Reviewing reactions to Islam and Terrorism

God bless foreignpolicy.com-- Its a great, low-cost way of accessing the magazine online and reading relevant opinions on current issues.

Take for instance, C. Christine Fair & Husain Haqqani's article on on islamist terrorism,'Think Again: Islamist Terrorism'. A well written article, that seeks to clear away the prevailing myths about who terrorists are and where they come from:

"Pundits and politicians of all stripes are quick to offer their wisdom on what fuels Islamist terrorism. It just so happens that much of what they say is wrong. Poverty doesn’t produce terrorists, a solution to the Israel-Palestine problem isn’t a cure-all, and young Muslim men aren’t the most likely to turn to terror. If we are going to fight a war on terror, the least we can do is understand who we are fighting"

The article addresses some of the most burning aspects of islamist terrorism that papers such as the New York Times have devoted many dead trees to, ever since 2001-- Madrasas for example, and the muslim, unmarried, male, unemployed demographic thats been touted as the most susceptible to acts of terrorism.

"“Young, Unmarried Muslim Males Are the Most Likely to Become Terrorists”
No. It is de rigueur to suggest that young, unmarried, Muslim males are the most likely population to become terrorists or to support terrorism. But from the perspective of the global supply of terrorists, this claim is false. Consider the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam in Sri Lanka. They are the world’s single largest group of suicide bombers. Their cadres are not Muslim, but Hindu by religion and nearly 40 percent are female.

Even on the issue of support for terrorism, there is reason to be skeptical about the popular convention that young males are leading the pack. In a recent survey of 6,000 Muslims in 14 countries published in Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, females were more likely to support terrorism than were males. What’s more, married and unmarried persons are equally likely to support terrorism..."

As stated before, it is a well written article. C. Christine Fair is a senior research associate at the United States Institute of Peace, and Husain Haqqani is a visiting scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and is a source well-trusted by Prof. Sawoski, a teacher of mine whose classes deal with international relations here at RWU.

However, a point I found interesting was this--

"...the significance of each regional conflict varies from one jihadi group to the next. For Algerian jihadists, their war, provoked by the refusal of the pro-Western Algerian military to accept the results of elections won by Islamists in 1991, is as significant as Palestinian resistance to Israel. Pakistani and Kashmiri jihadists spew the greatest amount of venom in their publications against “Hindu India,” not Jewish Israel..."

By stating such, the authors seem to point out that there are multiple causes, and multiple groups. This much may be true. And yet, the fact is that if what is perceived as an insult or threat is offered to the global أمة or ummah, a collective reaction will be offered by all jihadi groups, around the world.

Take for instance, the recent matter of a danish newspaper publishing "offensive" cartoons-- "The newspaper published caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad, some of which depicted him as a terrorist" (bbc.co.uk)

There were reactions to this act at all levels, from around the world-- Ministers of 17 arab nations asked the Danish government to take strong action against those responsible. Embassies were closed, or the threat was made to recall ambassadors. The publication was protested in Gaza-- many thousands of miles away. Secretary General of the Arab League Amr Moussa said:

"Why do they talk about democracy and freedom of expression just when the issue concerns Islam?" he asked. "If it concerns other religions the facts will change."

Bingo, Mr. Moussa. This is the indicator of the key fact that the authors of the FP article, the danish newspaper editors and the danish government have collectively overlooked-- Islam today has a unifying strength that no other global religion has. This is because it is far more monotheistic than christianity is today, and carries a sense of community that other religions don't have, or possess to a smaller degree. There is no hurting the sensibilities of a part of it-- You affect the whole.

The editor of the paper tried arguing for the freedom of speech. He forgot abt malicious libel.

Its not about religion or ideas-- it is people dealing with people, people hurting other people. The "terrorists" are not fighting a crusade, or attempting to convert the world to their belief. They are protecting their culture and beliefs from external aggression. Take away the aggression and things could only get better.

But who am I to talk?

That danish cartoonist is going to have his ass kicked though. Rightfully so. How dare you use the gentle art of cartooning for propoganda? Children and whimsical-minded adults read that stuff. May the spirit of Gary Larson and Bill Watterson twist his undies forever. Sniff.

I need bed. I also needed a post scriptum on this piece, due to the comments it generated. Do read it, here.

Crikey!

By gorry, do I have much to tell ye--

of a quiet enlightenment, a love I thought I lost only to find I always had, a new penchant for shoes, my run in with the law, trans-atlantic flights, unexpected angels and MA courses.

It will all be told. Slowly, slowly.

For now though, an article that MUST be pointed out-- Attorney general Gonzales trying to justify the illegal serveillance indulged in by the Bush Administration:

Confronting Gonzales during his nearly half-hour speech were more than a dozen young people in the audience who turned their backs to him and held up for a banner for television cameras. The banner, loosely based on a Benjamin Franklin quote, read: "Those who would sacrifice liberty for security deserve neither."

