The New Friends Colony Community Centre

_

2009-09-30T16:08:00.001-07:00

Uday,

2009-09-10T05:01:00.001-07:00

I think we're the only two who read this.

Uday,

2009-09-10T05:01:00.000-07:00

I think we're the only two who read this.

_

2009-08-31T01:11:00.001-07:00

to put things in perspective

2009-08-31T01:04:00.000-07:00

Your job sucks.

Your clothes and shoes are made by overexploited underpaid children in a sweatshop in China.

Your feelings were cast, directed and produced in a dingy studio in Bombay. Your first love whored herself out in this very place.

Your aspirations are second hand American. So is your idea of feeling good.

Your favourite film is ripped off from somewhere.

The guy who sang your favourite song was just pretending.

Your education was at the hands of cynical discontented failures.

Your Diet Coke is part poison.

Your god is dead.

-

2009-08-12T00:28:00.001-07:00

There’s this one shot in a Wim Wender’s film called ‘Wings of Desire’. It shows an angel standing on the roof of a tall building. He’s on the edge and leaning forward ever so slightly. You can see the skyline in the background, but it is blurred and indistinct. Everything looks slightly grimy, as if a dust storm is brewing. The wings, however, retain their delicacy - they are white, almost transparent.

Whenever I see this image I feel a strange kinship. I keep getting this feeling that he and I are in some way similar. We are both in purgatory. He is condemned to saving souls, but instead wants to live a normal life. I am stuck with a shatteringly normal life, when I’d rather be saving souls.

He’s on the edge. So am I.

He’s leaning forward. I am too.

_

2009-06-30T10:47:00.000-07:00

The strange new things

2009-06-26T02:50:00.000-07:00

The clean bathroom,
The neat and clean,
The order as I see,
Is that mine?

The less for me,
The most for her,
The new way of things,
What is it?

The turning of the time,
The change of things,
The new language,
Do I speak?

Free of thoughts,
Full of doings,
Short of me,
Do I long for it?

This is nice,
Simple with rules,
One for me,
And isn’t that simper?

No friends to meet,
A few of hers,
She is the centre,
But where am i?

Catch me soon,
Where I will be,
I’ll be the same,
But without me.

delhi/gurgaon

2009-06-17T12:50:00.000-07:00

so i walked out of allnut gate, talking on my mobile phone/so i walked out of the office, talking on my mobile phone.

before we'd mentioned how we loved each other more than we had loved anyone/before we'd mentioned how we loved each other more than we had loved anyone.

we had talked about moving in together, about how we'd do the house up/we had talked about moving in together, about how we'd do the house up.

i saw no issue with that, she was home to me/i saw no issue with that, she was home to me.

i promised her breakfast in bed, despite an incapacity to cook/i promised her breakfast in bed, despite an incapacity to cook.

i promised her i'd clean up/i promised her i'd clean up.

she hated dogs, so there would be no dog in the house/she loved dogs, but she knew i couldn't take care of one. so there would be no dog in the house.

her parents wouldn't know/her parents wouldn't know.

the conversation was still fresh in my memory/the conversation was still fresh in my memory.

this conversation was different/this conversation was different.

i sensed something different in her voice, something alien/i sensed something different in her voice, something alien.

she said she was worried about moving away. about how we'd be after/she said she was worried about moving away. about how we'd be after.

i felt my heart lurch. it was then that i knew how much i loved her/i felt my heart lurch. it was then that i knew how much i loved her.

things change. people change. she said/things change. people change. she said.

i cried, silently to myself/i laughed, silently to myself.

_

2009-06-15T07:52:00.000-07:00

Earth 2523 A.D

2009-06-13T00:55:00.000-07:00

You couldn’t have missed him.

Like some vision of an apocalypse that had already come to pass, he sat wrapped in his stained Bedouin apparel, his gas mask a small hole where his face should have been.

Perched on probably the last rock on the planet, he quietly sought his peace with the destruction.

Mr. Knight, I presume.

Funny, he said, as he tore open his mask, no one’s called my by that name in at least a couple of centuries.

I’m guessing that’s as long as it took me to find you.

Immortality’s a bitch, he mentioned, his face scarred, not wrinkled. It’s not what they made it out to be. I mean I could always slit my wrist or jump off a cliff.

But you never had the courage to.

Smart kid.

It’s always the cowards she chooses for immortality.

Who?

Destiny.

Oh her. Yeah.

You know, I have a theory, sort of. Self ingratiating really.

Let me hear it. I sort of like self ingratiating.

Yeah. That it’s like vertigo. You know, how the people most afraid of jumping off are the ones who most want to.

What? Immortality?

No. Cowardice.

At that he laughed a lot. Betraying that he hadn’t heard a joke in at least a century.

You’re funny. He said. I like you. What’s your name?

Max. I said. Max Black. Got a light?

Stick it to the earth. The planet’s almost burned down to the core.

Sure enough. The tip of my cigarette lit up as soon as I touched it to the surface.

Smells funny, he said. What’re you smoking?

Menthols. Want one?

I don’t smoke.

I laughed now. Not convulsively like him. My quiet cynical laugh.

