From The Quill

 O Fakira, Iss Safar Mein Ghar Kaha Dhunti Firti Ho? Insaano Ke Jungle Mein, Ek Aur Musafir Ho Tum, Bhool Gayi Apni Pehchaan? Kitne Aaye Kitne Gaye, Kitne Aenge aur Jaenge Tum Aye Ho Toh Tum Bhi Jaogi. Iss Safar Mein Ghar Kyun Dhundti Ho? Tum Kaha Waha Rehne Wali Ho. ~ Suranya

 Most often, we come across people who boast of accepting someone with their flaws. Or we ourselves often look back at lost love, saying, "We accepted them with all their shortcomings." But what are these flaws? Some qualities in a person you didn't like? Some choices they made that you didn't approve of? Do those make them wrong? Every one of us is unique in their own right. Their thoughts and ways of seeing the world are different. Hence, what you think is a flaw is actually a quality to someone else. Each one of us has good and bad sides that balance us. Don't term them flaws. It's just who we are, what lessons made us, what life taught us. Everyone's journey is different. Do you truly love or respect anyone if you keep counting their shortcomings? I am not saying you need to love everyone unconditionally. Life is too short. We should choose what makes us happy. But what doesn't make you happy isn't wrong. And if you do love someone it is not a ...

To be alive is a blessing. We should use the opportunity to grow, learn and enlighten our souls. To prepare it for the next journey. The journey of a soul is in a loop. Never-ending. Perhaps one day the soul will acquire a knowledge so great that it will travel beyond the earthly bonds of mind and body and be liberated. It is perhaps then, when my soul leaves the loops of the cycle of life and death, the two eternal truths of the universe that I can finally meet you. At eternity. And feel complete. In the most platonic ways that a man can never complete me. With knowledge. Quenching my thirst for it. With the solution to the mysteries of life. It is then that my soul will never travel the world twice over; it will be forever merged with the Universe in its magnificent mystic ways. ~ Suranya

 Are words really mightier than the sword? Then the Bards must be braver than Warriors. ~ Suranya

 You and I often meet where the night meets the morning You enlighten my darkness with Your ray of hope. And I wake from my slumber of unawareness Your consciousness plays in my subconscious. I hold on to You like the wind tries to pick sand in the desert In Vain. I feel You near until day breaks. And You slip away slowly. I wake up with a feeling of emptiness and longing. Until I see you again, in my dreams When the darkness engulfs and silence reigns. ~ Suranya

Summer is here. The leaves are still. The air is suffocating to breathe. The earth had been scorching with the heat, and the leaves had withered away in the burning light of the sun. The birds had long gone home. It is then that the breeze turns cool. The wind gushes and turns cooler. And like a whirlpool, the Storm dances her way into the city. People rush to close their doors and windows. The rebellious Storm can do them harm. Break their glass houses. Perhaps blow away some precious things. People are never ready for rebels. Be it the Storm herself. She picks up speed and music. And prances around in the beat and rhythm of the drums of the clouds. The lightning is her spotlight to glory. She unties her long black hair and lets it sweep across the earth. Brushing away the dirt. Making it enter homes. Perhaps that's how people will learn to clean up their own mess. She smiles. Only Nature enjoys her dance. The trees sway in rhythm to her body, and the leaves rustle like the music ...

 One by one the dreamy stars in the sky disappear The beam of the moon fades away into the reality of blue hues Then I wonder what is real? The blue that covers the morning sky Often in the brightest light, Fails to make the vastness of the Universe Visible before us? Or the dark-skinned nights, real, raw and full of stars. That blink at us, from light-years away Reminding us of how mere our existence actually is. ~ Suranya

Have you ever wondered what Love is about? It's like the colours of a rainbow. Diverse in sense and feeling. Like the vast blue ocean that meets the shores, Love is boundless. Like the red in our hearts, Love is like the blood necessary to thrive. Like the greenery of nature that is home to the living, it is eternal and timeless. Sometimes love is like a tint of Purple, royal in its ways; it doesn't bow to norms, much like kings. And sometimes it's about the saffron of sacrifice. Like warriors in wars, who choose to die for the love of their motherland. Then, at times, it lives in the friendship of the sun with the yellow sunflower, which follows it with trust and loyalty. Love has many colours. United. In a canvas. And when all the colours of the rainbow are united, it creates white. Pure. Peaceful. Perfect. Just like love. ~ Suranya

