May 30, 2014 Awake in Dream Time - Journal Entries about the almost real, the surreal and the unreal
Un-Metaphorical Musings – Sixteen Haiku
©May 30th, 2014
By Vijaya Sundaram
Focus! I order,
Focus on love, joy and fun –
Tragedy, begone!
Focus flickers out.
Blindly missing what I like,
I simply exist.
So, filled with ennui,
I sit here, silent and still.
Empty, hollow-eyed.
Hollowed, I sit still.
Ennui all around me.
Boredom fills my bones.
Bones thrum to music
Outside, birds trill in pleasure
When did pain arise?
Pouring from the sky
Outside, the golden sunshine
Makes bright the darkness.
A bright ice-cream truck
Clamoring sounds fill the air.
The weekend begins.
Inside, in school-mode
Thinking, pencils in our hands
We face each other.
Puzzling over this
Moment of non-metaphor
Can we write the truth?
Here, I write in peace.
In India, two teenage girls
Hang from a tree, dead.
Elsewhere, children starve
Gazing into cameras
Eyes huge and hungry.
Here, we eat and crunch
The savour of salt and oil
Permeates the air.
There, a woman walks
Baby on hip, pot on head
Water, far away.
Here, see the landlords,
Grossly surfeit, call for more
Wine flows into cups.
And here, I sit, bored?
Bored, am I? How arrogant!
Step outside, and see!
Today can go on
Stretching into a weekend
And the earth spins on.
__________________________________________________________
Tags: #haiku, #Original Poetry, Boredom, Daily-ness, Writing about writing
Mar 22, 2014 Awake in Dream Time - Journal Entries about the almost real, the surreal and the unreal
Canine Comfort
©March 22nd, 2014
By Vijaya Sundaram
A dark presence hovered at the door.
It had no emotions attached to it, save one. It wanted something. It was in a state of NEED, urgent, voiceless need.
Atavistic it was, and it called upon its ancestors.
Behind it, silently, appeared the ghosts of need.
The pack shifted behind the dark presence.
Somewhere, in another time and another place, an ancestor lifted its dark head and called into the tundra.
Somewhere close by, in a cave, someone awoke and stiffened against the ghosts of the night. Death was always close. The person in the cave reached for a piece of meat and threw it out into the shadows. There was a padding and a scuffle. a growl, a snarl and a chase. Then, a snuffling, a chomping and a tearing of meat. The ancestor crept into the cave. There was a small fire there. The ancestor liked that. It came closer. The human held her breath. Then, the ancestor lowered itself to the floor by the mouth of the cave, thumped its tail briefly and closed its eyes.
The human was strangely comforted. She pulled her baby close to her, and her male, who grunted in his sleep, turned over and snored, oblivious to all that had occurred.
She felt complete.
The night faded. The time and place disappeared into the mists.
Here, now, at the door, a dark presence, a cloud of need waited. It looked at me, mutely.
I opened the door. I let out my dog. She went out, sniffed the night air, attended to her needs, said a farewell to her ancestor, and came back in. The radiator drew her, and she lay down, sighed her sigh of contentment, thumped her tail briefly, then closed her eyes.
I felt comforted. My child and my husband were up and about, doing human things. I looked at my dog. She settled into quiescence, sank into placidity. One eye opened and looked at me. She needed me to be close. I needed her to be close.
I felt complete.
____________________________________________________________________________________
Tags: ancestor, canine, Chronicles of Holly, human and dog, need
Oct 27, 2013 Awake in Dream Time - Journal Entries about the almost real, the surreal and the unreal, Awake in Real Time: Coffee-induced Meditations and Journal Entries
So very sleepy. Falling, falling, falling into sleep … drifting into somnolence. That’s right. Now in a state of sleepitude. Those delicious yawns. How sweet and welcome and tear-filled those yawns are! It’s good to sleep when you’re fed, when you’re warm and housed.
Am grateful, O Forces that Govern the Things that Are.
See you in a while!
~Dreamer of Dreams
Tags: #Sleepiness, somnolence
Jun 25, 2013 Awake in Dream Time - Journal Entries about the almost real, the surreal and the unreal, Awake in Real Time: Coffee-induced Meditations and Journal Entries, Kitchen Table Anecdotes, Teaching and Learning
Cross-posted on FB as well:
Up all night last night (Sunday night), grading the last of my 3rd Trimester papers (grades due on Wednesday). 4:00 a.m., I notice a male figure clad in jeans moving in the darkness of my living room (I was in our library, which has a window into our living room).
I call out, “W, what are you doing downstairs at such an early hour? W? W!” Figure moves away. I rush into the room in a panic. The side sliding door to our deck is open, and the wind is blowing the curtains. My heart stops. I scream. Poke my head out. No one there. Quickly lock the door. Rush upstairs. Check on daughter. Fast asleep. Check on husband. Fast asleep. Wake up husband. He jumps up in a sleep-startled panic, hears my story, goes outside, checks all around the house. No one. Says words to the effect of, “Well, there’s no one. Nothing missing. Why call the police now? I want to go to bed.”