- PETE YOST, Associated Press Writer.

Read the full article here. And check out the pic-- Dang, I'm proud of these guys.

WHOOO-HOOOOO!!!!!

Walk the Line just picked up the golden globe.

Joaquin Phoenix won best actor. Reese Witherspoon won best actress-- The category hasn't shown up yet on starworld, but bloomberg.com carries the news.

YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!

I LOVED THIS MOVIE!

ok, I know. No typing in caps. But I'm happy.

Oh aye-- In india. Will be back on tuesday.

The Reason

For the longest time, I have not been able to understand why I came back to madras this winter. There had to be a reason for leaving my comforter-lined new-found fishbowl behind so soon-- Come on, 7 months doesn't warrant a teary-eyed return to ma and pa. It wasn't like I was homesick. In fact, as late as october, my plans for the season were meant to include at least two of the following:

i)working with Maya in the global studies office in Bristol

2) Going back to Portland and seeing Laura and Ryan and Kansei and Aman and Mike and Mary and Linda.

3)Ayush, Maya, Abdel Khader and myself together yelling in Timesquare when the ball would fall on 31st night.

And till yesterday, I did not know the reason why all that didn't happen. Being with mum and setting up the tree is all very well. Meeting old friends and new, driving to the coast and plane-ing it to delhi is quite alright. But that didnt explain a certain pattern to my actions-- ensuring I met the people I had been with last year around the same time. Laughing with them, grateful that I exist now outside their lives. Grateful too, that the few I count as close, still are. Driving past certain places-- an ex-college, a fishing village, a mofussil bus terminus, a temple, a beach, a chinese restaurant, a bridge. My room that carries no scent or smell of me, anymore. Throwing out old papers, old books. Climbing up to my water tank, relieved to find that the dragon spirit that used to live there has now gone.

It took a little book to tell me that I returned due to the second of the two greatest instincts known to human kind. The first one is fear.

"Then she turned, moved closer to Pedro Cantos, and did what she had lived for.

She curled up behind him: she pulled her knees up to her chest; aligned her feet until she felt her legs perfectly paired, the two thighs softly joined, the knees like two cups balanced one on the other, the calves separated by nothing; she shrugged her shoulders slightly and slid her hands, joined, between her legs. She looked at herself. She saw an old doll.

She smiled. Shell and animal.

Then she thought that however incomprehensible life is, probably we move through it with the single desire to return to the hell that created us, to live beside whoever, once, saved us from the inferno. She tried to ask herself where this absurd faithfulness to horror came from but found that she had no answers. She understod only that nothing is stronger than the instinct to return, to where they broke us, and to replicate that moment forever. Only thinking that the one who saved us once can do it forever. In a long hell identical to the one from which we came. But suddenly merciful and without blood"
- Baricco, Alessandro. 'Without Blood', Trans. by Ann Goldstein.

I returned due to the second of the two greatest instincts known to human kind--

The need for
closure...

Merry christmas, darfur. Happy new year, baghdad.

On the Greatest Song U2 ever wrote

And don't think that this was written in a drunken frenzy, or in haste to avoid yet another of those oh so famous madrasi power cuts.

Now I know you've had this discussion with yourself and whichever peer group you choose to go on a downer trip with--

"dude, 'with or without you'. I know the words backwards, and--"

"yeah man, when he sings "nothing to win and--"

"nothing left to lose. Fuck. And you give yourself away..

fuck. I need another drink"

True. I see the point in this discussion. Any poor fallen sod who's had the ill luck to have loved and lost the one person who will--unwillingly-- haunt every 3rd waking thought; any poor sod who will refuse to attempt getting 7 hours sleep for fear of dreaming; any such unfortunate wraith *will* share this view-point, and will--hoarse-voiced-- yell along with Bono, 3:03 into the song.

[For wraiths we are. Overweight, with blotchy lungs and dusty shoes. The undead have it better: at least they are just the decaying fleshy presence of their past. Wraiths are shadows: If we reach out to hold your hand, you cannot feel us. If we try weeping, we get a headache and itch horrifically for a smoke. We can't handle light, class reunions and old photographs. And no high works, and no new year party. But I digress.]

'With or without you' will always be a masterpiece. It is a song for the dying, for the idiot romeo who wakes up and realizes juliet couldn't see through his bad acting. It is a song for the loser left waving at an empty space in a crowd at the airport. It is meant to be sung along to on the radio when you're driving back to your personal hole, alone.

You can close your eyes at the end of it. But the screw up is, unless you have actually overcome hamlet's dilemma, pulled a madonnaish rebrand or jumped off your terrace's water tank , you have to open your eyes again and deal with the next song and the dawned day.

Which is where 'One' comes in.

