Jasmines

What I often miss in the day, or which pass away as fleeting thoughts, come back at night to me, raking old memories and thoughts, and propagate a chain of dreams, so that when I wake up, I feel my subconscious laughing away at my conscious as to how ignorant it could be of such simple facts. And if that does not make sense, let me tell you what happened yesterday so that you could sympathize with me and understand my position.

It is not in my habit to wind up long sentences to explain what I feel. I just blurt out what I do feel, as much in real life as in my posts. But with wishes, it is different. When I wish for something that I know I will not get, I do not let tongue give voice to them. But here they are, my dreams, which act as a wish-fulfilment and force me to pen down these thoughts here. For I would have never given them a second thought unless I dreamt of what I dreamt yesterday. Before I begin, let me tell you what happened a week earlier.

So it was last Monday which was my last day at office. All but my closest friend S were present at this occasion. It would have been a long celebration, but was cut short because I had not much to say about the matter. I could have given them long speeches about what is right and what is wrong, and how we should follow our dreams, and at least try to understand them so that we might learn of what we want, but I did not say anything. One of the reasons was also that I was missing S at the occasion, and since we had only parted a couple of days before in a hurry where our farewell was kind of clumsy and incomplete.

No wonder my dream took this string of thought and wound it up completely, so that yesterday in my dream, I was present at my farewell and S was present too. It would have been okay if this was the only alteration, for that would have made sense to me regarding my wishes. However, it is the second alteration in the occasion that makes me think about it. Let me now introduce you to my colleague A, who shares his name with my best friend from school. My best friend (also called A), as you might be aware, passed away in 2010. In my dream, he substitutes the person with the same name, such that now he was my colleague. But now my mind had a goal to achieve, namely, to furnish me a proof that this was in fact possible. To do this, it fabricated a very rich story, which I would like to share with you. It may sound absurd, for it was a dream after all, but the details in it were so true that it cannot be kept muffled in my heart for long.

I see that soon after his death, a couple of months later in fact, it had so happened that news had arrived that my friend was in fact found somewhere below in the country where the river leads. I go down and in the middle of a field which is full of jasmines, I see my old friend again. I joke with him and tell him how funny it is going to be when everyone else gets to know about this fact too. Then my dream simultaneously transports back to the office, and I pat his back and ask him to accompany me to the café. But however suddenly, I realize that he does not work at my office and now his face is distinctly superimposed with the actual face. I wake up, and I try to remember where my friend is currently working, and what happened to him, when after a moment I realize that I was in fact dreaming and that he has been gone since forever. Thus my sleep breaks and I wake up.

It is funny how when I write this I feel I had so much more to write but I cannot pen down anything more. In fact I do remember a scene where we are having lunch, but it is a dim cave with yellow lights and lots of people, and we sit on the floor later with our food, but I do not remember where that figment goes and how it ends up. And hence this post must be left incomplete as such, because I find it strange that such a queer post be given a fitting conclusion. All in all, I must say that now onwards, whenever I hear of jasmines or see them or smell them, I know I will invariably be drawn back to the field in my dreams, and be forced to think of the prospects and the imaginary life that I could have led were this dream to stand true in front of me.

Return – Chapter 8 – Finale

Losses are what make us what we are. A lost cause this was. There could be no good ending to this, not even a satisfactory one. For I had thought of something and it turned out completely different, though in a way it had all been my fault. But so be it. I had learned to cope with myself, with the problems that I created for myself, and then never solved them for I was ever too afraid to face them. As I sat silently at Irtiqa’s grave, someone patted me on my back. I turned around. It was Shaena. I looked at her teary-eyed. She looked at me silently. No words were exchanged. But we did speak. Our silence had given words to thoughts in our minds. And we both knew what the other was thinking. And yet we kept quiet, waiting for the other to start speaking. I knew I should have begun, but somehow I had made up my mind to never strike a conversation by starting it on my own. And so I pretended to be dumb, looking at one’s grave now, while the other stood behind me.

When I turned back to look at her, I was spellbound for a moment. For it was not Shaena who stood, but Irtiqa. And she looked poignantly at me. “Irtiqa,” I gasped for words. But none came. For now was not the time for words. “Do not make a decision in haste,” she said. I asked, “What do you mean?” but by then the moment was gone. The face had now changed. Now stood my mother in front of me. It was as if someone had plotted to show me my entire past through her. “Come back, home,” she whispered. I knew it was a lie, a dream, a manifestation of my wishes and a by-product of my dreams, for the same woman had shut her doors on me only a while back. I rubbed my eyes. It was Shaena again.

“Here’s the key,” she said, “to your home. It’s yours now.”

For a while, I stared blankly at her. Only when it hit me like a rock on the head that I fumbled on the ground. “You do not mean what I understand, right?” I asked. I felt like shouting loud and hitting my head against the ground, but now was not the time for foolishness. “Give speech to tongue,” I shouted, “What do you mean?” She looked at me teary-eyed now. “She said you should come back home. Those were her last words.” And throwing the key at me, she ran across the street and I saw her changing into a silhouette and then only a shadow of the past. No, another death was not something I could handle at this moment. Not now. What had happened of my life? Was this the way it was supposed to end? Hadn’t I better plans when I first started? My head was throbbing now, and I fell to the ground. As the world around me started to fade, there was only one thing I repented about. This return.

…

The Clientele

[1]

The black of the night gave way to light. It was just another normal winter morning. The birds chirped just as usual and the sun hid partly behind the clouds, glancing at the grass once a while, which partially covered with frost, occasionally turned back to look at the sun. The morning dew on the leaves was still as fresh as it could be, and the dogs on the street lay lazily without barking at the pedestrians who passed by them. As she woke up, she heard the bustles of cars and trucks from down somewhere. It was going to be another long day for her. Sometimes she wished she could just keep sleeping and not do anything else on a Sunday. But clearly, that was not possible. She went downstairs and looked around the house, clothes piled up on the sofa, a cup of coffee spilled on the floor staining the carpet, breadcrumbs on the table, and a half-finished bottle of fine Irish whiskey. She drew the curtains to let in some light, and sprayed a bit of the freshener to nullify the smell of cigarettes which seemed to be coming from everywhere. Slowly she staggered into the kitchen, finding the cupboards half-open, an untouched packet of chips lying on the floor, a coffee mug splintered into pieces. A slice of pizza was still left in the box, and the tap was open, so she went up to it and turned the knob. At the opposite end of the room, the television was playing songs on MTV. She lowered the volume; she wanted to sit for a while and catch up with the news, but there was hardly any place to sit. She smiled wryly and went back to the bedroom. The last week had been hectic for her, with five assignments in seven days. She took out her phone and checked her appointment for the day. Then she undressed herself and threw her blood-stained clothes carelessly upon the bed before moving into the shower. There, beside her clothes, slept the corpse of her latest client, Mr Jacob.

