Kinship, writing and Marissa Nadler

Have you ever come across an artist with whom you felt an instant connection? This connection is different from others, it's not merely that the artist speak of things you know well and intimately, nor is it mere admiration for how like you they seem, it certainty isn't the kind of connection that grows with each listen so you feel by imbibing the artists in your life you are growing a little. No it's the kind of connection you recognise instantly-you feel it in your bones with the first strains of music and when he/she begins to sing and you're even willing to entertain the slightly foolish notion that you're siblings of the same order-kindred spirits if you will be.

It's rare this kind of connection because we love so many artists for the diversity that they bring to our lives, for the way they train our ears to their sound and their message, for opening us to new ways of seeing and I'm sure many many more reasons. But this kind of connection is unique because it seems to take you back to somewhere ancient, some place no I don't want to use the word primal, even before that- a beginning of sorts. Your beginning. I haven't felt this way about too many artists and it's a good thing because over the past few days I have become obsessed with Marissa Nadler.

The moment I first heard the opening strains of Thinking of You  I immediately had that swooping sensation in my stomach a little like when you first realise you're in love but instead of throwing you off balance like love does, this feeling centers you. I guess it's what meditation should do. And then when I hear her cover of Famous Blue Raincoat (a song that holds so many memories for me that I would call it my favourite Cohen song if not for Chelsea Hotel No. 2)  I was lost. I am not someone who grudges covers but I am wary when it's a song I am already deeply attached to. Her version manages to break through that barrier. It is just as painful as Cohen's but adds a layer to it, turns the mystery of that song in a different direction and it becomes every bit her song.

I love that she is so gracefully dark. Why gracefully? I guess it's because it goes back to something I said to someone a long time back, that darkness can be very very beautiful that there's much to learn from it if we allow ourselves to. I was sick of the whole enlightenment spiel (at the time) a friend was giving me and I can remember how we coined the word 'endarkenment' as an anti thesis to it.  For as long as I can remember I've been preoccupied with pain.  I've had clashes with so many people about this though that I just shut up about it now. It's why poetry works so well for me and much of Marissa's writing reminds me of things I know, wonder about, some times don't have courage to write about.

I wrote a poem (Have you seen my sadness?) under her influence the other day and it's one I am happy with even though I know it needs more work. I took time with it, her music playing all the while in the background and it was just an amazing experience writing it. I love when that happens, when the writing is enough.

Read more about her at Pitchfork they have some great reviews of her albums. My favourite so far is Songs III Bird on the Water.

On (possibly) leaving

I will be leaving Bangalore soon. And I'm not sure how to feel about it. As soon as I stepped into this city I hated it. It didn't help that I was going through a particularly bad phase at the time. So when I saw the dirty streets, the pot holes everywhere, the terrible traffic it was all too easy to project my terrible state onto the city. I painted the city in the most dreadful colours and my family still teases me about my habit of throwing my hands up in the air screaming"I hate this city" everytime the power in the city failed us (which was very often).

Now, as I am applying to study in Delhi (yes back there again) and mind you, the chances of me getting through the exam and into the course are not very high-even so, I'm feeling strange about leaving Bangalore. I still don't love this city. I hate the million malls that have erupted like mushrooms all over the city. I hate the fact that I had to walk past a ditch entertaining pigs, garbage, shit and god knows how many diseases, everyday on my way to the bus stop. I hate the fact that you go to a restaurant and spend oodles of money on food that isn't even that good.

I hate that I hate it.

I realise these things could apply to any city in India. But they do bother me more in Bangalore. My memory (from childhood) courts a different Bangalore, one with flowers blooming in trees, the wind sharp against your face and this lush greenness everywhere you looked. It was a limited view(I used to come on vacation) I know and a highly romanticised one. Who knows if the Bangalore that I thought I saw then was really there? But I thought it was real and that's what counts I guess. In a similar way I know a lot of people living here cannot picture themselves living anywhere else so maybe they are seeing a different city. A city that invokes strong ties despite the things I mentioned above. Things to complain about but with affection. I know what it's like to love a city like that.