'With or without you' is a howling at the moon. It's a drag race over the cliff. It's a blade in your wrist and the last words of Cobain when he said that if only he could fly with fire like Freddie on stage, if only the performance still had that for him...

'One' is for the man or woman who has the incredible balls to go sober and undoped where s/he is certain to find the ex. 'One' is for the calm handshake at the wedding, with no flamboyant gestures, because in truth no one is Slash and life aint a gnr video.

This song is for those who have the kind of humility that only comes with living the loss. This one is for the quiet standing face to face, and the laying down of the still sharp-edged weapons in front of the one who knows how to use them best. This song is for those who have the grace to turn away, no matter the mob, the kisses, the tears, the foot pressed against yours in silence.

This is for the meeting in a corner table for coffee, leaning forward and asking quietly
"is it getting better
or do you feel the same
is it getting any easier on you now
you've got someone to blame."

It is the song for kissing the ex, and then cursing yourself for the poisoned bitterness you both exchanged, when you laughed like it was no big deal and this is the way grown ups meet, and hey I'm busy all day tomorrow, and my flight's in the night so see you when I see you, and take care of yourself.

It is walking back upstairs without screaming your rage at yourself, it is refusing to give into being a compulsive alcoholic, it is admitting you are a coward, it is admitting you cannot live without him but now must, it is admitting you are overweight and don't give a flying fuck. It is admitting that it was more than just need in the night, and that nothing you write or say can ever change the words you typed over msn. It is admitting that it's too late tonight to drive the past out into the night. It is knowing the restraint it takes to not blog this, and admitting you have none. It is wishing you had refused that kiss. It is not minding them selling the story on their blog, to Time or NDTV. It is accepting that they had the nerve to make the final cut. It is telling your parents that everything is fine. It is not changing the song however much it aches. It is not clicking the send button.

Did I ask too much, more than a lot
You gave me nothing now its all I've got
We're one but we're not the same
we've hurt each other and we'll do it again.

It is bono and pearl jam performing the song live together, and bono, over the out-of-tuned screams tears hugs cries of the crowd, quietly flowing into the chorus of 'unchained melody'.

Because that's the fuck up with being a wraith. We may turn away, but we can never forget.

One of the greeks [remind me which one, please] said that we are all but halves of a whole, wandering the earth to find the completing piece. So what happens when you realize you're the kid who ate the 3,999th jigsaw piece, that you're the dude who broke the last match-stick in the last match-box on the camping trip at 2:04am?

There is no such thing as a new year. The power fails, and when you reboot, winamp comes up clean coz you hadn't saved the playlist.

Mr. Kipling, I know you said that if I could bend and pick up the pieces when the others break it down, I would have the earth and all that's in it.

But what if I raised the first hammer, and what if I don't want the earth, nothing at all except the thing that cannot be?

The song's changed. The Stones have a new album. He won't meet me tomorrow. Bob sings that when you hear the music, you feel no pain.

Goodnight, Mr. Marley. The song is done, the time has come.. thought I'd something more to say.

My muse sits

**********

My muse sits, her fat white spotted shiny-skinned calves stretched folded
Against the power of her squat in the light by the door.

She chooses to be fat. As she chooses to not wear bras and dog ear books and

Leave me.

As she does, often.

Pain is often brought, so much that like an unwanted baby striped, cottoned and warm
Piles of it are left around the floor of my mind, second hand clothes…

**********

I right.

I right for the might is in flight by night of words that bite with tooth-marks of light so blood run like kite like glory volcano sight.

I right.

I left my write a while back coz pain like a sack was stuck to my back till calcium lack made my knee go slack and…

I right.

Wait. I no right.

Now, I right.
Right so the all of the call will be
answered by rise and fall of apples
and the dead who are fed the seeds in your bed and…

I right.

Was I left?

I left the parts that were bought
And then sought on red silk that caught
Whispers like flu by corners in a loo and televised voodoo
That left you with plenty to see and nothing to…

I left when I knew that my muse read the news only for the funnies
And sweated in pews n' climaxed with the bunnies
That rolled on Discovery and possibly the green by the sheen
Of the moon and the Thames with Beatles in May.

I left where the word-pictures took curtain calls and made trunk calls
Where men and women left doodles on the walls of latrines whose sorrows
Were mourning waterfalls of lipstick and wishlick and Russian blonde heeled sputniks
All who ran man can pan hooved, laughing
Into the wilderness and jazz of parting, dancing.

I left who declared who be losers and who were the spared
Who cored my mind’s cunt and told me they cared
Who woke without grace or the necessary pace to get
Past the tangled sax of dreaming on a TV talk-show set.

I left how I came- plenty noise and taking my name
Back to before we turned the same like custard and mustard
All yellow and spineless no caress for the cess of our minds made sure
Our baits left us and we lost our lure

I left why I left why I left why I left
Why I left, was coz to die was a lie for
Who went? like your mothers back your will bent.

I left

to

right

Backwards.