Once she had showered and dressed up in fresh clothes, she started with her daily chores. She cleaned up the bedroom, bundling up the blood-stained sheets that she would need to throw. She folded them one by one and put them neatly into a polythene bag. Then she took out a bottle of hydrogen peroxide and an old rag from her bag. She dabbed the rag with the solution, and slowly but carefully removed the stains from the study table and from the floors around, where the blood was now turning brown. Had someone else been around, he could have pointed out that there was a blotch remaining at the corner of the bed where he was lying now, but she missed the spot. Rag and solution went back into her bag. She looked at him one last time and planted a kiss on his lips. Then she went down and cleaned up the kitchen. As she moved out of the house, she picked up the blood-stained knife from the table. It would be her souvenir from last night. Had she been more observant, she would have spotted a man standing on the other side of the road, clicking a picture of hers.

She needed to move fast, if she were ever to reach on time for her appointment. As she sped up the highway in the newly acquired BMW, her thoughts went back to the night before. She had put up a good show, and she had fought bravely. If only Jacob realized what was going to happen after he was tied to his bed, he would have never agreed. She let out a smile as his face came to her mind: the grin slowly fading out from his lips and the horror creeping into his eyes. He had tried to put up a good fight, but a businessman with his hands tied pitting himself against a trained martial artist were as good as a deer surrounded by a pack of lions. The odds were clearly not in his favour. He tried to shout for help, but she bit his tongue, and then he fell quiet. That was almost the end of it. She plunged out a knife from her side and quickly stabbed him thrice in his chest, after which she untied him. She did not want him to die a handicap. She could not be so brutal. And she was amazed at what she saw, for Jacob was man enough to still try come back at her. He staggered and pushed her against the table, and clenched his fists around hers. But he had lost too much blood by then. He only wished to have not drunk so much. The whiskey was doing its job pretty well, and he started feeling dizzy again. He picked up a cushion to hide his face as she came back at him. Knife struck cushion as sword against shield, and in moments his face had gained more scars than she had ever put on anyone. He fell back onto the bed, mumbling words of despair. She solemnly closed his eyes. And then she had a sound sleep.

[2]

She was about to reach the other end of the city. Her appointment was scheduled at eleven in the morning, and she had a good thirty minutes to reach. She called in at her office, and the secretary picked up the call. “Please mark a sick leave for me, today, Miss Donnett,” she said politely. “Sure, Mira,” she said, and added, “Get well soon,” before she hung up. As she came nearer to the sea, she started feeling better than before. She stopped by the sea for a while. She liked to visit the beach between subsequent appointments. It gave her solace. She had learnt a lot from the sea. Like the sea which took its colour from the sky, never trying hard enough to change. She believed in being controlled. Like the sky which controlled the colours of the sea, and the moon which controlled the tides, controlling when the sea be angry and when it be calm, yet the sea hardly revolted. But when it did, it did with all its might, flooding the cities and washing the sand of all its memories and the sand castles were washed and the letters people wrote in the sand of being together forever, they were all washed out. It seemed strange to her how the sea could be so tranquil and so ferocious at the same time, and how it could manage two opposite characters so well. She had always tried to do that, manage both her responsibilities with all her will, yet it seemed sometimes that one was slipping away to make way for the other. She saw a flock of white seagulls flying across the sky, and the sun gleaming blissfully over her. The clouds were gone, and the day was happy. She saw children holding hands and walking on the sands, barefooted, and she saw an American woman riding a camel in the distance where the sand met the horizon. A vendor came by, and she bought a scarf. A blue silk scarf, just like the sea, she thought. She glanced at her watch, and saw it was time she moved on.

She sped up her car, and reached just in the nick of time. She went in, and took a seat at the end of the aisle. Having order a crème latte, she sat in the Starbucks cafe, sipping her coffee and staring out of the window. The blood stained knife lay next to her handbag, covered with her blue silk scarf. She took out her phone and checked her messages. Somebody had sent her a picture. As she took her last sip, she saw a man in a black suit coming out of a car and heading towards the café. He was the same one as in the picture. As he entered, she stood up. They came face to face, and she shook hands with her next client. “Good to meet you,” she said. “Good to meet you too,” he replied, “I hope you know how important this day is for me.” She replied, “Yes, I hope you don’t start hating me by tonight,” and they both laughed together. Had he been observant, he would have noticed how her voice stiffened when she said that line. Had she been observant, she would have seen a man on the other side of the road, clicking a picture of them.

…

Dance With Me

If I asked you for just one time,
To dance with me,
Would you?
Do you think we would be able,
To sync our feet,
And for once move them together,
Instead of opposite ways?
Do you think we could look into,
Each other’s eyes,
And see only a passion for music?

If I asked you for just one time,
To dance with me,
Would you ask me why?
Or would you tap along,
Assuming it’s okay,
To just dance for a while.
After all, what bad can come out,
Of a dance?

Unless,
The dance is a ploy,
If I told you,
To dance means to take his life,
To dance means to stab him,
With a knife,
Until the red gashes spill out blood,
As lava in an eruption,
Making a warm salty stream,
Thick in the beginning,
Then slowly becoming more watery,
The knife stained a permanent red.

If I asked you for just one time,
To dance with me,
Would you?

Too Late

He stood there, aghast, looking at her,
Her clothes stained red,
Her face half burnt, as black as coal,
But the half-lips on the other still smiled,
Her eye closed, eyelashes burnt,
Wrapped up in a shroud of white.
Their house caught fire in the midst of night,
When he was away, working far away,
She must have shouted a lot,
‘Cause her throat was all nerved up,
He regretted their fight last night,
And regretted not picking up her call,
She had called him at least six times,
Before she finally texted, “Fine, bye.”

Six

She was six when she first learned about death.

As she walked to school the next day, a cold winter morning, clutching her father’s hand so tight, a plethora of emotions ran through the man who held her hand. He had covered his face with a scarf-kind-of-a-thing, so as to not reveal his face. He would not want the girl to know his father was dead, and he wanted to pretend to be one just as good. But somehow, even in front of the six-year-old, his courage faltered, and he fumbled while walking. The girl saw his eyes, and they spoke. The eyes spoke to each other of the lies they hid within them. “Where is father?” she said softly now, almost about to break into tears.