Now, with the possibility of leaving looming large before me I have to consider that while this city holds no precious memories for me there's been a lot of inspiration here. There's been a lot of poetry written here and for that I can only be grateful. I think it takes a while to understand what a place does to you-that you have to leave it to know the things that have settled in your bones and skin. Right now, this indefinable feeling of loss and also relief makes me think it is like saying goodbye to a dysfunctional relationship.

You're glad it happened but also grateful that it's over.

Falling

"Heard about the guy who fell off a skyscraper? On his way down past each floor, he kept saying to reassure himself: So far so good... so far so good... so far so good. How you fall doesn't matter. It's how you land."
                         - La Haine


But this ocean must have a floor right?

A friend

Some times hearts surprise you with the number of times they can break. Even so, it does get easier after a point to go through it even though a broken heart becomes the only way you can feel whole again. Then some songs come along and just help you slide into it. So you find it easier to sleep with the heart under your pillow, find it outside your window, eat with it as it cracks apart a little more. There are some songs that allow you to be a friend to that heart.

Flailing attempts at prose

I invest more in the smaller plans. The big ones, almost never work out. I think I tend to believe that there is some grand plan for each of us and it’s the tiny ones that we are allowed to tinker with. Sometimes I would get glimpses into this big plan at my old house. I would go to the terrace nearly every day in the evening to sit in the sunset. As far as terraces go, it wasn't spectacular. My house was by no means the tallest building. And the time had passed when you could see the sea from the terrace. New buildings had come up by the time I started frequenting the terrace. To my right was one of those big towers? Electric ones? I’m not sure. It was constructed on another tall building. I would always look at that the peak of that tower and wish I could be up there, closer to the sky.  Often, there would be a lone crow sitting up there watching everything else. It looked incredibly lonely to me. But I always sought that even as a child. It was still unsettling. Like the skeleton of something abandoned. Or rather the skeleton of something that would grow only that far. No flesh for this building. So I had this skeletal tower to my right.

In front of me was a big coconut tree-the branches draped themselves over the wall under which I would sometimes hide when I was a child.  When I grew older, that side of the terrace always frightened me. When the sun set and everything was thrown into shadow, that part looked especially dark and impenetrable to me. And yet I always felt like I was being watched from something in there. I always had the sense of something small, female and abandoned sitting there watching me. Sometimes I would leave the terrace, too frightened to stay when it got dark. Later, I decided that I wouldn’t be chased off my own terrace and learned to stay there and face my fears. I remember I would talk loudly to myself telling whomever I thought (of felt) was there that I wasn’t there to hurt them and maybe we could co exist happily. Soon I stopped being frightened and would stay for hours not leaving till I was called for dinner. I think something still waits for me there. That patch of sky above that terrace is mine. My big plan has been written there and its waiting for me to read it.

Repeat to self

"The only way out of a feeling is to go through it." -S

This isn't her quote. But it's so much more meaningful to me because it came through her. 

Birds and Nests

I woke up this morning, my chest feeling heavy. It’s funny. I have carried this weight around for a while and though I have gotten quite used to it, sometimes I feel the weight as if it were new. As if, it were pressing down upon me to remind me in case I ever forget.

Let’s call this weight a bird. A big beautiful bird. A bird who meets other birds, squabbles with other birds, falls in love with other birds but you know, never quite sees me as a bird. I suppose I am this bird’s nest. Last night, this bird felt its own weight and seemed to be asking me why would I put up with this weight? Why don’t I shoo it away?

Why don’t I shoo this bird away?

I suppose it's because I am this bird’s nest. Where will it go if I shooed it away? 

It's weird how this started as a poem and then just wouldn't go anywhere I liked it to go. So I guess that's why it stays here instead of Tiny dancer. On an aside, I wonder if it's time to change the name of my poetry blog. Something like.. "Tiny Dances No More" or "Tiny Would Rather Sing" or "Tiny Would Like the World to Believe She Is Tiny Even Though She Is Not". I guess the last one is too long. Oh well. 

I suppose it's strange to have a randomly personal post come up in the middle. Not that I haven't posted my rants or allowed glimpses into my life in a more direct fashion, before. I haven't done it in a while. I guess I'm being obscure enough to satisfy myself and keep you wondering. Ha.

Blogging and some reflecting.