Forwards

I right to be left which is best for the zest of a lime cut fresh
That comes with a world free and hair-ee.
I right to be left that is political that like conical
Is a shape that is susceptible
To faith and fall and fear and the maul
Of not quite walking the straight yellow line.

I right.

Now I right?

What is left?

Space on the page of this flat white cage
To hold the purest part of my droppings of rage

Damn you.
What is left?

I write.

Googlistically speaking

I'm trippin'.
Procrastinatin'.

But honestly, this was fun. Unfortunately, 'priyanka' brought up way too much abt the gandhi and the chopra, and it got boring. And apparently, Google doesn't know the blue goblin yet.

[insert threatening yet woeful growls]

So I settled for this.

My favourite?

pj is the meta devil.

Go figure. Go be a googligan.


pj is the man
pj is 2sweet2bbeat
pj is in the babybedroom
pj is made of stars
pj is back home
pj is in need of a loving home in ca
pj is famous?
pj is drifting more and more away from the huge
pj is home
pj is like rodney dangerfield
pj is evicted from big brother
pj is out
pj is a developer toolkit for parsing
pj is home and big troubles
pj is distributed in binary form in a single jar file called hip
pj is the first user interface framework that brings state
pj is not a gi jane poster girl
pj is
pj is a shameless publicity hound so if you are with a periodical
pj is between p
pj is famous? pj is famous? posted by
pj is a champion 14 lb
pj is the best golfer on the team
pj is ready
pj is not a man of few words
pj is our older norwegian fjord gelding who was born "ryvar" on a farm in illinois in 1980
pj is drifting more and more away from the huge fanbase they used to have
pj is an angel on earth she has wiped away my tears
pj is the biggest agency in pechiney world trade and since 1994
pj is made of all mahogany
pj is growing out of the stripes around her face
pj is now doing their homework together with fbi to lock down "hackers" who aleggely are involved on us hacks
pj is diagnosed when the freckles are noticed or hamartomas are found in the intestinal tract
pj is fond of many outside activities
pj is illegal if
pj is a social science graduate
pj is a director of a successful ten
pj is a breath of fresh air
pj is one of the easiest
pj is the meta devil
pj is featured on lead vocals and accordian
pj is short for a pompano jig
pj is devoted to the history of the japanese people and how and why they react to one another within their own society
pj is sponsored by
pj is listed in the world artist directory
pj is eligible to work legally in the following countries
pj is a pourable version of the popular polywater® j high performance pulling lubricant
pj is an area located in the district of petaling
pj is a factor of m
pj is just naturally curious and ready for anything
pj is saved from her pretensions by the force of her talent
pj is our retired racing greyhound
pj is so unattractive and was'nt he childish going on about why alex never picked him
pj is one of the best clowns in america winning numerous awards for her creativity
pj is a complete visual programming language based on the concepts of parallel
pj is for you
pj is a parlor
pj is defensive
pj is introduced as a man who has all the answers
pj is a toolbox for parsing
pj is wanting to get first tickets and she's first on the line
pj is clearly at height t+1 we have completed the induction
pj is currently enjoying a two
pj is also a member of the american association of suicidology and is both a member of and certified by the association for death education & counseling as a
pj is still scheduled to play bumbershoot in seattle on aug
pj is having no trouble keeping her music fresh while keeping her vision pure
pj is a big boy & is already potty trained
pj is the odds
pj is trypsin
pj is in a better place now
pj is contained in xðp; jÞ
pj is one to look out for
pj is now tested against pk
pj is all too happy to set the record straight now that he is back in the real world
pj is a relatively easy model to restore given the fact that there were more than 350
pj is currently busy working on
pj is a great source file management tool
pj is ?
pj is a very affectionate hamster and just loves to be cuddled
pj is the millennium place project coming up in the section 14 area

"The dead suffered a wrong. Uphold justice"

There is a fishing village near Hong Kong and its name is Dongzhou. At the mouth of the bridge leading to their village, a group of Dongzhou's residents, numbering about 100, gathered to hold a banner with the above line scrawled on it.

The chinese paramilitary forces are at it again.

And here is the curious truth: Tiananmen Square was apparently not enough for the administration. And neither is the first time since 1989 that violence has been inflicted on the little people in China.

It happened because the villagers were protesting the building of a power plant.

This is not the first time. If it aint a power plant, its oil ownership issues. If it aint oil, its the falun gong.

And the only reason yankville hasn't said anything to chinaland is because of trade and deficits.

The things you can buy these days. Silence, blindness, and battery operated foot massagers.

Qua-ack?

The United States, which generates a quarter of the world's greenhouse gases, had questioned the need to engage in even nonbinding talks on the subject. When the Europeans and Canadians proposed such talks Thursday, chief American climate negotiator Harlan Watson rejected it on the grounds that it would be tantamount to formal negotiations.