The man did not have an answer. He wanted to choose between, “He’s gone far away to visit your granny,” and “He has become a star in the sky,” but instead he chose to say, “He’s dead.”
“What is dead?” asked the small girl.
“Dead means you will never see him anymore.”
“Why? Is he angry with me?”
“Yes, he is. Why didn’t you have all your food today?”
“If I have my lunch, will he come see me?”
“He might,” he said, eyes red with lies, shamed to hell.

When she entered the class, her teacher asked why she was late, and she replied, “Because my father’s dead.”
“Who told you that?” the teacher retracted, trying to hide her tears, but her voice had already welled up too much to fake that she was still angry.
It was fascinating to see how the girl didn’t feel sad. She thought it was a trip his father had been to, to a place where her grandparents lived. She thought he was a star in the skies, but also thought it was easy to go up there, once you did good deeds.

As a mother, she narrates the tale to her daughter today. She is six, and she is thirty, pained by her husband’s death, but doesn’t want her child to be the way she was. She has learned, from experiences that were bitter, that truth might hurt, but when it is dark and you are all by yourself, truth is the only thing that will keep you warm, like a bonfire in the winter, like a warm fireplace where the cat huddles herself to sleep, awaiting another morning, another dawn, that will bring back light into her eyes, and she will see clearly albeit the fog, what awaits her on the other side on the road.

Five | Seven

Hopes

Mothers, with their mortars and pestles,
Crushing red chiles on hot afternoons,
The aroma of spices, floating in the air,
Their smiles, their chuckles, and the whispers,
Their daughters come back,
Pails of water on their heads,
Their gait ever graceful,
Their faces benign.
She sees them from her cot,
Too old to rise up now,
Remembers how once she was the daughter,
And how once she was a mother,
Now too old, her only children,
Are her hopes, which she nurtures,
With loads of care, as she once did,
For her children and her husband.
She closes her eyes,
The heat makes the dark turn yellow,
She can feel the light with her eyes shut,
And her children float by, in her visions.
She hopes one day they will come back,
Their heads on her lap,
They will narrate to her stories,
From cities long forgotten,
From borders between nations,
From mines deep down.
She can smell already,
A tinge of love, floating in the air,
Her husband sleeping on the cot beside,
The toothless smile, the grey beard,
His auburn eyes, which can only stare,
She turns and finds it empty for now,
But hopes someone will sleep on it,
Before the night ends,
Before the winter ends,
Before her life ends.

Will You Recognize Me?

Are you really that intangible,
That you would come every single night,
Every single night in every single dream,
Yet fail to show up wherever I look for you,
Are you really that intangible?
Like a wisp of air, tangling in my hair,
Like the breeze of summer, and the gale of winter,
Throughout seasons, you are just there,
Sitting, smiling, waiting, looking at me,
Through those two shiny eyes that I have long not seen,
But as soon as I wake up, you are gone.
Where?
Where are you now, right now, in which world,
Tell me the color of the sky you see,
Do you look up to see at the skies,
Or do you look down silently watching me,
Tell me for I am tired of this melodrama,
Tell me.
Sometimes when I think of you before I sleep,
I see the face I saw so many years ago,
So many years have died since then,
A hundred seasons have passed,
And yet you are still there, holding time in your hands,
Not letting it pass by,
When I see you again,
Will you recognize me?

The Last Prayer

The taste of brine, foam in his mouth,
He smelled of sand, the sun and the birds,
Kept going deeper every next moment,
Drowning, drowning into the sea,
When he spoke, only bubbles,
And he breathed, only bubbles,
No one to see, no one to hear,
They said under water, the dumb and the rest,
All are alike, because neither speak,
And here he was, proving it true.
The sun glimmered, shining through the waters,
But every second it kept being dimmer,
Whether his eyes were closing,
Or he was going deeper,
He could not tell.
He’d lost track of time, didn’t know,
How long it had been since he was under,
His eyes were closing, his eyelids heavy,
He realized he should have drank lesser last night,
He longed to know one last time,
Who it was that had pushed him,
They were all his friends, all close to him,
Yet one plotted behind his back,
Or were they all involved, he could not tell.
He prayed one last time, prayed fervently,
That the gods forgive him for all his sins,
And slowly he stopped struggling,
One last breath, and then he decided to rest.

Rough

He kept sailing, the waters turning rough,
Storms every night, and rain sodding his clothes,
He caught a fever, but then recovered,
Yet caught it again, the rain never stopped.
The brine and the wind made him dizzy as ever,
And he retched constantly into the waters,
But never did he stop, it was important that he didn’t,
And he continued to sail, by the light of the moon.
Food had become scarce, wine even scarcer,
Water nowhere to be found,
And so he drank the sea water,
His stomach else empty.
When he went down, rats had infested,
The leftover grains and he’d have to throw them,
There was no one to talk, he the sole survivor on ship,
But he didn’t lose hope, he kept sailing.
A fortnight later, he found an island,
Stranded though, it had some trees,
He used the wood to mend the holes in the ship,
Then resumed on his journey.
How long he’d have to sail, he had no clue,
And didn’t know whether the winds would be in his favor,
But he knew he had to reach,
The land where the sun never sets,
And where his life would be just one long day.
He longed for his dream to come true,
And he’d set forth to make it so,
And he prayed to the gods to make it happen.
For deep in his heart he did believe,
And somewhere within we should too,
That dreams are but visions of what could be true,
And to make them possible, we alone must strive.

Minutes to My Death

I can count on my fingers, though they move no more,
The minutes left before I leave this world,
And yet I write, in memory of the past,
Rejoicing in life, and what I did with it.
I see myself, the five-year kid,
Walking to school clutching his mother’s hand,
And I see her smiling in front of me,
Like a wavy line of the candle, always providing warmth.
I see myself as a boy of nineteen,
Fighting for a girl I never met again,
Blood on my fingers, bloodstained shirt,
And how I wore it with pride, in mark of her love.
I see the day when I bombarded the school,
Killing my own son in a bargain,
Wearing orange, the jail, the keeper,
I see everything, and in a flash it disappears.
I see my daughter, a small girl,
But then she grows up, and spits on my face,
I see the guy who fought me for her,
And reveled in the blood, on his stained shirt.
My eyes close often, I can’t open them much,
And darkness spreads like a cloth on my face,
I hear the sound of muffles,
And a grr-grr-grr,
Then the pay-pay-pay,
Of the ambulance I hear,
And they put me in.
I close my eyes, take my last strong breath,
Don a smile on my face, and am done with this life.

She Was a Knight

She trotted along, her horse never tiring,
She claimed herself to be a knight,
Yet within she knew she was only a woman,
Tired of being denied of what was her right.
Once upon a time if things had turned out,
The way she had wanted them to be,
Today her son would have been smiling at her,
And she’d have had another in her belly.
She wished that war had never happened,
She wished he had still been alive,
To carry her in her arms when she was wounded,
Or on a day when to walk she’d have to strive.
But none of that happened,
None of it was true,
And she was here, a knight today,
Heading a hundred behind, her own crew.
Soon they would fight,
Soon they’d be dead,
And in the heavens above she knew,
She would be wed.