So I do a lot of blog surfing and I mean a lot. Some blogs are just crappy and (heh) I get some twisted pleasure in dismissing them. Some are just oh my god so good, that everything I write here seems trite and forced. So I figure it's a good trade. Okay but to elaborate.. I find that a lot of people expose themselves on their blog and I used to find it so weird. I recently came across an old classmate's blog and I was shocked to learn how depressed she was. She had always seemed annoyingly chirpy and just full of zest. She was always bouncing down the hallway with her ponytail bobbing behind her. I remember getting seriously annoyed with all the happiness. I guess something seemed so wrong about it even then. But on her blog she sounds incredibly lonely and sad. It's not so shocking that people hide who they are or how they feel but what's shocking to me is that her blog is right up there on her Facebook profile. It's for everybody to see. I wonder why people do that-hide in one circumstance and yell for attention in another. It seems so pathetic.

Now me, I feel like I've always been consistently dark and depressed. I keep thinking how it's pretty obvious who I am. I am not going to make the effort to get to know you if I don't want to. It's pretty simple. I'll just make sure I'm weird enough so you wouldn't be shocked if you spoke to me. Okay I don't look weird but I wasn't ever friendly or overly talkative, guffawing at what everybody said. I would practically run out of the department. I mean I made it pretty clear that I didn't mind not fitting in. I don't think anybody would be surprised if they knew how dark I was. I remember this annoying girl(god I sound terrible!) grabbed my Dali notebook in which I was happily sketching one day and started reading as if it was her god given right to. And I had some pretty heavy stuff in there. I got so angry. I just couldn't be polite about that intrusion and I made it pretty obvious. I just find it really funny that I choose to expose myself over here.

I wonder about the kind of people who read my blog and what message I must be sending out to them. I've been closely analysing my posts( wow I need a life!) and I realised I shy away from exposing myself directly. It's in the I-think-I''m so-witty-comments and the self deprecating humour that I'm most naked. And I wonder if people look any closer? Or do they chuckle or *sigh* at the tired humour and then move on? (See? Did it again. *Sigh* It's like a disease) But anyway, I figured I should allow myself a little more license, be a little naive and yes allow myself to be excited/depressed about life and just spread myself all over this blog for the amusement and disdain of the readers. I mean, I wonder who I'm fooling with all this unnecessary humour anyway? So I decided I'm going to do a lot more "personal posts". Anybody else's amusement or disdain is their business-it's their property, I can't do much to prevent it.

The year end.

Every time I start with a blog post there’s always a purpose -I’m not sure whether this ever comes across but I always start with the best of intentions. I’m starting this one without having anything particular to say.

It’s the year end and looking back on what has probably been my most memorable (oxymoronic-I’m getting some secret pleasure out of knowing that I’m the only one who gets this in its entirety) year yet, I am taking some time to contemplate my fingers. And my toes. I feel like they should have changed in some obvious way because they do feel different. My entire body feels different.

So maybe I’ll run through this year, though a lot of it is still in a haze.This is of course very personal and very boring for anyone who doesn’t know me (who am I kidding? It’s boring for those that do as well):

January: Something changed imperceptibly when poetry began in me. Tiny Dancer came alive for the first time and I started something that a lot of people have frequently scratched their heads about since. “You write?? Whaaa? I didn’t know!“ Neither did I.

February: Delhi misery set in like no other. With a thesis full of holes up for submission, I spent much time moving between disgust for myself and my teachers.

March: Addictions began to tell their toll and we began faltering for the first time. Though when I think about it… it probably began a long, long time ago.

April: Exams and Vivas should have taken the forefront but they didn’t.

May: A reprise in Shimla. An explosion in Bangalore.

June: Even Madras couldn’t help.

July: Employment, finally!

August: Shillong, Shillong Shillong.

September: Work blues. Joined PFFA and began to take writing a lot more seriously. I also had my first real epiphany about what craft is and the bullshit that people pass off as craft. I think this really marked my growing up-if not as a writer then definitely in how I view the world. Contrary to my previously held but flimsy opinion, this did not make poetry any less beautiful to me. Also of importance, this month marked the birth of this blog.

October: Conoor, A Cats eye generated epiphany.

November: Hazy-why can’t I remember? Oh yes-a reunion leaving me itchy. A breakup (?) leaving me dumbfounded. Somehow along the way apathy set in and I am officially disillusioned.