Once you get in the business of manufacturing doom, you get off the idea of buying it.

What shit. I said. You’re afraid of the cancer, aren’t you?

Are you mad. Look around you, I breathe cancer day in and day out.

Day in and day out, I said. Explain day out. This galaxy has two suns, there’s no night here.

Day out sounds cooler. It’s funny how all the phrases I knew are slowly losing their meaning.

From one liar to the other. I said. It’s always about sounding cool, isn’t it?

Yeah. So how did you find me?

I don’t know. I didn’t even know I was looking for you.

Huh?

Yeah. I just let serendipity guide me. It sort of sorts things out.

Well. So how does this sort itself out?

The earth is dying. I think you could save it.

I already did. Once.

I know. I think someone wrote about it.

Something good, I hope.

No. they know everything, you know.

The internet man. It sucks. Though I thought it was pretty cool back then. Whooping Andromedan ass and all.

Oh it was. Despite, well, your inconsistencies. And do you know we’re all one now. Humans and Andromedans and Altarians and everyone else. We’re all a Federation now.

That sucks.

Sucks?

Yeah. Now you don’t know who’s the enemy.

Yeah?

Yeah. Always been my issue with multiculturalism.

So, you’re going back with me or what?

No. too much of a cause man. But I do know of a fantastic café around a nearby star system.

Really.

They’ve got only one sun. And you catch the most beautiful sunsets there.

Sounds cool.

Unless you want to go back and try saving the earth on your own or something.

Are you mad?

So let’s go then, he said, with some luck we’ll catch happy hours.

Sleeping with the Fishes

2009-06-10T07:56:00.000-07:00

Early in the night, he woke up in a cold sweat.

He knew what was wrong.

There were silver fish in the water supply. He had avoided drinking from the taps, purchasing cartons of bottled water instead. His fridge was just bottles of mineral water now.

It was close to the end of the month. His bottles were almost done.

He had, of late, employed a new maid.

The maid had found an empty bottle. In a fit of empathy, she had taken an empty bottle and filled it with water, placing it in the refrigerator for a pay hike.

He had come home stoned. His throat parched, he had opened the fridge door and gone for one of the three remaining bottles inside. Serendipity had ensured that his hand reached for the relevant one.

Silver fish, exclusive to Gurgaon’s water supply, are microscopic piranha equivalents. Once in the blood supply, they start biting. They don’t stop.

A clinic reported discovering a silver fish in a post mortem. The creature had fed itself to the size of an eel (a growth of over a 1000 times). The doctor said its eyes reminded him of a greedy and fat Chinese minister from the 70’s, also of his wife when she woke up in the middle of the night.

Now it’s interesting to note how these silver fish feed.

While an ordinary predator will try and ravage his prey, the silver fish tries to preserve it. For instance, while a piranha, once through your skin, will cut through your veins, a silver fish will consume the vein and instantaneously substitute it, rearranging its biology to form a surrogate vein that keeps the blood flowing. This keeps the blood flowing until there’s none left, giving the silver fish a fresh supply of meat for the longest possible duration. This necessitates the silver fish to secrete an anesthetic to camouflage the substitution against the nervous system. Otherwise the host would choose suicide over the pain and hence compromise the quality of the silver fish’s feed.

That means that it’s a painless sort of death. Once infected, doctors recommend that you just sleep it through.

He knew that.

I’m not doing that, he thought. Getting up, he started stripping for a shower. Then he’d go to the Saket 24/7 and pick a chilled beer and a pack of smokes. He’d play his favourite playlist on his ipod.

Oh bondage, up yours!

2009-04-29T20:10:00.000-07:00

'Some people think little girls

should be seen

and not heard

but I think

OH BONDAGE, UP YOURS!'

Yes, really

2009-03-16T23:12:00.000-07:00

Non-profit. Altruistic. Emotional. Relevant.

Sell-out.

The Further Adventures of Max Black and Charlie the Talking Dog: Plan B

2009-03-04T22:43:00.000-08:00

it's a crowded road. it's close to that time of the afternoon when schools get off so everything looks like a traffic jam. max is sitting beneath a bus stop fanning himself furiously while charlie sits drooling, with tongue extended.

charlie: what're we doing here again?

max: this is our last chance to save humanity

charile: save it? from what?

max: i don't know. from itself maybe...

charlie: hmmmm....

(they sit in silence)

charlie: you know, max, i don't think we're at the right place

max: why do you say that?

charlie: i mean there's not much happening here... like there was a jam here sometime ago, there's an old man sitting staring into space next to us, there are two kids waiting, for i don't know, the bus or something, there's a man selling water across the road, there's a fat woman crossing the road. i mean, there's no black hole or monster or anything here. is there?

max: no no no, that's how it happens, it's a moment thing, there's no build up to it, the event happens, and you have to react to it then and there. you know, there's no weighing the pros and cons. the event wants your natural response to it, and it gets that by marginalising your response time...

while max is in the thick of his explanation, a maruti van stops near the children. two burly types get out of it and grab the children and get back into their wagon of doom. the van drives off. people just stand around looking.

charile: fuck, what now...