I was and had been very much awake the whole time, and state this fact. Besides, I add, the sliding door to the deck was open, and we know for a fact that it was shut the previous night (I had been very diligent about locking back door and front door, but hadn’t thought that W had left the side door unlocked). That, and the basement door are the only ways in which the intruder would have come in, and left.
Nothing was taken. Meanwhile, I continue to grade papers. Then, I begin a large meal to take to school to feed my “Green Team” kids — today was our last meeting, and I’d promised a freshly cooked meal! Got to school very early to boot.
So, Wonder-Woman stays up all night, frightens away an intruder with HER fright, cooks Indian-ish food for fourteen or so students, grades papers, administers two Final Exams for the last two classes, feeds students, cleans up classroom, does some clerical tasks, and comes home, then feeds family with aforementioned food (leftovers).
A stranger comes into the house in the darkness of pre-dawn. I’ve been on adrenaline all day — returned all the papers to the last of my classes. All seems well. My heart is uneasy.
A stranger comes into the house in the darkness of pre-dawn. I cannot shake off the dread and terror. I plan to put my child in our room tonight.
W suggested I let the police know today. I planned to, anyway. It seems to me that the neighborhood should be on the alert and on the lookout for this shadow person.
Sorry to unload. Had to. A stranger came into my house in the darkness of pre-dawn.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The End ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Tags: cooking Indian food for teenage students, fright, grading, intruder alert
Jun 2, 2013 Awake in Dream Time - Journal Entries about the almost real, the surreal and the unreal, Awake in Real Time: Coffee-induced Meditations and Journal Entries
Melted Meanderings from the World of Coagulated Cheesy Corn
©By Vijaya Sundaram
June 2nd 2013.
Heat melts my brain into lumps of cheese. (I want to find some nachos.)
Yes, I’ll spread the cheese on the nachos, bake them into delicious, coagulated, gross, fatty lumps of congealed food, and snack on them.
Yum. Yum. Crunch. Ouch! My brain hurts.
I hold up a tortilla chip and observe it. Paper-thin and brittle, it reminds me of the skin I’ll have when I’m old. How delicious! I could be autophagous!
Translucent in the afternoon heat, the chip shimmers before me, an illusion, wrapped in a veil of corn-like deceit.
Who knows whether it’s GM-corn from Monsanto?
I’ll just snack. My brains on chips taste good. Oh, so good.
The heat washes over my pliant limbs, and I laze, like a sodden, sleepy slab of cheese on a concrete step waiting to be trodden on.
Disillusion washes over me, a veil being lifted, revealing another veil waiting to be lifted. Perhaps, good things lie in wait behind that veil.
Hail, O! Being behind the veil! Are you me? Can you see? Do we kneel to each other?
Behold, you! I kneel to me!
Now’s when we keel over.
An idle wind (which I respect not) passeth by me. I leap on it, and fly, a tortilla chip covered in cheese. A tornado lies over the horizon.
Ride into that storm.
The smallest things win.
From corn-chip to computer-chip is but a step. GM-corn to nano-chip. Nice! And so crunchy, man! So flavorful! So full of silicon-dioxide!
Day at the beach, don’t you know? That’s what’s called for.
Because, as we know, the answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind. Dust-storms, sand storms, silicon chips, silly corn chips.
Good evening! Have a nice day!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The End ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Tags: chips, corn, Meanderings, melted cheese, melting brains, silicon chips, stream of silly consciousness
May 18, 2013 Awake in Dream Time - Journal Entries about the almost real, the surreal and the unreal, Awake in Real Time: Coffee-induced Meditations and Journal Entries
The Lure
©By Vijaya Sundaram
May 18th, 2013
How simple it is to abandon all! How attractive an option! Drop one’s bags, walk away, never look back, never return — this image has always haunted me.
The lure of the unknown, and the seduction of a future without any strings, without any knowledge of anyone new one would meet, without any expectations beyond what tomorrow would bring, whispers in my blood — and I want to follow that Sirenic voice.
This must be what makes a few people turn to into vagabonds and gypsies.
I’ll never be one, alas. I like my security too much, and am too attached to my loved ones.
That, however, does not stop me from dreaming. I dream of not being afraid. I dream of walking, walking, with a stick holding a bundle over my shoulder, a guitar slung over my back (strings attached), a flute tucked into a waistband (one needs some air to breathe music into), a bottle to hold water, and a bowl to eat and drink from, one big book (Oscar Wilde’s complete works? Shakespeare?), pens and note-paper, hairbrush and toothbrush in a shoulder-bag, walking towards a hill, because, surely, there must be another town I’ve never seen beyond that hill.
