Avataars

By V. Shruti Devi (quill-o-the-wisp)

Avataars is the title i've just given, (right now, in 2014!), to this poem that i wrote in 1998 (on the 20th of November around the time of the Leonid meteor showers).

Heard and dreamt of Meteor Showers
And waited for the storm
which did not reach.
Not here.
But they say
"There's another round
of madness
on it's way.
Be there.
Meanwhile, gaze at the serene purple
Of a safe and hollow night..."
I'll float on starlight yet
and dart as heaven darts
In the cunning guise
Of elemental beings...
But Heaven cannot hide for long
Nor don strange mantles for sport that does not end.

-shruti

A Short Play entitled No Interpretation Required

By V. Shruti Devi (quill-o-the-wisp)

This is my poetry website. But in a small departure form the normal, i'm posting here, today, a short play i wrote about two years ago, broadly based on real-life.

No Interpretation Required
A short play by V. Shruti Devi

No Interpretation Required: A short play by V. Shruti Devi

Characters: An Australian man, Mark, in his late forties who is a musician; An Indian woman, Ruby, in her late thirties who is an activist; Seven cricket commentators; A group of cricket players

Scene: Half the stage is visible. A badly-lit, untidy room somewhere outside Brisbane. An old desktop computer is half-buried in the mess. Crumpled clothes, books, music equipment and a funky coffee mug dot the cramped space. An Oz guy, Mark, with a guitar is slouched on a beanbag.

Mark: (to the audience): You asking me? Yeah, its true. Everything I’d ever heard about India -and hadn’t- its all real. I’m not much of a tourist. Naah. Didn’t go to the Taj Mahal. Or anywhere. I just took a good look around. Woke up late, walked down the street outside the door. Took the message of my song with me. They liked it. (He stands up, hums what might be the song, starts walking around a bit) Asked em to spread the word. About our coal. Asked them not to buy it. That was the refrain. And played my guitar in a place or two. Drank some coffee, met some –people-. Rejoiced. Came back home to Australia. Back to working on my song. Need to start taking my music around the place. It’s five her time. Skype today.

(Mark goes to his computer, brings the screen to life. You hear the familiar sounds of logging in and the ringing tone of Skype Chat. The other half of the stage lights up. General bright lights for the entire stage from now on. You see an Indian girl, Ruby, in her late thirties in a room that has low-lying cane furniture, bamboo floormats and large floor cushions with colourful Indian patterns. She is hurriedly adjusting her hair at the front of a small mirror set in a handcrafted frame that’s hanging on a wall. She hears the Skype ring and goes to her laptop computer that’s lying on the floor, and settles down for a chat).

Ruby: Heyyy

Mark: Hi there, Ruby. How are you?

Ruby: Whatever. What’s up? What’s been going on?

Mark: Nothing, really. Been working on my song. Went for a swim. Got some stuff coming up.

Ruby: Ah.

Mark: And you? You been busy?

Ruby: Kind of. Assorted stuff.

Mark: What? Too many chocolates?

Ruby: THERE! See! Tell me, are you a mind-reader?

Mark: No.

Ruby: And you said you‘re not a spy. You’re a shrink, right? My latest theory is that you’re a hypnotist.

Mark: I’m not a shrink…maybe a bush psychologist….

Ruby: Ya, ya, you said that before. Haha.

Mark: Did I tell you that when I was in India?

Ruby: No. Never mind. What else?

Mark: Lets see. I’m going next week to the Lands. Doing a show with my aboriginal friends.

Ruby: When am I going to meet them?

Mark: Ya, so the show. The music’s a bit like the stuff you heard on the Turluku album. I told you about the album?

Ruby: Are you testing my memory now?

Mark: Your hair is looking really nice.

Ruby: (animatedly) Oh thanks. It’s quite long, needs a trim. You should’ve seen it in the eighties, cut in curly steps and then there was the blunt, and then the ethnic look, I know ethnic is politically incorrect, but here its just a style statement, and do you remember pumping curls? No you wouldn’t, it was the last thing I needed, but you know me (Mark feebly tries to interrupt with “No, I don’t”), I decided that pumping curls was it, and then the pinned up look and the Hawaiian hairband.