Life, Death and Music

The real talent of a popular musician cannot accurately be assessed until the musician has been dead for several generations, so that his or her fame does not interfere with honest assessment.

---

The issue at hand states that we cannot accurately assess a musician’s talent as long as he is alive, because we may be biased towards him based on his fame and popularity. However, I tend to disagree with this notion. People appreciate music for more than one reason. If the only reason of appreciation of music was who the composer is, then the assessment might have been biased. However, other reasons reduce this predilection and hence I believe that the fact whether he or she is living or dead or how many generations have passed since his or her death is not a reason based on which assessment should be done.

When we listen to music, sometimes we appreciate it without even knowing who the musician is. In such cases, we have already assessed the musician irrespective of his fame. In fact, a musician become famous because of the result of the assessment of his talent. If people did not like his or her music in the first place, he or she would never have been famous. If the fame that he or she has is in any other way apart from music, good or bad – for example, past criminal records or past success in another field – then that fame and the music are in two different places, and we must make it our responsibility to not intermingle both of them.

At this point, people might argue that in fact most musicians are assessed after their death. One might argue with the fact that Warner Bros productions dedicated an entire television channel to Michael Jackson shortly following his death, concluding that he was assessed after his death. However, this is not really right. The channel might have been the result of appreciation from before, and only serves as a dedication forum. Also we have no proof that the channel was proposed posthumously.

It should be made clear that appreciating music after one’s death is perfectly alright. However, that should not be the sole way, or the mandatory style. Whereas it is not wrong to assess a person after his death, it is also not correct to wait ‘until the musician has been dead for several generations’. The issue points out clearly that a musician cannot be assessed until he has been dead for ‘several generations’. However, there is a strong negative notion about this. Music styles are not always perennial. There have been paradigm shifts always, where different generations prefer different kinds of music. We see that all the time even at our homes. Whereas the older generation might have a predilection towards soft rock, children often like noisier music. When an entire population is shifting in its tastes, trying to assess older music is really a bad choice.

In fact, real talent is often judged during the lifetime of a musician. The music award ceremonies are a testimony to this. Assessing during the lifetime also helps the musician because it makes him realize his weak points, and the genres where he is likely to succeed more. We have often seen singers change their styles entirely, moving from Sufi to rock, and from underground to Bollywood, in search of fame once they were appreciated for their work. It also acts as an incentive to better work. Hence the above example acts as a proof that assessment should be done during the lifetime.

To end, I would say that it is the personal responsibility of the people who assess music to make sure they are not hindered by the popularity of the musician. They should make a disinterested judgment based on the music and solely on the music that the musician composes. In doing so, the real talent can be tested more accurately and passionately, and would result in better quality music at the end of the day.

The Bell

Written on December 7, 2010.

Never before had Bull felt the way he felt right now. His emotions swung left and right, and he was under a fix as to whether what he thought was eternal relationship came to an end just because of the love of one’s own life. As he sat in the cell, the king came along.

“So your dear friend hasn’t arrived as yet. Wasn’t I very sure of this! After all why should someone be so foolish as to come back to die once he has been given the chance to escape? Only because his friend believes in him? This is pure bullshit Bull, I told you earlier do not come into all this but you didn’t listen. Now you have to suffer. You have no other choice.”

And then the man rose his head. The king noticed, silently, how the slight curves on his forehead now smoothened, how a black patch had developed beneath his eyes as though he hadn’t slept a million nights, how the skin of the lips had cracked, and how wrinkled the face had become, as if he weren’t a youth but an old man, older than him. Diseased he is, thought the king. Slowly, taking the support of the wall beside, Bull rose up, stood on his feet and cleared his throat. “Sir, you are mistaken. There is nothing to suffer in this.” And he sat down again, curled himself up and was lost in his thoughts.

The king, too confident to argue, left.

Lost in his thoughts, Bull now remembered those moments of his life which he wished he could relive a million times. The house painted white, behind the hedges, the evergreen field on which it stood, the fan hanging on the beam of the roof of it, which he always wished would rotate faster. He remembered how in the cold winter nights he would curl up under his quilt, listening to his parents’ talking among them. He still did not forget that day, when he returned from school to see that the house wasn’t there anymore, only rubble, and he still didn’t know where his parents were. People had told him that they dies when the house shattered to an earthquake, but he never believed those. He knew his parents would return.

His thoughts then went to his school. It was a small four-room cottage, but it was there that he framed himself for the latter part of his life. He remembered the white and red striped paint on the front walls, and the cement broken on the interiors. He remembered how a mattress used to be kept in order that the room wouldn’t get dirty, and how he and Ross stole all of them. Ross. Yes Ross. His favorite schoolmate.

Ross, a dark-complexioned boy, taller than Bull, he thought, and a wry smile crossed his face, when he was reminded of all the fun they had together. Bunking classes to sit by the river, picking pockets of the travellers who passed by, telling people wrong routes so that they lost themselves, making paper airplanes and flying them in the classroom, never doing their homework yet always escaped the teachers’ scolding by making some lame excuse… and how they grew up together, never realizing that time passed so quickly.

His thoughts now wandered only around Ross. He remembered the lunches they had together at his house, when Ross’s mother cooked better food than any other lady in the world. What a sumptuous lunch they had always, though he always wished that his mother come back from wherever she is and cook him her food too. He too wished that he invite Ross to his house and that he ate his mother’s made food. Little did he know that people don’t come out of their graves. Ross’s mother was a kind lady. Short-heighted, yellow streaks on her front hair, she was always a little bent, due to her age he supposed, she wasn’t pretty, but she was beautiful. Her face was white, white as the snow that fell when he stayed up the hills, at an age of four, with his parents. Sometimes when they both would return from school, his mother would be just outside the door, sweeping the floors with a long broom. The broom had a long wooden handle, and he could still remember the exact picture of it. And she would be coughing loud, the dust causing it. And he remembered how Ross would take the broom from her hands, and ask her to go inside whilst he swept the courtyard, after which they had lunch together, of bread with butter and a glass of milk, the milk of the cow tied to the fence in the backyard.