December: Musing on the year end and wondering what I would have changed about it. I wish I could say I had no regrets. But if anything, this year has been filled with events I wish I could erase.

Well this ended up pretty purposeful.

Things to say. To people I love.

1- I love how you cut to the point. Even if when you cut it hurts. We should talk more or we should just sit-either way, the world makes a little more sense when we spend more time together. Probably because alone, we don't make much sense you and I. See how I am not making sense now?

2- I love that whenever you call I can hear you smile. I don't think you realise that I listen more to that smile than anything you actually say.

3-I love how we pick up from where we leave off. I love your cackle. You're such a goof and with you I'm goofier. And, I miss her almost as much as you do. Only almost.

4- You're like a breeze or like wet mud-so pleasant. And that might not sound like much. But it is. It's just enough.

5- I think you should get your butt back to this side of the world and just call me. I think you should share some of that happiness. You shared enough of your depression. And my poetry misses you.

6- I love that you're always there on my gtalk. What I don't love- that we don't talk as often because of this.

7- I wish you would brighten up a little. Heck(who says heck??) I wish I would. But I try. I try, so please just try. I think we need to be braver.

8-Life isn't that hard. Or it is. No wait it is. I'm sorry... it is.

9- We're going to have sooo much fun. I hope I don't ruin it.

10-I am your hydra you are my panda. This is not cryptic enough but neither are we. Thank god!

11-

12- I love that you're the only person who'll read this and bother to ask me who is who. I love that you bother.

Delhi

Today is such a wet day. The rain hasn't let up since I have woken up. I am listening to Sufjan and I am remembering Delhi. People who know what Delhi is like often have this strange expression on their face when they ask me about it-as if they're daring me to say something awful about it. And I usually do. I complain about the weather, the people, how much I hated the entire experience. But these days I find myself thinking about Delhi a lot with a surprising amount of wistfulness. Like I wish I could have made better use of it. I think I miss Delhi more now because even though it was painful being there, my relationship with it was more obvious. More laid out. It was a very love-hate relationship. It treated me awfully (at times)and I would malign it as much as I could- when it suited me. Often enough though, I'd feel like I was talking about an unwanted family member. The point of course is that it still remained family.

I live in Bangalore now. I feel like we're still withholding judgement on each other. It's a lot more uncomfortable-this not knowing. This sense of alien-ness. The inability to complain because my mind hasn't been made up yet. Delhi was also family because I had family there. I remember them now and I can't believe how somethings have changed. Maybe all this remembering is because of the rain. Right now, it's coming down like needles- piercing everything with sharp clarity. The fog that has surrounded me seems to be lifting from me briefly. And I remember things. I remember standing in our hostel bathroom and watching the rain at night glowing in the yellow light. I remember I calling me for this rain ritual of ours. I remember friends and I remember family. Maybe it's Sufjan. I first heard him with A. I remember lying flat on my back in her room- always listening to music and not talking. I don't remember what I used to think about then, but I remember being happy. Maybe because I didn't think. I was just.. being. If I could just be- I would go back. But being as we know it can't be contrived. It just happens. Delhi just happened. And that's how I must remember it.

The secret lives of little girls

When I first told my aunt(former English Literature lecturer, lover of words and the one who helped in opening that secret window into books and their worlds) that I wanted to read Cat's eye by Margaret Atwood, she shuddered(a bit dramatic but I love her reactions) and said "Ooh that's a dark one" I didn't take her very seriously or rather I was actually inspired to read the book even more. I really underestimated how much this book would affect me. It's not just because it's dark or because it's about women. It's not even issue related I think. I started reading it and immediately related to it.

Have you ever had a friend while growing up who was the queen of the gang? Who everybody secretly hated but outwardly worshiped because the alternative-of standing up to her would leave you out in the cold? I did. Her name was D. She was the prettiest girl in our class and she made our lives hell. She was completely dictatorial. And we just followed her while wishing someone would just topple her over. So you wouldn't complain if you were told that you'd have to play the elder sister while playing princess and the witch, or god-knows-what we indulged in at that time. You'd rather be the nondescript elder sister in the play, than the rebel who stands up for herself in the playground and gets thrown out. Ya I was always the boring elder sister. D as you can guess, was the pretty princess. She would lets us know why we were worthy of her condescension and of course when we were not, she would inform us why. This would of course change at a whim. Now when I look back on all that I have no idea why we took it all. She was a kid. A stupid kid in pink. But then so were we. Maybe it was the pink, maybe it was the fact that she behaved as if she deserved worshiping- but the truth remains, that we let it happen.