No Man who once walked on the face of this Earth Experienced Life the way another did. That's the Beauty of Existence. Or perhaps the Magic of Creation. - Suranya

There is always this song in play.  That tells our tale in the strangest way.  The kind of song whose lyrics speak,  In our head, like music in the background.  The song that perhaps reminds you of me,  In ways you can never relate it to any:  That song that comes on the radio set  Makes you stop and stare till you get  You had been humming along  With the lyrics so long. And a smile had curved your lips,  While your heart made a tiny leap;  Sometimes the universe Gifts us our moments,  In art, like bits and pieces of heaven: So, if we ever have a story to tell,  Remember, we have a song as well!  ~ Suranya

The battlefield was a mere 10miles away. Every evening, the news arrived. Of numbers. And names. Every evening, one or the other hut had the chilling wails of a widow or orphan live the nightmare. She would sometimes walk away from the pain. And sometimes sit in prayers. Every evening, her heart stopped just for a few seconds watching the messenger arrive. As if she were living a nightmare, she prayed to wake up every day. Then one day, the messenger hadn't arrived. Instead, a troop came in. In urgency, they were shifted. Uplifted from their huts with the minimum of belongings and taken deeper into the forest. Her eyes had searched in vain. That night, she did what was perhaps not expected from her. The wife of the bravest feared death. She had cried. And wrote to him. The next morning, as he assigned his troops, a messenger made him frown worried. The small letter and shaky handwriting. "Waiting for you. Your empty home." It was no miracle that the war was won that day i...

 Aisi Kaise Kisi Ke Liye Khud Ko Kho Doon? Abhi Abhi Toh Mili Hoon, Khudse Aur Khuda Se. Kaise Insaano Ke Liye Rab Ko Kho Doon? Rab Ka Sath, Uska Mehr, Zindagi Ke Manzil Jo Hai. ~ Suranya

The Gypsy Girl had always seen the Guiding Spirit wait for her on the other side of her dreams. Each night, she had felt Him like a devotee feels God. Purely. Platonically. In Peace. With all her heart and mind. She knew that someday, somewhere, they were destined to meet. Him and Her. Maybe in Life or beyond it. He would complete the missing piece of her existence. Their souls had travelled through centuries. She was not merely who her thoughts said she was. She was a Soul. A Free Spirit. A timeless traveller of History. She had been a caged bird, chained down by reality. And he was always her polestar. Her guide to a Journey to Discover Life. Like the navigator to a lost ship, He always gave her directions. The barriers of norms and society had no place for her Love. So she broke free. In Spirit and Dreams. In Hopes and Courage. Away from the Barriers of Reality, He resided in her inner self. Her heart. Her mind. Her mere being. He once chose His purposes. She chose Him. He was Her P...

Badal chumti imaraate toh Kayi raja o ne hai banai, Kabhi koi aisa bhi tha, Jiska swabhiman badal chumta tha. Naam reh gaya uska, Baakiyon ke bas imaraate reh gayi. ~ Suranya

The silhouette moves in the hide and seek of the light and darkness. The sounds become clearer. The water of the tap. The whirling of the fan. The clinking of the windchime. Perfect rhythms, never missing a beat, they make music. I see reflections of my thoughts on pen and paper. I realize and reawaken my soul. I count my mistakes. And blessings. Often I cry over things. Big and small. People. Who left and who didn't. Rarely, I think of reality. Days are for reality. For counting gains and loses. Facing harsh truths. Nights are for dreamers. Dreams you see in deep sleep or with open eyes. Visualizations of the vivid imagination come alive in the darkness. Nights are for losing oneself to ones soul. Hear it speak to you in languages only you understand. Of the universe inside you. Slowly the darkness gives way to light as the stars disappear one by one into an illusion. Even the sky pretends to be a blue facade to hide it's true self in the morning. Now I try to sleep. When the ...