"If it walks like a duck and talks like duck, it's a duck," Watson told the other delegates, according to several participants in the closed midnight session.

As Watson walked out, one of the other delegates, baffled, responded: "I don't understand your reference to a duck. What about this document is like a duck?"

- 'U.S. Joins Informal Talks on Warming', by Juliet Eilperin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, December 10, 2005; Page A01.


Read the full article here.Only good thing about yank Presidential second terms: they're on the way out & don't give a duck's beak about winning the vote of petroleum paladins and arms manufacturers. Thus they can finally concentrate on energy policies that will keep us all, bird and human alike, breathing easier.

Quacky.

Mall-Run: For Frank O'Hara*

Sunday Afternoon 12:21 all's fogged up
Inside the bus the men and women you will never find on Oprah
Wait for the final wheezing stop.
As corny as that first Godzilla we breathe furious white smoke
And rush Into the made in china warmth of PROVIDENCE PLACE
like it's the thanksgiving sale
The president
Or a jumper off the Newport bridge.

Speakers and mp3 players on sale: the only
Things sold that aint nano are the milk jugs down at 7/11.
Maya and I walk on, fists buried deep in pockets.
But where I really want to be is outside in
All that glorious slushy first real snow of Providence.

I'm not sure who's bigger today; Sponge bob,
Or the shot glass special at CRATE & BARREL.

"But where I really want to be is outside in
All that glorious slushy"—Hold up, Jack she tells me
As we scramble out of the arms of the last salesgirl
At VICTORIA'S SECRET. 2:55pm and it feels like daylight saving
And American Idol reruns. We need out.
I hold the door
For a guy in an Ozzfest hoodie. We exit.
3:05 now: we miss one bus so there's time for
Any god damned beautiful adventure in the world.
The skaters out in KENNEDY PLAZA look mournful,
Like they just found out Disney paid off the senator
To keep them forever circling to Brenda Lee:
Rockin’ around the Christmas tree.

We stand outside the 7/11 and smoke gloveless
Shivering. Holding a pint of 2% and saying THIS finally,
Aint just Bristol. There's the sign to New York, all snowed over,
We could hitch a ride, find an Uno’s and—
Yeah sure I have a lighter, and the guy says thank you and we're all right.
Screw NYC. This tight-sphinctered quaffing cheap coffee
And kids huggin and kissin only coz its this cold
Is where it's all at.
And Tim Allen in a fake beard can't find us here.

I'm so happy I want to make my third snowball of December,
But before I can ask Martha Stewart for ribbon and some tape
The 60 steams, waiting—she knows where we have to go.

_________________________________________

This poem was written on the first snow-day, here in rhode island. Maya and I went to the mall, and this be the account of that day. Statutory warning: some bits fictionalized. But of course ;)

*Frank O'Hara is one of the poets we've covered in class this semester: just covered, in fact. Last poet before the final paper, good lord. Our assignment was to write a "I do this/I do that" poem, the kind he is known for. O'Hara used everyday images and the idiom he knew, of the time he lived in yankville. I tried doing the same, except using the images and idiom of today.

Two of my favourites of his are A step away from them and the day lady died. Here's more of his stuff online.

Written on Samhain*

I sit here atop their faery palace.
I am permitted, because they have taken to watching.
The new gods displaced no one:
They only stopped running and stood still,
Feet rooting into earth--
Long fingers clutching at leaf cover.


They stand curved and listening.
You won't see them till you
Lean against them,
Wind whispering in the leaves above your head.


The Lochness sleeps at the bottom of the bay,
Smiling in his dream.
Except on this night
Except for tonight


Look at the pebbles at your feet:
Old bits of driftwood and dragon tooth.
Some slate.
All tools to leave a note for them
That they will laugh over once the party is done.


Here where the grass grows—ramparts.
Here where cigarettes have been stubbed out: a watch tower.
Here where the marigold grows: a moat.
Your behind rests on a turret: a tiny telescope watching for ravens.


They know your schedule.
When the lights come on.
How the sprinklers work.
Why campus security will not climb these ramparts.
Especially this night.
Especially tonight.


They let the grass grow into the moat.
The draw bridge rotted and turned to soil.
A beer can crush lies where the levy would gather.
My ungainly foot stomps in a fairy circle.


But as the last leaves are lit by the setting sun,
Their faces hidden in flames laugh as they wait
For their night
For tonight.


For the campus security will not climb these ramparts,
And I have made an offering
Of a chocolate bar and my sorrows.
Speak the ancient chants and light no lamp--
Then you will see their glittering eyes and hear
The ancient harp being tuned, underneath you, near.


________________________________

Samhain- the ancient name for a tradition that is now translated in popular culture as Halloween. Pronounced "sow-in", it is honoured by those of the celtic tradition.

Winter Haiku

breath falls with the snow.
trees hold only grey chest hair--
loss bites like young crabs.