Some friends of mine like A and G would shudder when they talked about her years later, much after she had left the school. I even remember when she came back once-I think we were in the 8th standard then. These two friends of mine didn't even look at her. I also heard she was pretty skittish about being back. I can understand that- it's harder for the perpetrator to look at her victims.

I think Atwood brings home a hugely disturbing fact about little girls which I see reflected in my childhood as well . We were awful to each other while growing up. Just awful. There's a major power struggle that exists that I think is either absent in boys or just less complicated. The worst thing of course, is that nobody knows about it. It's almost like this covert operation happening right underneath parents' noses who by the way, are too busy sniffing out their mischievous but far less harmful boys.I remember how we used to gang up on one person at a time and tell that person exactly what was wrong with her. Each of us went through it. And you never knew when it would be your turn. I remember the time it happened to me, quite clearly. We were in the 8th standard. N had left school and gone to Sishya-I was miserable without her and miserable with having to make friends with the others- those that I had neglected when she and I became friends. And it started slowly -the slight cold shoulders, the wondering, the looking over your shoulder, and then when finally they surround you to start the complaints you're almost relieved because it's finally out there and you can face it. It's hell. But you let it go- get accepted again, and the next time you participate in it? Someone else is the victim.

When I finished reading Atwood's similar account of peer torture I bawled my eyes out. I was in Conoor at that time and all I wanted to do was call my friends and reassure myself that we're not the monsters we used to be. Because we're still friends. And I almost feel like the way we treat each other now -all soft and warm and cuddly is to make up for what we did to each other before.We stand up for each other now. Whenever each of us is heartbroken or someone has treated us badly there are a flurry of emails that invoke a sort of inner sisterhood that bypasses distance, time, and yes even abuse. Because that's what it was. I think the fact that we're still around each other says something we never really acknowledge about love and friendship-that though we're often kinder to a stranger than we are to a loved one, there is a greater sense of validation in being around those with whom you share your failures.

(I just apologised to G while writing this. It's never too late for anything)

Unresolved. Don't know how to end this.

Some miseries have their place and they are the only chance we get- of feeling relevant.

Poetry

Finally! Finally I find inspiration has struck, and I start this new blog-with nothing spectacular but with something to say. A new muse for each day(or week or month-I'm horribly lazy) I promise.

So today was like any other- I was incredibly bored and was seriously considering taping my lids to my forehead so my eyes could remain open. Then, in one of those rare days when the internet offers something beautiful, I managed to chance upon a blog so ripe with inspiration I felt the stirrings of a whirlpool of ideas even before I explored it. So in my initial forays into the blog I found one lovely tiny post titled "What is Poetry?" (I won't mention the blog here-I'm weird like that) Anyway, the post dealt with the author's own struggle(I'm not sure if this is the right word- I don't think she'd know either) with this question. Anyway, it brought me to wonder about poetry as I understand it. I only began writing this year and yet I feel like something inside me has always been waiting to burst this way. All this poetry is the best reflection of my life's transitions. My personal mascot, that no one can deny because it is the part of me that I choose to place out there. It in my indefinable stamp- though it does allow comment, it is brazen and bold, stands up for itself unlike me. So that got me thinking about my poetry. What are my poems? Not what are they saying but what do they mean? To me? What are these undefinable intangible beings that I have breathed life into that survive quite happily without any assistance from me. These things I have no explanation for but Poetry(and I'll capitalise here for no reason) as I understand it is wildly different, it is an act. An act of commitment made almost too soon, to an idea that almost always comes at the wrong time(like an office meeting *sigh*).. And an event..occurring(always!) when you bang your knee against something and then sit to pick at the scab that forms over the wound.

It is inescapable, wildly unpredictable and I indulge in it because I must. I figure that's definition enough.

If this blog post ends too prematurely think of it as a poem undecided. It's much easier to forgive.