Mark: This is good. I like this tone of yours.

Ruby: Your hair is quite long, why do you wear that cap all the time?

Mark: I don’t know, it’s just a cap I wear.

Ruby: It’s not fair that you can see me but I can’t see you.

Mark: It’s really expensive to get a webcam.

Ruby: Ya, ya, you said that before. I didn’t expect to ever hear from you after you left for Australia, you know.

Mark: Now, this is nothing to do with being strategic, is it?

Ruby: The only strategic bits are the detective bits: you know, wondering whether you’re not just a singer-songwriter, but all sorts of other things.

Mark: Well, sorry to disappoint you, but I’m just not your James Bond kind of secret agent character that you want me to be. This comes up in our conversations every time we chat.

Ruby: You’re just a regular guy? (silence) Hmmm. Oh, well…So when are you coming to India again?

Mark: Er.. I, I’m quite – I’ve got a lot of things to do and…I really need to find my stage legs first. I’m planning to travel with my new music. But I don’t know where that’ll be.

Ruby: You do know that India is the Place in the World right now, don’t you? Or we could meet in south-east Asia. No, no, too many Tsunamis there… It would be good to meet again?

Mark: Yes, I wouldn’t mind spending some time with the likes of you.

Ruby: Are you a detective? Or a channel?

Mark: What kind of channel?

Ruby: The spiritual kind.

Mark: No, no I don’t really know too much about the auras and the chankras. How’s the mantra yelling going?

Ruby: See!!! How could you be that insightful? Why did you call it mantra yelling? You could’ve tried to patent the phrase if it wasn’t for the minor political incorrectness.

Mark: Haha. Did I tell you the story about the black horse that my grandpa wanted his grand-daughter to have?

Ruby: About a hundred times.

Mark: And the one about the illegitimate child who might be a half-sibling?

Ruby: Not again.

Mark: You remember I told you how I went for a swim and I was the only adult in a pool full of children?

Ruby: Yes, and about how you went for a funeral in a Hawaiian shirt.

Mark: Ah yes, did I tell you that one?

Ruby: So you ARE a shrink?

Mark: No.

Ruby: Ok.

Mark: I’m sorry I haven’t been in touch lately, but I’m happy to keep the friendship going and the occasional skype chat.

Ruby: Do you always quote people you talk to? Verbatim? You’re mirroring me, I just don’t know whether you’re doing it consciously or not.

Mark: About us, the distance is beginning to wear out on me.

Ruby: It’s not like anyone’s inviting me to Australia for a holiday. I’m not going to invite myself over.

Mark: Is that a saree you’re wearing? Is it a traditional one?

Ruby: No, it’s a normal saree.

Mark: I wouldn’t know the difference. We don’t get to see sarees in Australia everyday.

Ruby: I wouldn’t have guessed.

Mark: See, there’s a cultural mismatch.

Ruby: Haha.

Mark: I think I’ll allow you to go now. It’s getting late here.

Ruby: Bye….

Two years later: Scene: Teams playing a cricket match. A large part of the stage is the cricket field, with players playing cricket in slow motion. Focus on a series of cricket commentators dressed in attires of various cricketing and non-cricketing nations.

Multi-accented Commentators: (Begin with a murmur of cricket-commentary related cacophony including words like runs, overs, bat, ball, batsman, pitch, stadium, umpire, six runs, four, drive, pull, hook, slip, keeper, stumps, gloves, pads, seams, grass, boundary, lineup, injuries, tea break that rises to a crescendo, following which voices of individual commentators can be discerned).

Commentator (British accent):  A marvelous, sunny day here at the Eden Gardens….

Commentator (Australian accent): …yes, and just the right amount of bounce…the medium pacers would do nicely for a few more overs, no spin doctors, from the looks of it….

Comentator (Sub-continental accent): Ha ha, and the fast bowlers are likely to make a comeback closer to dusk.

Commentator (European accent): I ask, once again, what is this Fine Leg? No, no, no, no, you do not understand, we need a cricketing revolution in the EU.

Commentator (American accent): Eeeeew! Too many mosquitoes dudes. Swing it out, swing it out! I have a dream that one day, there shall be cricket.

Commentator (African accent): A hundred years later, maybe. You got a problem, buddy. You not dancing to no good tune.