max: over to plan b

_

2009-03-03T03:34:00.001-08:00

The Further Adventures of Max Black and Charlie the Talking Dog: Introductions

2009-03-03T02:51:00.000-08:00

max and charlie are lying on the terrace basking like strays in the sun. max is trying to light his cigarette using his cool zippo. however, his efforts seem curtailed by the fact that the lighter is upside down and the flame, following the order of conventional physics, is headed the opposite way.

charlie: dude, what's with the name?

max: the name?

charlie: yeah. max black?

max: oh that...

charlie: yeah.

max: i'm into typo, you know...

charlie: typo?

max: typography.

charlie: oh...

max: alphabets, the fonts they're in, words, the way the words are arranged, the way sentences are arranged...

charlie: yeah...

max: and i love black on white, you know, i sort of dig the simplicity to it

charlie scratches his ear

max: and my favourite shade of black is maximum black

charlie: ohhhh!

max: yeah

charlie: you could've just said that, no

max: yeah. and also i read this short paper on bullshit

charlie: on bullshit?

max: yeah. not the cow derivative...BS...

charlie: okay

max: yeah, by this harvard professor...

charlie: havard (makes a dog variation of an 'impressive' face)

max: the guy's name was max black...

charlie: hmmmmm...

max: also, i think it sounds cool...

charlie: yeah, why am i called charlie?

max: charlie... yeah... oh, now i remember

charlie: yeah?

max: charlie's slang for cocaine

charlie: it is?

max: yeah, and i have this friend who really likes dogs

charlie: likes dogs? that's really nice of her man...

max: i named you after her cocaine habit

charlie: fuck you

The Further Adventures of Max Black and Charlie the Talking Dog: No Logo

2009-03-03T02:32:00.000-08:00

charlie's taking a piss on a brown esprit bag. max enters the scene.

max: just look at you. that's horrible. it's...it's so uncouth.

charlie: i don't like multinationals.

Burning Safari

2009-01-03T01:22:00.000-08:00

http://in.youtube.com/watch?v=X0UmVrKC9hA&feature=dir

Mr. Fairfax

2008-12-02T22:02:00.000-08:00

Pointed like a compass,
In an awkward geometry of time;
Brownian in its motion,
Calculous in its crime ~

_

2008-11-14T19:16:00.000-08:00

69 cures colds

2008-11-14T19:06:00.000-08:00

69 cures colds
threesomes help with loneliness
blowjobs work wonders for the flu
It’s hard to believe but it’s true
porn is, porn is, porn is good for you

priests says no
feminists say way to go
mother might misconstrue
it feels so bad but feels good too
porn is, porn is, porn is good for you

is that your ex
with her new banker friend
you’re sitting there crying, you can’t move
could have been anyone, could have been you
porn is, porn is, porn is good for you

when a cigarette’s too distant
alcohol’s too expensive
and a j’s too enthoo
nothing’s better for your decrepitude
porn is, porn is, porn is good for you

what they taught you was wrong
biased
untrue
this is the option, the in lieu
porn is, porn is, porn is good for you

your job sucks
she’s not here
you spent the whole day in a queue
look at the camera baby, close your eyes when he shoots
porn is, porn is, porn is good for you

Dehydration

2008-10-25T01:47:00.000-07:00

A troupe of tap-dancers did their hoppy thing. Their feet were a blur of shamrock green. The smile on their faces belonged in tourism brochures. They made an amazing amount of noise - clattering, clapping, tapping, stomping. Their feet beat out a tattoo which which found an echo in my heart, and quickened its beat. The camera panned out a little, and I saw that there were only ten of them, not the two hundred they sounded like. Then the camera panned out some more, and I realised that they were not really dancing in front of me. They were in my head. Or on my head. I can't be sure. Everything's strange this morning.

The morning brought with it memories and memory loss. It also brought with it turmoil in the stomach, eyes that wished the sun would turn itself off and inexplicable shooting pains down the length of the arm. It forced you to hydrate, but to hydrate one has to move, and every step was a small death. It forced a music change - rock 'n roll for violin strains that seemed to waft down from heaven. It served to remind me that somewhere in the world was goodness and beauty, and if I survived this morning, I should dedicate the rest of my life to searching it out. If I survived.

Bad hangover. Bad fucking hangover.

_

2008-10-21T11:21:00.000-07:00

Squirrel semantics:

2008-10-21T02:20:00.000-07:00

Art of a maniac,

Sloshed in shame,

Robbing realities,

Fermenting for fame.

Magic in the making,

Molotoves in the mind,

Milf on the desk,

May he find.

House of a hag,

Hats of a hound,

Hire for hire,

The harrowing sound.

Tease of a fly,

Tart of a tamarind,

Toss of a coin,

Tap of the wind.

Wailing willows,

Waiting windows,

Wafting wants,

Whiling in woes.

Calculus colours,

Crafting cold,

Curious cats,

A clean fold.

Leaning lights,

Laurels of lac,

Lieing lepers,

Lying on their back.

dusts of sunshine

doing of a deed

doling daisies

Deep in weed.

Sighing in silence,

Severed in swoon,

Sliced up in dices,

Feathered to be soon.