But wait … even those few things I’d be carrying would be things I’ll be needing. Ah well, one must make a few concessions to being human!
Death always awaits, however. Perhaps, there I’ll find what I seek.
The unknown always awaits, looking over its shoulder, half-turned to face me, an arm raised, one finger beckoning, a whisper floating on the breeze towards me, but just beyond comprehensibility.
Hang on … I’ll get there eventually, my friend!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The End ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Tags: #Death, attachment, gypsy, Siren, the unknown, vagabond, wanderer, wondering
May 10, 2013 Awake in Dream Time - Journal Entries about the almost real, the surreal and the unreal
The Dream That Could Devour
©By Vijaya Sundaram
May 10th, 2013
Little bit by little bit,
The fog dissipated
And winter paralysis
Loosened its hold
Upon her mind.
Was it depression all along?
What a dreary word!
Was it dread, then?
How dreadful!
Was it worry and inaction
Born of inaction, perhaps?
How worrisome!
Words can bind one tightly
Words can blind one brightly
Words can find one lightly
Treading the narrow path
Of consciousness
Verging on the forests
Of the unconscious.
Can one be arch
With matters like these?
Can one be coy and drop
Hints like breadcrumbs?
Can one laugh and say
“It’s all made up,
Every single word of it?”
But the facts remain
And the worries were
Possibly real, yes, most
Definitely possibly so.
And the depression
And the blackness of
All-encompassing dread
were most definitely so.
And the deepening fog
And gathering mists
And the muffled voices
Therein were all so real
She could get lost on the hillside.
And, wandering after a faint light,
She would find herself fainting
Into the arms of a mist-creature
Looking in vain for comfort.
And, like a knight, alone at arms and
Palely loitering, near a lake
Where no birds could possibly sing,
She could awake, shake off her stupor
And find herself lost and alone
Forever in the land wherefrom
No one escapes, having
Ventured therein, and seen
The distant, deep green
Eyes of the brooding forest
And the crouched spring
Of the dream that could devour
All sense of the real.
Tags: "knight at arms along and palely loitering", #Fog, #Original Poetry, depression, dread, inaction, mist, paralysis of the will, possibly self-referential archness, reference to Keats, the real and the unreal
May 4, 2013 Awake in Dream Time - Journal Entries about the almost real, the surreal and the unreal
A Random Moment
©By Vijaya Sundaram
May 4th 2013
The constant, low humming
Of my child in her room
The constant low thrumming
Of my head in my gloom
The unceasing tingling
Of my hands and my feet
My senses now mingling
In the cold and the heat
All of these remind me
That the real is as real
As my dreams, which will find me
On the edge of the surreal.
~~~~~~~~~~~~ The End ~~~~~~~~~~~~
Tags: #Original Poetry, a moment, surreal
Apr 20, 2013 Awake in Dream Time - Journal Entries about the almost real, the surreal and the unreal, Original Poetry
Djinn
©By Vijaya Sundaram
April 20th, 2013
Today, an imp found residence
in a strange place: my lamp-mind,
which needs polishing.
And it chatters, natters, patters
ceaselessly, unceasingly, incessantly,
because it wants out.
It wants to be let out, it says.
Out it wants to be.
Can’t you see? it says.
I need to be.
If you let me out,
I will be your slave.
For my mind is the lamp that
holds it captive, and all I ask
from it is three wishes.
But that tosses me
On the precipice
Of my conundrum,
Which yawns open below me:
How can the container
ask a wish of the thing
It created, and which is
contained in it?
~~~~~~~~~ The End ~~~~~~~~~~~~
Tags: #NaPoWriMo, conundrum, creation, Creativity, Djinn, Imp, Magic, magic lamp, mind-chatter
Apr 7, 2013 Awake in Dream Time - Journal Entries about the almost real, the surreal and the unreal, Original Poetry
Disregard -- A Poem
©By Vijaya Sundaram
April 7th, 2013
It is only when you sit in silence
Electricity humming in your eyes
That you notice you are grimly angry.
It seems the thought police have invaded
All the spaces, inserted themselves in
All your faces, devoted themselves to
Tracing and erasing all that you are.
“But … But …” you stammer deep within your mind
And now you hope that they will never find
The depth of your disregard for that which
They hold so very dear, so very close
To their lemming hearts, justification
Upon justification to prove that
What they did was always right and always
True, because only they are right, you see.
So, observing all, you reflect and rejoice
That, although they seek to undo your mind
They’ll not find you, for you’ll be gone, a flash
Of laughter and mischief, and that too will
Vanish in the hot sunshine of your words.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The End ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Tags: #NaPoWriMo, #Original Poem, Disdain, disregard, free mind, free speech, Freedom of speech, justifications