And then the smile on his face turned to a dark gloom, and the curves on his forehead reappeared. It was due to what happened last week. Murder. Ross. Sentence. Thoughts flashed in and out of his mind. What apparently happened was that Ross had murdered the prince of the city. The reason for this was unknown to everyone. Ross did not share this even with Bull. But there was a rumor that it was because of the fact that both loved the same girl and that Ross was jealous of the fact that the girl loved the prince because he was richer. It was due to that that he had been sentenced to death. However, he had a last wish of seeing his parents before he died. But there was no guarantee that he would return once set free to meet his parents. That was where this man Bull came in. Ross begged Bull to stay in his place till he returned. The king put a condition that if Ross did not return within the stipulated time, Bull would be hanged instead. Bull had almost instantaneously accepted the proposal, he having so much faith in their friendship. But now, only fifteen minutes were left for the bell to ring, and he hadn’t arrived yet.

The bell rung. Bull was escorted to the place which was designed for the hanging. A large crowd had appeared. A sense of serenity showed on Bull’s face although in a few minutes he would be hanged for absolutely no fault of his. The bell rung a second time. The rope was put around his neck. Three. Two. One and… “Stop!” Came a voice from behind. He was huffing, panting and through his blurred vision, Bull saw Ross arrive. There was a smile on Bull’s face, a smile of faith, an eternal friendship, a relationship which had passed all limits. Amidst that smile, Bull’s eyes closed. “No!”, shouted Ross in the background. A loud applause of the crowd. Only had Ross been sooner by a second…

The Smoke

The smoke rose endlessly from the pier,
Suffocating the child whilst the held the fire,
He was only five, then why didn’t he,
Sit at home unaware of this?
He knows not what he does,
He knows not what he loses,
He cries because his eyes are sore,
Knows not why the others around weep.
He sees a kite flying in the air,
Wishes he could fly the one at his home,
But he can’t leave the others here,
He’s sad that others cry,
And asks one if he wants a kite too,
The other looks into the sky,
Sees the clouds huddling together,
Soon the rains will come down,
Wash away the fire lighted in front,
Wash away the fire in each one’s soul,
He sees the clouds too, sees a cat in them,
And sees his father’s face in another,
He hasn’t seen him for a while,
And feels he is somewhere around,
He knows not what he burnt,
He knows not what he lost.

Ad Infinitum – 2

They thought it would be easy,
To make up bedtime stories,
Follow them passionately with all their hearts,
Turning them into harsh reality.
But when the river turned over,
And flooded the country,
Whilst they died, every single one of them,
Who made their wooden piers, oh, none did,
Who dug the ground, oh, none did.
God turned up and showed them,
How futile man’s attempts were,
To appease Him, to placate His soul,
And though we may think he is the Creator,
Deep in our hearts, who doesn’t accept,
That He is the sole Destructor?
For those that create the air which we breathe,
Are those that we kill, are those that we kill,
And when our breaths draw to a close,
Who do we blame, other than Him?
We must stop right here, think for a while,
Remove the misconstruing of the world that we have,
Or the end is inevitable, and the cycle of destruction,
Would continue,
Ad infinitum.

Ad Infinitum – 1

They said living in this world was fun,
Making friends was easy,
And that once you had someone,
You would end up being together,
Ad infinitum.
Lies, all of them,
We live in a world, no, we just spend,
Our breaths, wasted upon everyone else,
Cynics, and half-hearted lovers,
Fill every nook and corner, every alley.
They said, think positive,
But I get only negative vibes out here,
Prying eyes, privacy dead,
They call it socializing, gregarious them,
But end up publicizing, what they shouldn’t,
Fell trees for wood, burn wood for the dead,
Kill both man, and tree, at the same time.
No one’s gonna stop them,
They are rites and rituals, must be performed,
Lest the soul stay wretched,
Ad infinitum.
Not realizing, that wretched souls,
Remain wretched,
That they are not within the dead,
But within those living,
Those among us.
Prayers won’t work one day,
Churches and temples and mosques,
They won’t save you,
Just as they don’t save the dead.

Stranded – 2

Read the first part in Stranded – 1.

She looked at him, he was still drinking,
He hadn’t said a word in the past three hours,
Wondered how terse he had become,
And wondered whether he even loved her anymore.
The blood on his face had dried to black,
A stream of it from his forehead to chin,
She remembers how that had splashed on his face,
And the axe that he used to kill him.

The boy who was waiting on him came up later,
And told them they needed to pay for the ale,
She explained how their money had been stolen,
How they had been robbed of everything as they came.
He went back to his mistress, explained everything,
The wench was ruthless, she didn’t care,
Came up and slapped her on both her cheeks,
That was the last time the wench ever breathed.

As night fell upon them, they decided to sleep,
Shared the hay that the horse in the stable slept on,
She talked to him about love and hopes,
About the children that she planned to have,
The things she had ruminated on while he drank,
He listened intently, or so he pretended,
Until a point when he dozed off,
Leaving her to herself, still talking intently.

When the sun next rose, the girl woke up,
And as she rubbed her eyes and faced his side,
Lo, her love was nowhere to be seen,
Nor was the horse, the stable gates open.
She leaped up and started running,
Never missing the footsteps the horse left behind,
But after some hours she realized her folly,
Sat down where she stood, and wept out loud.

She learned that day what love was about,
How it seldom stood against the face of adversity,
How people changed, and did not realize,
And how love like all things eventually came to an end.
Her love knew no bounds, then why was she,
Alone today, in despair and turmoil?
Stranded she sat, amidst the sand,
Which would bury her into itself, come tonight.

Stranded – 1

They reached the city gates, hand in hand,
The guards looking at them melancholically,
He choked on his voice, but bravely enough,
Asked them to open the gates for them.
The guard’s eyes met with those of the girl,
All lachrymal, trying to rub off her tears,
Her eyes looked into his and a moment later,
Her vision buried into the sands below.

Then a screech of the gates, and a toll of the bell,
Made it known to one and all,
That the two would remain unwelcome as long,
As they drew breath from this world.
They limped out slowly, eyes forever on each other,
Neither knew what stood against them,
For the sands of time were running loose off their hands,
Nothing perennial in their lives anymore.

Save he, the girl had nowhere to go,
Or to see, or talk, or wail loudly,
But he seemed disheartened, became laconic,
Owned brevity in speech, in thoughts, and smiles.
Once she thought she was in love,
But that sentiment was only ephemeral,
And withered like leaves that fall off in autumn,
Never getting to see another spring.

Their hands had the mark of the city they came from,
And no one else would take them in,
So they walked by day and they walked by night,
Until they came by a petite inn.
As he drank his ale, she thought about him,
How their lives had changed for just one decision,
She thought of the evening when her hands was bloodied,
The blood never washing out, the oceans turning red.

She remembered how she had pleaded at first,
Explaining to her father that it wasn’t her fault,
Telling him how much she had fallen in love,
How she tried not to do so, but all in vain.
She remembered how she had been tied,
Beaten up till her skin almost came off,
She touched her bruises and almost instantly,
A tear silently fell into her wine.