The Light-- Non-fiction

December 2, 2005. 7:35pm.

Providence Place isn't a big mall, but when you lose the only three people you know in that tinsel-wrapped world, it is suddenly larger than a New York traffic jam at 5:15, with the grumbling coffee, and the bags, and the files...

I was lost. With a bag, grumbling into my turtleneck, trying to find in my ipod the same solace I used to seek in mum's neck when such impossible events would happen in the past. No such bloody luck.

I was lost. The three moroccans were busy GAPing or Banana Republicing somewhere, and I couldn't find them.

It got worse.

I had never been into Providence before. Mum calls it the Hermit Crab complex. Call it what you will, it also meant that I had about as much knowledge of the bus numbers and stop locations in Providence as would a Tibetan Monk of the Tabo Chos-Khor Monastery.

Metallica on ipod.
Filene's shopping bag folded severely under one arm.
Survival instinct kicked in-- They are three. I am one. I will survive.

I carpe diemed my way out of the mall, looking for restaurants and crushed soda cans as signs of the way we came, the only things that could point me towards the bus stop. One doesn't try asking Rhode Islanders for help. An unwritten law.

Shapeshift-- Nose to the wind Here, the basement irish pub. Roamer, wanderer, nomad, vagabond And here again, the crushed autumn leaf that looks like diseased liver call me what you will. There, a lamp-post with the red car underneath dance little tin goddess, dance. 5 steps more and-- yes, the crushed day old Providence Journal section, with the Darkness on the cover St. Anger round my neck, he never gets respect. Cross street. Wait. What I've felt, what I've known, never shines through what I've shown Cross another street. Stop girl who's smoking, who fumbles instantly for her lighter assuming that's what Im asking her Gimme fuel, gimme fire, gimme that which I desire. Girl, boyfriend and madly barking dog direct me towards the stop. 7:50pm. Get on the bus oh please God, wake me .

8:20pm. Miss my stop, because its my first time and No Leaf Clover is on my ipod and I like listening to it at a volume louder than what the driver uses to announce the stops in.

8:21pm. Im on the wrong side of the bridge that connects Bristol and my college to Portsmouth and the rest of the world. But it was a bridge, and I assumed I would walk over it like I've walked over the chetpet overbridge so many god-awful times in madras.

But here's the deal.
Madras has no winter, and chetpet lake no deep water.
A sign says its illegal to cross the bridge on foot.
The foot-path's a foot wide, no more and no less.
The metal railing comes upto my upper thigh, no more and no less.
Winds blowing at 24 knots seem to want me and my blue coat flapping over the bridge, down into the black flat water faaaaaaaaaaarrrrrr below.

I begin to curse. Not god, not my parents, not my ipod-- But the conductor, the bridge-layer, the wind, and gravity. I cursed and swore at them all, yelling that I-- 3 cars go by, zip zip ZIP!-- would be alive, past winter and its silly wind-- ZIP! and another ZIIIP!-- inspite of my blue coat flapping and the narrow sidewalk-- ZIP! zip, zip ZIP!-- I WILL SURVIVE!

Fuck me. I was going to fall off a bridge and die just when I had bought a nice dress and was heading home in two weeks.

Maybe I should pray, I thought.

"The Lord is my Shelter and my Refuge"

One misquoted, tiny psalmic line. I attempt thinking of the second line when--

A car pulls up. Black family van. Elderly couple in the front. The woman is frantically smiling and opens her door to ask me if I'd like a ride.

I blubber. Overwhelmed-- am I still in rhode island? Is this heaven? Did mum send you?-- and frostbitten, I scramble into the back. She tells me they went by me, and she had asked her husband to turn around because she was worried about that "young girl" out alone on the bridge. I thank her profusely, continuously, my own little mantra. Om mane padme hum. She says she has children of her own, and couldn't have let me walk it all the way back.

4 minutes later, I am across the steel monster and at the gates of my university. They drive off, I sniff and take glad muddy strides in firm, flat and large earth.

One misquoted, tiny psalmic line. Om mane padme hum.

There is a god. Hopefully, he'll be around and sniggering next time I endeavour a Mall run.

Winter Litany

Holy Holy Holy
Holy the weaving withered golden hands,
ten thousand leaves arched here above me.
Golden fingers reaching
inspite of raging winds over the dead grass.

Holy Holy Holy
Holy the tight elastic
cutting, every second carving
into my skin the reminder that
I am human and must needs sleep.

Holy Holy Holy
Holy the thorny honey locust tree
Bare branches reaching like a many veined artery
into the warmth of my father's heart.

Holy Holy Holy the moon hidden
from the cold in november clouds and rain.

Holy Holy Holy is the fallen ash
fanned to embers by winds howling holy.

Holy is my fat self running to time my last puff
with the top of the hill
and slash's eternal guitar riff.