Commentator (Chinese accent): Lalalalala long; We got a little song; Wickets and bats and cricketing hats and markets make the world go round.

(All the commentators now repeat their individual lines simultaneously and in song to the tune of the sports theme song This Time for Africa. The actors who were playing cricket start dancing and singing with assorted folk and tribal dance steps from across the world, as they all exit or as the curtain falls, they all end the song with the line: “A cultural mismatch? Who said that? What’s that” Echoes.)

Of Revolutions

Posting a thrice-published poem here today. i wrote this in my last year of school, and it was first published in a supplement of the Times of India, followed by a leftist newsletter, and then in The Stephanian in my first year of college. It begins with a reference to the colour lilac...if you scroll down to the poem that i've posted just before this one (called Exotic Transition and written in 1990), there is a nice continuity.

Of Revolutions (written on 18th April, 1989).

The lilac mist evaporates

to let the blazing mixture

of the heavens

reign supreme.

And the earth bows down

and is content,

For it approves

of this consistency of events

as they repeat themselves

in systematic succession

with an air

of time-tested perfection.

Then, a strange day arrives

with a different strain

and stranger hues

and shatters all

that once held sway.

The alien storm

uproots the old

and that past perfection

is made to appear

incomplete and erroneous

and is made to fade away

into obsolescence.

And Mankind finds

that the world must change

and that it holds no place

for those who cling on.

And the loss is great.

but what is gained

is greater still.

                                 By V. Shruti Devi (quill-o-the-wisp)

                             

Exotic Transition

By V. Shruti Devi (quill-o-the-wisp)

Here's a poem from my collection of writings in the 1980s and '90s. This one's called Exotic Transition, and i was reminded of it because it's about the colour purple, one that suddenly seems to be in vogue now. This was written on the 4th of January, 1990.

Exotic Transition

Mauve mellow breezes

drifted into time

And cast a net of purple shades

From earth's deepest purple caves

to the ultra-violet skyline.

Lavender-perfumed moonlight

caught the amethyst eyes of a swan

as it moved on

in the river of wine.

It was the reign

of the colour divine.

It could kill and it could thrill

the heart and soul of man.

And so it came,

the purple time.

And man wondered

whether it was dawn or dusk.

It was dusk.

It was dawn.

The new would come

The old would be gone

---

                                                                  - V. Shruti Devi

Canvasses

By V. Shruti Devi (quill-o-the-wisp)


Somewhere
Between idea/s
And depiction.
No claims
to hindered skills.
Just art.
Dashes of light
to amuse
with.
Click on the link, then blink.
http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10151637643257028.1073741825.650792027&type=1&l=bd22e704a4

Drink the Light

Fort Kurupam 2012 (written on 24th October, 2012)

Return from Viswanathapuram
Vijaya Dashami

Breathe into earthen cup
The Dasara moon
swirls
in the Earl Grey.

Solar systems
Pranayam
And it disperses
into galaxies

Drums and the dancing moon
Flux
As i drink the light.

Then write.


By V. Shruti Devi (quill-o-the-wisp)

Limtum

Written on 1st Nov., 2004
Found that clear pool
tucked amid the hills.
Clarity
and darting fish
where a green deep
feeds a clamouring curent.
Waded through water,
staff in hand.
Slithering stones
and a brainful
of stories
of flashfloods.
A cloudburst
on the hilltop
would have me flailing and faltering
on the altering 'scape.
Preserve this, I say,
for me to replay.
Who?
A one-time wader
Yet no invader
- there's life across this brook
to meet, greet.
Limtum, then.
A culvert for that beat.

Weavers' Street 08

On a spin
step in
to looms.
Floor to sunken floor
Ribs and arms, wood.
Walls sprout hooks, embed rods
Person pushes pedals, bars
on counted thread,
girl deftly flings the spool
and gets it right.
Flesh and stone, teak and bone,
Organic.
(Written on 6th Dec., 2008)

Nirnayalu

Neeku, naaku, prati aaku.
prati aaku, prati panta
prati panta, prati vanta, prati manta
meeda cheyudaaniki nirnayam
eppudu wochestaadi
aa udayam?