Read the next part in Stranded – 2.

Blue

You turned into an owl, hooting and screeching,
All the while trying to tell me something,
My ears dilated, trying to grasp the words,
The tune of the song that you tried to sing.
Was it yesterday, or the day before,
When like an eagle you flew,
Soaring into the skies then swooping down on me,
Nibbling my eyes until they turned blue?

I had the face of a deer, you were the lion,
And I ran as fast as I could,
But I couldn’t outrun you, we knew that well,
And suddenly you overtook and in front of me stood.
The blue of the sky submerged into the waters,
The ripples as the breeze swayed it,
The leaves that I chewed, and you my flesh,
As the sun rose and the sky was yellow lit.

When I looked into the blue waters,
The ripples distorted the face I had,
I looked like a wolf, and smelled blood around,
And the air around was quiet and sad.
Then I pounced on you, and devoured you,
Chew you until the last morsel,
But all the while, you only smiled,
What would happen of us, only time could tell.

Though blood did ooze out from both of us,
My hands were painted with the color blue,
You weren’t of this world, this world knew red,
Pray tell me then, who were you?
For the dream may be untrue, for all I know,
And the things it showed might be undone,
But when the truth would sting us in the dark of night,
Pray tell me, where would we run?

#15 – The Gale of Winter

Bello woke up sweaty. He had had a bad dream, he knew it wasn’t really much of a dream, more of a warning it was. In his dream, Fahhr stood in front of him, in both his hands were two heads, both had their eyes closed, and a wry smile on their faces. They were killed in their sleep, Bello realized. He tried to imagine how the last moments of Syra and Kazh might have been. That was the point he woke up. He was late. They had to be on their way, along with the others, to cross the mountain, before the Things could reach them. Then came the gale.

The wind blew so hard more than half the people got buried in the ice. The Mountain was close. They could see the peak, and they knew they had to reach it somehow. Amidst the noise of the gale and the rain and thunders, Bello felt he heard a screech. He kept quiet, because he didn’t want his fears to creep into the others. The Things couldn’t be so near, he heard himself say. They kept walking. The screeches and the hisses kept getting louder. Were they actually around? No, it couldn’t be. His dream indeed came true. Moments later, Fahhr came and stood before him, in both his hands were two heads, both had their eyes closed, and a wry smile on their faces. Syra and Kazh. “The oak fell on them,” he said. “Many more have died.” Bello kept silent. He couldn’t undo it, and there was nothing he could do about it either. He pretended to be a stoic, and kept walking. He had to be strong.

They walked another mile, then another. Bello saw a huge man walking through the mist. He had the face of Brad, he felt, but said nothing. They looked at each other, and in the next moment, Brad’s nails thrust deep into Bello’s throat. Bello spit up blood, and looked up at him. “I am of this world a Thing, and will remain so forever,” Brad whispered. Bello closed his eyes, one last time.

Suddenly, the sky turned black, as if night crept on morning. Fahhr looked up into the sky, and for a moment his mouth remained wide open. He saw them, thousands of them, flying in the sky, ready to swoop down upon them. “Run!” he shouted. But running wouldn’t do. They swooped down all of a sudden, the screeches louder than ever, louder than the shouts of the people around. And then there was fire. Fahhr rushed to the Headmaster. “What do we do now?” he asked. The Headmaster laughed, ever so loudly. “There is nothing you can do but to surrender to us, you fools!” he cried, and slowly he grew until he was of the shape of a Tasmanian tiger. He breathed out fire, until Fahhr was charred black, and then he flew, screeching, “Fly! Now! Fly! Now!”

It was the dawn of a new world, a new era where everything would be ruled by a sect who were once people, normal humans, but had turned to become only Things. Such was the tragedy of life, that they had to submit to the more powerful, and allow them to rule over them. Such was the tragedy of life.

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#14 – The Hiss of the Dragon

The dragon hissed loud. The Things knew. They knew how close they were to the men of earth. They kept flying. The whole thing would be over in a while, they knew. They would kill each and every one of them, lay a new foundation where the earth was ruled by them instead of the humans, who were stupid and far below their level in terms of power, intellect and resources. They knew.

When they reached the Mountain, they stopped. It was only dusk then, and the humans wouldn’t cross it until dawn. They would be taken by surprise, thought one. A journey that would have taken hundreds of days got cut short to such an extent, and how did they do it? He laughed at himself when he thought about it. They had never thought of it before, and he didn’t know why it had been so. They had forgotten the basics of what they had been taught lives ago. They didn’t remember they could journey through the center of the earth. If that done, their time would have reduced on every trip that they made, but then, they had to have learned it some time, and this was the time.

They drank and they sang and they danced all night. Winter would be on them soon here. They had to enjoy the summer as much as they could, for this was the foretold Land of Always Summer. They had only heard about it, but now they witnessed the very being of it. They feasted on meat and their bellies were tight on alcohol. Yet they kept celebrating. It was almost midnight when one Thing, called Xaroxys, was so drunk he blew out fire and burned another Thing. The Death of Phaxys. The singers made a song on that, and sang throughout the rest of the night, whilst Xaroxys told stories of how it happened.

It was almost dawn when finally the singing stopped. Through the patters of the rain and the rumblings of thunder, the Things heard it. The humans were coming. They were near. The Things smiled. Someone was in for a big surprise. They put off their fires and put out their wings. Then they soared into the sky, one last time.

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#13 – The Death of the Raven

Syra moved stealthily, all the while surefooted on the slippery ice, while she made her way into his room. She stood at the entrance, looking at the entire room, her eyes moving from one corner of the room to the other, deciding if it were the right place she was in. Then she entered.

Outside the door, a man waited. He was a cobbler in his days, now he had nothing but his son and a wife who didn’t remember him although she was always around. Kazh, he was called. Once he had a happy life, but now only the remnants of it in his memory served to bring up a smile on his face once a while. He waited. He knew it would not be long before his guest came up. And soon he did. Clad in brown, fur and leather, always bearing a wicked smile, his hands stronger than any that ever lived, he came and stood by him. He was his son, Fahhr. Or so everyone thought. But Kazh knew the truth. Only if he could speak up.

When they entered man and son, Syra lay on the bed with him. She tried to cover herself, but after a moment she decided it wasn’t worth the effort. He stood up. “Kazh and Fahhr.” He smiled. “I have seen you in the litter, and heard a lot about you as a boy, yet I knew not that our meeting would be in this fashion. People think I am dead. You would know I am not.”