Holy is this night
Holy is the amber glow
Holy my thumb, with its 20 year old scar
Holy the dew on this glistening black tar.

Amen/Omen*

The sky had no clouds but was as filled with grey heaviness as a glass is filled with milk. You could poke a finger into that sky and a sigh would escape from the hole you made, through which a lone seagull will escape, mourning.

Evening. She stood there stirring her coffee and staring, for against her window 300 iridescent bodies flung themselves, hummed, hovered and dove against and into glass and sky and dark in a frenzy, circling the outer rim of the light from the lamp, a madness shining in their glittering eyes.

A host of dragonflies. More than 300, she was sure.

Dec 25, 2004 8:52 PM
"laxmi reads powerful thunderstorms into
this congregation near my garden lamp, my driver on the other hand --
a practical man, who possibly did better in biology than I did, says
they are just gathered for body warmth and will soon fly away. The
trick is in knowing when the body has had enough, for if the heat gets
too much, they just wither away like corpses on a pyre.

Am going for a run"

I had smiled at the beauty in that, even if it was a terrible prophecy. Such beauty she had, and still does. She saw dragonflies. She's going for a run. I will love her forever.

December 26th, 2004 7:05am.
I woke in a gently rocking bed. Mum making dosas. Dad reading the Hindu. Neither had felt it.

Dec 26, 2004 10:52 PM
"Everyone's calling up everywhere... family in sri lanka.. those who
had gone on a pilgrimage for christmas to velankani... sam's
production buddy who was on a shoot at that taj on the maldives... 5
stars on bamboo shoots, jesus christ... sri lanka is still the worst
hit. Nagapattinam is miserable..worst bit, its raining there too.

We will go see if we can help the children. Will mail you when I get back...

have I ever told you how I hate being woken by a swaying bed?"

November 27, 2005 sometime in my night. She and I on Gtalk; I am being told of dead dragonflies outside, in her pool, on the lawn. Maybe the body has had enough heat, and they have all lain down to sleep. She and I nod, but do not smile-- Because it has been a year, and because there is still a little less than a month more to be certain that the dragonflies are finally still.

_______________________________________________

*Written for this week's writing exercise on S&C, a Ryze network: the theme was "paranormal", and the idea was to write a true account of an occurence in real life, in less than 750 words. Kudos to Gmail for the search option: I resurrected year old emails for the quoted sections.

I be Burnin'

midnight oil, old newspapers and rubber.

Last few weeks of work and then Im off and flyin.

Gotta love this beat, dammit.

Watch Video:

WE BE BURNIN' (Sean Paul)

Video Code provided by VideoCodeZone.Com

The Frog King

I heard a fly buzz when I died.

The insult was I was still alive.

Wearing my crown and little else besides,

There sat one cousin where once sat five.



The bastard chorus still sounded

From the low lying squelch outside.

Would they not stop? How my head pounded!

Day shone bright when their king died.



Wait. I had not closed my eyes, and thus could see

The smug-n-sorrowful filching of my things.

The four have left, carrying a throne, a wife,

my first spawn: such is the death of disposable kings.



"I cannot breathe" and "the end is near"

I make a show of it, nostalgic for the monsoon.

My cousin hops tearful to my head, my bed

The dirty bum buzzes 'gainst the square heat of noon.



With triumphant rude laughing eyes

His fat self saw what will soon be bog news:

A tongue long-prized, now too weak to reach.

The tiny reaper buzzed, awaiting payment of his dues.

The Kids of Calcutta

Giving Oscar to 'Born into Brothels' under best documentary was the best thing the big-wigs have done in a while.

Come see the pictures the kids took here.

And see their faces. See what they saw.

Eternal Return?

Nietzsche in his attempt to excavate the meaning of life once used the myth of eternal return to describe what he saw as the most important reason for men-- and the odd woman, or two-- to move from being into becoming. Eternal return, in short, is the hypothetical box in which the hour-glass of life as you know it is eternally flipped over and over, so that the same joys and sorrows, the same series of experiences repeat themselves ad infinitum.

Nietzsche in his 'gay science' followed his hypothesis with a question, asking whether the reader would curse life forever on being informed of this eternal return, or thank whatever Greater Force there is for the comfort of knowing that nothing new would ever happen again.

Nietzsche meant this again, as the measure of separation between those who chose to remain and those who chose to move. The sheep and the goats. Being and Becoming.

[We will assume that this 'choosing' is a well-oiled tool, a worn coat, a known ciusin. Leave Beckett and Pascal's existential theories on choice aside. Humor me. As you have so often.]

Kundera picked up on this and figured it would be a great way to start a book. He of course, wrote The Unbearable Lightness of Being before this present day when Nietzsche is considered passé, where every second high school sudoku aspirant blubs and blogs on the man and his horsey madness.

Except Kundera chooses to assume that this 'being' and 'becoming' is not a choice, that sheep and goats together, we are condemned to be what we essentially are: either 'be'ers or those given to becoming.