(i wrote this in 004. It is a verse that wonders when the dawn that enables you and me to make decisions over crops, leaves, food and fires will break.)

Causes

People's rights
to Land
in a mess.
Pretentions to solve
wouldn’t absolve
of hypocracy.

Causes for discourses
on mineral resources
Abundant.
Siting to citing;
river-bed or death-bed.
Rationalization
points
towards
Nationalization.
We’re still watching….

18th Jan., '09

A Journey

15th Jan, 2009 (about ’08)

Nasik
and the surging
waters
-ashes
transported.

Thereafter,
steep climb
for mortals.
Stairway
to Kapaaleshwar
equivalent
to having
toured
twelve spots of light
of which two
were
in the vicinity
-a radius
of a few hours
as wheels roll….

Triyambakeshwar, Grishneshwar
Aurangabad.
Once, touched three stones-
the mudra,
disc jockey of the world.

Ellora
-masses
of stone and dirt
transformed.

A miniature Taj with variations
-Bibi Ka Maqbara
not macabre
as the name might suggest.

ROOKERY

Many-shaded squares on a durrie
Coalition-era chess mat
Hop-scotch the talk
Pitthoo ban gaya
everyone’s game
Kho kho gaya
Catch and blame
Kabaadi wallahs wheel their carts
Rocket launchers gather parts
Spokes and tyres
Dying fires
O to be an ember
And not a flame

Formulae

Picture-perfect
resolutions
On and off
-the records.
Olympian grit
the tooth
of the matter.
Victories wrought
from more things
than this world
ordinarily
dreams of.

Puri On My Mind

Big wheels are turning
by the shore today
Hands pull chains
The Saalwood moves
Leaves
Issues
Non-timber forest produce
Trees of yore.
The DNA of a peahen
might
Run through these feathers
Unruffled.
An island breeze
swirls in,
and brackishness
harbours rare species
aqua-guarded
by the mind’s lagoons.
Remembering
the poet
on a moonless night
Purna Chandra
on his celestial journey
this day
would write
-seize the light

dappled

succour

for

the masses

plights

of fancy

and other-wise

the collective

the noun

and a barn

or well,

a book, a note, a flick, a vote

- flickers

of light

discerned

Of doormats and flying carpets

O pressed flower
what status
quo
is this.
Generations
inherit pages
-lettered, seemingly unfettered-
Volumes
bear down
and keep you as you are.
-Bound
to be.
-Keep on the bonnet
And stay with the sonnet-
The buzz has set some free
to trample the air, board a wishing chair
to seas and creeks
and deeper notions

Borra Caves

shimmering walls
the mind unwinds forms
from stalactites, stalagmites
silicon glistens
to the swinging torchlight
which was a mashaal
three decades gone

ladderways
connect old pitfalls
deities reside in stone
light streams in from above
thousands surge in to worship
-on one day,
not charged by the powers that be
-free.

auspicious yellow
trickles past,
handed out
to women from beyond
the cordon.

the sound of bats,
-an overheard cluster
and honeycombs.

Outside,
the Gosthani flows and seeps
partly imitated
by a railway track.
Inside,
a giant seam of stone
has clicked the jigsaw
into place
for the moment
which is
a few hundred years

Spotted

Poachers
of delicacies in wine
Their Delinquencies
-ambassadors
of the fluffies.
Self-appointed
peerers
through tints of scarlet
(tinctures from ravaged hutments)
juggling hats and plumes
floating in bubbles
spewing
conservation priorities
and perfumes.
Fanciful insights,
marketable bytes,
Mangling contexts,
colouring texts.

From a vantage point: Eliot's Beach on 26th Jan

spray paint
by the sea
-psychedelic perch.
long-tailed kites
parallel the sand
-a mid-air zone.
scattered below:
vendors, spenders,
pakoda time.
roots, berries, nuts
shaken, garnished
-multitudes frolick
neath a tricolour
untarnished.

Who's Who

Jalebis
-lessons
in fries, cartels.
Spirals
-prices, priceless fumes
Sinks
-the notion's carbon:
untold, unfold
Criss-crossing ways
-hunters, gatherers
Stalk,
Exchange.
Land for paper, water for steel
Heavy Metal
-no combo meal