“Yes, headmaster. But.. there is this I cannot comprehend. We saw you get buried in stones. How did you manage to come back amidst us, back from your afterlife?” The headmaster only smiled. “There are things I have learned, boy, in this journey. And much of it you may not believe, though know this for sure. The Things are for real. I have seen them, and they are coming. Even as the raven on my window-sill died today, it croaked and I listened to it. It said, ‘Fly! Now! Fly! Now!’ Do you know what that means?”

“No,” came the reply.

“Then I will tell you,” replied the Headmaster. “I will tell you. I will tell you. For now, it’s our time to fly.”

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#11 – Barren Trees

Brad was laid down on Bello’s lap. He murmured something which was too faint to hear. When Bello brought his ear very close to his lips, he kissed him softly on the ears and whispered, “Fly now.” He was dying. The pain was too much to endure. When the wolf had first torn his flesh, it had hurt; but then it started numbing down as the doctor gave him the ointments and medicines. Yet before long, he knew what the doctor had done. He didn’t tell anyone, he didn’t want others dead too, but he knew that the doctor had been poisoning everyone with his medicines. All the medicines contained the same chemical, which was soothing in less quantities, but over a period of time, it would kill everything inside a man, and finally take his life. He knew it. He knew he was dying. Yet he didn’t mutter a word.

When Bello promised him they’d die together, Brad had smiled. He knew nothing of this world. Brad had higher dreams. Once dead he would join the Things. He would persuade them to not enforce their laws on the human world, and would see a happy end to the journey at both ends. He closed his eyes and dozed off. Bello kept praying. When his eyes opened, there was an arrow through Brad’s chest, where he knew the heart was. There was only one man who knew to use the crossbow, and Bello rushed into his tent.

‘Edward!’ he cried out. The Headmaster was sitting on his bed, feeding grains to the raven. The raven shrieked “Fly! Now! Fly! Now!” but no one paid it any heed. Edward tried to stand up, but Bello kicked him on his groin and threw him down on the ground. “Why did you kill him?” he asked. The Headmaster only smiled. He stood up again, and Bello kicked him down again. “Why did you kill him?” he shouted louder. Edward wanted to explain how he couldn’t allow his teachings to go into a waste, how he couldn’t allow the smaller children to see two men loving each other, how he himself had once loved a man so dearly and how heavy a price he did pay for it, but instead he only smiled. That was his last smile.

Under the barren trees, they laid the bodies of Brad and the Headmaster. They looked so alike, and no one knew how much alike they actually were. Their eyes were serene, and under the glistening moon, they covered the father and the son in layers of ice. They kept walking ahead, but the raven on the tree above still croaked, “Fly! Now! Fly! Now!”

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#10 – A Cold Night

The hills used to be stagnant, though no one could tell how long it had been since they started moving. The clouds burdened with mist, made their ways into the lands and seas. It rained today, and it rained heavily. Pellets of water came first, but pellets of ice followed soon after. In a moment everyone was rushing to the nearest shelter. The Headmaster’s daughter rushed to a tree beside her. She staggered now and then, her strength not yet revived from the birth she gave a fortnight ago. Then everyone saw her guy come and pick her up and take her beneath the nearest oak, to shelter from the winds and the ice. Only a few days ago had he saved her life. They had always shared the same rugs after that, until now. A huge creak sounded and everyone looked up. It was falling, the heavy trunk was uprooted. In a flash it happened.

It took some time to pull out the bodies of the two from underneath the tree. Their eyes were open, blood tricking from the forehead towards their lips, yet frozen beside the ear. Ice and blood, the duo was lethal. They buried the bodies, and moved ahead. The road was covered with ice up to their knees. Tonight would be a cold night. They would have no choice but to light the fires. And when they did that, they knew the signal that they would send. Fire. They already had ice and blood that day, and now they would have a fire. Everybody knew what the three together meant, except the ones who were so young they still suckled at their mothers’. They had no choice. They kept walking.

The road was long, and for boys who were young, it was no easy task. Janas limped, even more than before, his leg aching, his hands frozen, the stump of his other leg turned into an icicle. But he never stopped. He knew he wouldn’t make it for long. But he would have the night’s dinner, he was hungry, he would eat and he would sleep, and then he knew he wouldn’t wake up. That was no reason to give up. He would walk. He prayed to the gods, to let him see another day, and wished fervently that they would listen to him.

Night approached them like a hungry wolf. It encumbered Janas even more. And then someone did him a mercy. The air whooshed around him and the next moment he looked down he saw an arrow through the place where they had learned the heart was. He fell to the ground, trying to look behind, to see who did it, to see who the gods had sent to mock him. His eyes had almost closed by the time he turned around. And then he saw. Through the quarter-opened slit in his eyes, he saw. He was carrying a bow, though he looked too old to use one. Could it be true what he was seeing? He came up to him, bent a little and said, “Remember me in your afterlife, boy, and remember I taught you about death, once today, and once more long ago. Do you remember?”

“Yes, when we were in school, Headmaster,” was the last thing Janas muttered.

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#8 – The Smell of Burned Leaves

She was too young to be called old, yet old enough to not be called a girl. Her auburn curls fell over her shoulder, swaying a little by the breeze, and slightly more by her gait. She walked slowly. She was pregnant, until yesterday. Then she had a girl. A stillborn. It was a curse, they all said. She shouldn’t be with them, she should be stripped and hanged from the oak, they said. All agreed in unison, save one. He was the man who had fallen in deep love with this girl, since the first time he saw her.

He would fight for her. Prince Christian he was called. He was a prince in fact, only his kingdom existed no more than the hours that passed by the seconds. He bore the title still. People said he was arrogant, he believed he was proud. He took out his sword, challenging anyone who would go against him and put her on the tree. He didn’t know her name, nobody knew anyone’s name here. They were all alike, only different in faces, yet this prince wanted to differ from them. His sword remained unsheathed for a long while, until they decided against killing her.

The baby was to be cremated. The smell of burned leaves, mixed with her fragrance as she lit it, was the purest smell he had ever known. He fell all the more in love with her, promising to himself he would soon give her a daughter, a daughter that would live. He once had a daughter, who he had lost in the fire. The fire burnt in front of him even now, choking his breath and tearing his eyes. He turned around to join the group. The woman came and walked with him for a while, and then implanted a kiss on his lips. The saltiness of tears, the dry lips, and the musky skin all fell together on his lips. He savored the moment as long as he could, but they had to keep walking.

Behind them, the one-legged boy Janas limped. His father was a woodcutter once, but now he was dead, and so was his mother. His brother was only what he had. And he had turned out to go against the people. The Things would come for them, he knew, and when it came, they would take him and her, and him too, and they would do nothing about it. Why then, would he care for a girl who he met only on the road, and why would he save her life when hanging was a merciful act compared to what awaited them? He hadn’t an answer, and he wasn’t sure he wanted one.