I return to India on December 16th.

A thing I assumed I wouldn't be doing till 2007, and even then only in order to renew some visa, any visa before I was off junketing again.

And of course, it is a hypothesis, this eternal return bit.

However, I get this sneaking feeling that the cosmos-- that dear old bitch-- has this way constantly spinning in our hamster's wheel when she knows there's a thing we long to get away from: instead of letting us run and find our man friday and our island, she keeps us on this ferris wheel till conciously or sub-conciously we face whatever we chose to leave behind. A certain about of active reaction is required of us, the price we pay to get off the blessed hell ride.

One of course could just get used to the unchanging scenery.

I have an ADD issue that makes this impossible to do.

And so I return. No air of finality, there still remains a year and a half of a yank degree to complete.

But I return, out of choice. Because I want to be with my parents for christmas. Because I want to be with a numbered few for new year's eve. Because what I came to yankville for no longer has any use for me. Because snow isn't romantic when you're walking through it in order to reach the only meal you will get today.

And also because I want to see how much I remember, and how much I could forget.

And so, to chennai. In less than a month.

O city of grime and gregarious rice
O mixing bowl of the 100 spiced fart
You welcome me with a sun-n-fly frenzy
You whose cows in traffic are kamikaze
I fan-fare thee in my amused distaste.

Chennai! Goddess unknown and thrice disowned
They changed your name ‘coz our Commons
Still mistrusted their Lords;
The Planets had moved—thank ye gods, every 3 million of him n’ her--
(We no longer drank ‘tay’, and avoided the obsequious ‘Sir’)

What metaphors do I make for thee?
Every moment with you is a never-ending concert by the motley crue
Stories and myth are spun in every house—kept refrigerated-- under every tree
Your mangoes 36B'd, your people laughing
In sun rain and at night undrunk, still dancing

You of unfinished cement hills and defiant pot holes
You where every funeral is a flower n’ drum parade
You where post 40, women— and some men—don’t get laid.
You, where difference is distrusted, down to its very soles
How do I find poetry for you in this language you grumble at?

You hide your soul under an ancient pile of dirty linen
Your real face was washed away by a slightly high tide
Your real laughter lives on beaches, and in kaapi cups
Of 3000 year old Tamilian verse
Your ideas walk the streets shuffling, looking for the young to bless or curse.

They call you old and dry and culturally rich
I have seen you buy BMWs, and turn your river to a ditch.
The muse ups and leaves, laughing
Any pain I write will never encompass what has been said and done
I will ask the silent ones to speak, and go wander under another sun.

N.B: I am not going 'home'-- I return to see my parents. There is a difference.

Like the old bony man riding Rocinante, bearing my rusty-trusty spear, I go clip-clopping into windmills.



"It seems to me utterly clear either that you do not really know me, or I do not really know you." Cervantes, Don Quixote: Volume 1, Chapter 33; pg 218.

My Harem

[One can dream, yes?]

No, but seriously. I have been asked often about my preferences in aesthetics, and most times have been unable to come up with a good answer because the waiting ears wished me to context my choice either in Bollywood or... erm... Bollywood.

But after a certain amount of thought, I have realized that all that I find intriguing about the male tangent of the specie is summed up by these wonderful men.

In no particular order, then--



David Bowie



Johnny Cash.



Maynard James Keenan




Joaquin Phoenix

So now we are getting somewhere. What then is the LCM of this dark yet olympian bunch?

[Dammit, list making IS fun]

1. Music. Must have music in blood, in head, in feet, all the time.

2. Intense eyes. Black holes into the 9th dimension, and autumn windows overlooking the stormy bay. No, really-- look at Joaquin, for instance:



Le gulp. And Bowie, too-- An injured eye from a long-ago fight makes this child of satan even more appealing:



3. Turbulence. An edge. Well directed, productive anger-- and if you think that's bollocks, do note Cash and Maynard's output, and their commitment to the issues they are passionate about. Bowie and Phoenix too-- perfectionists, and passionate about their respective crafts. Cash spoke for the people in America who never had a voice: in spite of being ignored by radio stations, he surged on. That power-packed finger above? Believe me, it was no pose. Maynard, whether by himself or with Tool or APC, always stands for his beliefs, whether those be anti-war or the balance in jiu-jitsu.



4. The ability to re invent oneself. Bowie hasn't let up in his creative steam-- Cash was no country rocker: beloved of NIN, APC, U2, Tool and other cutting edge bands of today, he enjoyed nothing more than playing with the new, covering their songs, jamming together. Joaquin is a book on the subject all by himself, as is Maynard.

I did mention intense eyes, yes? Sigh.

Siiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiggh.

Right ho. Here's taking my dreams and self off to bed.

Want that harem. Screw the xbox. HAREM!!

Ahem.