Sleepless nights  Restless mind,  Heartbeats racing  Expectations soaring Parents to be made proud,  Marks to be told aloud,  A future to be paraded,  Relatives are to be pleased.  And amidst those numbers,  Rat race growing stronger,  Disappointment and anger  Some dreams lie forgotten  Like the guitar in a corner. © Suranya

 What has the moon decided to tell the wind today That it gushes around me in such a merry dance? I sit down on the open roof, carelessly with a smile. Once again, it is night, a time to feel You near me. A time for musing. The wind frolics around me like a child at play, Tossing my open hair around as I shiver a little I hug my knees as though I would hug You. I grasp in vain, trying to catch the wind and decipher its words. Perhaps Your thoughts that the moon once witnessed The wind brings to me today. I grow restless to feel you near me, For I know, the moon and the wind know no time or tide. Eras and centuries are not for the eternal universe. The darkness is gone now, the moon reveals herself from the cloud. The moonlight makes my tears look like Dazzling droplets of diamonds tonight. For tonight I feel you near me, yet so far Like my soul is complete yet void. Tonight I am drenched in the moonlight In my thirst for your soul. Yet the moonbeam cannot quench my thirst For it is...

"Healer" " cried the heartbroken "Feelings" blushed the lover. "Passion", smiled the singer. "Hope" beamed the dreamer. "Money", said the beggar. ~ Suranya

It's not Death you should fear. That's the ultimate truth. It's life that should be feared. For no experience is enough. Every journey new. And temporary. ~ Suranya

 Tonight, the moon is my spotlight The twinkling stars are my audience And you are my Muse. The stage is set for the storyteller. Tonight, I tell our tale, whisper it to the winds. That perhaps carries it to the sky, While the night withers away into dawn. ~ Suranya

The thunder roars as the lightning flashes once again. Somewhere, a child shudders under the table at the sound while his mother stretches out her arms open at the scared child. The older sibling laughs out loud bravely. Somewhere inside, he's jealous too as the mother protectively hugs the younger one.  The farmer looks up at the reddish hue in the sky, worried. The winds are building up. Last year, the storm had blown away their roof. He says a small prayer. Tomorrow, he will get the price for his crops and start on the tin roofs, replacing the straws. Somewhere on the street, the girl's phone rang the umpteenth time as her father asked her whereabouts. She quickly looks for a shelter. The couple stare up at the lightning bolt hand in hand. They smile at each other. Their first romantic walk in the rain. I switch off the lights in my room. Summer rains are the best. The thunder doesn't scare me anymore as I feel the droplets soak the earth. The smell, the feel and the sol...

The city sleeps in silence. The lights of the city seem far away as I breathe in the cool breeze, basking in the moonlight. It doesn't even feel like night with all the light. It seems like a fairy has moved her magic wand carelessly over the sleeping city and left behind some magic in the air tonight. The magic the city misses out on during its busy summer days and traffic-snarling evenings. The magic that she perhaps left behind only for me. At a distance where the sky meets the skyscraper of cement before I can see it meet the sky, I see tiny lights from the skywalk. And the sound of one or two cars comes fleeting by. Otherwise, it's all quiet. The leaves rustle. The clouds play hide and seek with the moon and the moonlight in turn with the shadows. I forget my existence in the smoggy metropolitan as I close my eyes and transit through eras. My soul doesn't belong here anymore. Magic really works. ~ Suranya

 "Chacha, please let me go, today is India's match. I will work overtime tomorrow". pleaded 10-year-old Abdur. "Ok", said his disgruntled employer. Cheeks painted in tricolour, face beaming with joy, he sat outside a shop to watch the match. Nobody will ever know he sacrificed half a day's meal to support his country. That one piece of stale bread never tasted better. India had won! ~ Suranya

 Is that You I hear so near me? Is it Your silhouette I see moving? Across the lake, atop the hills? Are You for real, warrior knight? My muse and purpose? Did I actually feel You? In flesh and blood?  Did I manage to travel back to You, in Your era? I go back again and again, to the same place Where the wind whispers your words to my ears My cheeks glow red and my eyes teary And suddenly the dream breaks, in completeness I smile And await nightfall again, for You to be Mine. ~ Suranya