget the INDvsSL match yesterday! Caught up with it later, phew!).

Finally, reunited. And I'm eternally stuck in the tar of loving memories.

Deathly hallows

Like shinning stars,

Dead inside,

Like wilting lily flowers,

The depicting story of death resides,

In the cankerous urban towers

Pallid, ashen face smiles,

As the tides of anger ebb,

The midnight train is passing by,

The weight of hope is shed.

Hopeless, dejected, she roams alone,

In the bleak mid-winter weather, 

Alas! A part of her is dead!

As the other is put together

For the fire within is still burning bright,

She is fighting under the raging light,

To claim what her body denies

And live until the fire survives.

  

So when she's gone don't mourn her death,

For every flower that once bloomed,

Should die,

Mourn as she withers fool!

Mourn as you deny her, her right.