Sivasri , Paulo Coelho and De’Javu!

I read a tamil short story named “sethalum” (even if you die) written by Sivasri, some time back, must be 8 or 9 months back . I was very much impressed by the story that I sent a mail to the author, praising her new – at least for me – story telling technique. In fact, the background she selected for her story itself is new. It is about a girl who tries for suicide. But fortunately she is saved. Thanks to the different medical techniques available to get rid of the poison she had taken in. The story starts as she takes in the poison. And revolves around the tortures she goes through, as the physicians try to get the poison out of her body. She at last regrets for the suicidal decision, which so far proved to give so much agony than her normal life would have given her, if she didn’t attempt suicide. Really any one, who reads this story, would never try for suicide, at least by drinking poison. I was so proud that a Tamil author could imagine this kind of new environment for a short story. And she had succeeded in story telling also. Ironically, this short story, rather than being grim for the theme, had so much wit in it. I felt so sad and so happy at the same time for the stupid girl. That is the success for the author and the story.

But then after a very long gap, I started reading “Veronika decides to die” written by Paulo Coelho. I respect this author. It is said that his most successful, thought provoking novel, “The Alchemist” is being produced as a movie by Laurence Fishburne. Fisburne is Paulo Coelho’s one huge fan. He is doing this for him just like our actor Prakash Raj did for Balachandar. Let me come to the point.

This veronica decides to die, starts very much like the short story I mentioned in the first paragraph. In fact the novel itself is about the girl who tries for suicide and got saved and about the agony she faced during her life saving process.

I got nothing to say. It happens sometimes. This is De’Javu, I suppose!

Poets

If I was a poet – done worry,in any case I wont become a poet, somehow this poetry stays as a mystery for me like an unbreakable algorithm – like Ka, the hero of the novel ‘Snow‘, written by Orhan Pamuk and translated by Maureen Freely, I would write poems in the mid of my programs. And my poem would be stuffed with if and elses. Ka writes poems often, however he starts writing after a long gap of 4 years. When he starts it is like water released from a dam. The flow is spontaneous. The poem comes to him – he says like this – from everywhere. He sees everything in the form of poems. He relates everything to anything. And he writes them.

Poets are the people who lives in two worlds at the same time. There are two types categories, as I see. There are poets whose body live in the present and their soul in the past. Most of the poets are of this kind. And the other category are those, whose body live in the present but their soul in the future, like Barathi. Poets never have their body and soul at one place. If it is in one place, they cant be poets, after all. Poets have to dream. Dreams may be of any kind either nostalgia or futuristic. Of course, You can not dream the present. Can you?

There is one more category of poets, very rare of course. Their body live in the future and thier soul in the past. That means they are one step ahead, or atleast one second ahead than all of us. These poets are very rare. And they shape the future.

I write programs. I develop softwares. I draw plans. But not poems. Poems never come to me, as they do for Ka. So obviously I wont write them.

Being not in touch, refers to laziness!

These days I am not at all in touch with news updates or blog updates or even close family updates. But I am not busy, that’s the fact. True that I have joined a new company and a task – its complex, as they say – is assigned to me, but I am not that busy. I was – and am – just reading some documents and gathering information here and there, and penning it down, hoping that it would be of help sometime later. I have some friends here, but they are busy with their own schedules. So it is like I am alone here with no solid task to do. And I am bored.  

This central plaza – the place where I am working now – is a shopping complex, right at the exit of the Tiong Bahru station. It wears a shopping complex outfit rather than a corporate grandeur. But One Raffles Quay – my previous work place – is completely different, extravagant in appearance and as lavish as the buildings you see in the Spider Man movie. Sometimes during those over-swelled-tummy afternoons, I stare at one pointed building, clearly visible from my chair, through the thick glass wall, imagining myself as Spider Man, sitting right at the bottom of the very long iron bar pointing towards the sky. I watch the people, now looking like ants when I see from the pointed bar’s base, hurrying towards the La Pousat, a food court, for tea. But now, from this new place, I see nothing. A bright maroon colored cubicle wall stares at me back, with its dark blue wall pins. I stare back, with same intensity.