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#7 – The Raven’s Croak

“Fly! Now! Fly! Now!”, the raven croaked.

As he sat in the verandah, feeding the sparrows, the raven perched on the high wall. He had grown an affinity towards the sparrows. The smallest of birds, who were complaisant to the happenings of this world. Just like the people, the small insignificant ones of course. The grains in his hand were almost over by the time the sun came up. He retired to his room, a small matchbox, seven feet by seven, good enough to fit his bed and himself.

He was dying. He didn’t have much time. The raven flew and sat on the window sill near his head. “Grain!”, it croaked. “Fly! Now! Fly! Now!” The man smiled. He shook himself up somehow, and slid his hand under the bed to find a bag of grain, took a fistful of it and kept it at the window sill. “How much can I fly?” he asked. The raven didn’t have an answer to that, but nevertheless it croaked, “Now! Now!” The man only smiled. He kept smiling, until an arrow hissed by his ear. He would be dead, if not for a centimeter. He reclined on his chair, looking at his palm, thinking of all what he had done till today, how he didn’t deserve such an ending, and how nothing should have been as it was.

His name was Edward. That was many years ago. Of late, he was only called Headmaster. Ninety and two years he had seen, yet this was the coldest ever. The others with him had already gotten up and had slowly started resuming their walk on the Winding Road. He strived a bit, then finally got up from his bed, and staggered out into the blinding sunlight. “For men may come and men may go but I go on forever”, he muttered, as he rejoined his people on the road. He spotted Uddin at the corner of the road, his mouth foaming, and a colony of ants streaming from his lips. It was the call of autumn, which begged for human lives. The first sacrifice had been given. He walked ahead, and the raven flew over Uddin, crying, “Fly! Now! Fly! Now!”

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#6 – The First Leaf

“Life comes in many forms, and so does death.” The students sat cross-legged under a tree, while the Headmaster of the school talked to them. Schools in villages were often conducted this way, under the open skies, for everyone to have a clear brain and of course, the fresh air did create wonders, sometimes bring the aromas of vendors crossing by as well. And then, the first leaf fell from the tree.

“See? That was the first leaf that fell off. It heralds autumn,” continued the Headmaster. Though only he, in his heart, knew what terrible things lay ahead of this, it would not be suitable to fill the children’s minds with such unwarranted fears. “Go back to your homes, tell your parents, autumn is here,” he said. There was a chill running down his spine, yet he bore the smile until the last student had left. It was only then that he picked up the leaf, studied it, and scampered down the street to his own house, barring the doors with logs, though he knew that wouldn’t really be of much help once ‘they’ arrived.

The first leaf had always been the sign of autumn, for ages. The ice-breaker they called it. Like in normal life, someone needed to first break the ice in order for the entire group to follow, similarly, the first leaf broke the ice. In this case literally. The first leaf broke almost simultaneously with the ice at the tip of the mountain breaking, and when the ice came down it brought along with it ‘things’, incomprehensible to man. They looked like skeletons of Tasmanian tigers, and flew like pterodactyls. Their screeches were louder than dragons, and they could smother the entire city with a breath of ice. However, it would take almost two years for the Things to reach their village. And once they reached, the rest was already written, over and over, time and again, in the pages of their history books.

The Things, the Headmaster thought, came once every ten millennia, and smothered everything. They were nearing the end of their ten thousand years now, with only two years left for the ten thousandth year. Everyone knew about it, they’d read lots about it in books of history, in encyclopedias, and yet nothing had ever been proved. The Headmaster wondered whether it would be proved this time. But, who would bear to testify the truth once it was over? That remained the unsolved question.

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#5 – A Rustle

The road was winding. It was therefore called the Winding Road. They moved a lot towards the left, then one had to almost turn around and walk towards the right. That made the journey more difficult than ever. And the storms. They kept coming. Gales and breezes, all of them. They whirled the sands into tornadoes and smashed them against the trees. And yet the people kept moving, their legs, forever creating a rustle amongst the fallen leaves.

Even so, these people were not the only one travelling on this road. At night when they slept, they were afraid to light fires, they were cold and they preferred staying so, for far away in the woods they could hear lots of sounds. They came as a mixture in the midnight, the shouts of men, the howls of wolves, the cries of eagles, and the cries of women. The smell of blood carried far and wide, its taste not unknown to these people, a slight salty one — and so they kept quiet for fear of fighting them.

They wouldn’t be afraid if it were men in swords, but beyond the city, in these woods, it were not only men and animals that existed. Everyone knew what else existed, yet no one ever spoke. When they were in the city, they could have joked on the tales over a spit of bull kept on a fire, whilst drinking hoarse wine from the bottles. Here, they could smell it. The gift of smell was a special one. It helped them know what was around them. And right now they knew, they were not unsafe. But no one could tell what would happen in the very next moment. The dead could arise, they had heard so, and had never again halted near any cemetery.

A rustle in the leaves. Only a few were left on the great oak tree. Autumn takes its revenge on nature as much as nature takes a toll on spring. The winds were cold, yet not as cold they would be in some time. All they had to do was wait for the first light, wait for the first bird chirping on dawn’s call, and make their move. Towards another life.

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#4 – The Withered Tree

The boy had only one leg. His name was Janas. The other was cut by the same axe that the woodcutter used to cut down the mighty forests. The same axe, when roused by anger, took the boy of his leg. But it was not something abnormal or unusual because no one felt sad about it. All were happy in this small house, at least as long as the house was there.

But autumns come and trees wither. The big tree fell down and with it the nests and the new birds in them. Everyone died but the boy and no one yet cared. The autumn brought with it the cold winds. Winds from far which bring messages and do not reveal from where they bring them.

There was a certain history about that tree, although it’s almost uncertain that it was certain. They say that the tree was the oldest in the village. It was supposed to be living for the past three thousand years, and yet it never died. Then why did it, suddenly, out of nowhere fall today? The birds died, yet no shouts of grief. What had happened to this world? Why were the laws of universe tumbling down today? Why did the storm flood the whole village today? Did anyone have an answer?

As he sat on a broken bench beneath the tree, a raven flew from somewhere, sat on the other end of the bench and started croaking. He though it said, “Fly! Now! Fly! Now!”, but it never made any sense, and how would it? Did birds suddenly start talking to men to warn them of the future and what it held for man? No, everything was a mere misunderstanding, a misunderstanding between man and Nature, and a proof that there was something beyond human understanding, beyond the natural, Janas thought, as he limped away on his one leg. The Supernatural, they called it.

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