A-Z Day 3 - C for Curtains

Peek a Boo

Through the filters

The virtual, the veritable

Guarding, concealing

What there is.

What do you see?

Beyond the layers?

Do you seek to see to begin with?

Or does your sight skim through the surface

Swimming shallow, living hollow!

Playing hide and seek 

Are flutters bright and bleak

Day's nuances carefully covered

Obscure to what doesn't bother

To delve, to dig

Deep within

Through the layers of fabrics, Fibs

And curated facades.

Do you look or  see?

Do you listen or  hear?

Do you live or  exist?

Do you draw them close in your delusion

Or reveal the real in your lucidity?

Photo by Castorly Stock from Pexels

 

A-Z Day 2 - B for Because

I jumped on the A-Z challenge because I realized my daily grind is taking over my life and I am not doing the one thing that I consistently loved since I was a child. That one thing is writing. I remember having small notepads with scribbles of random words and doodles that didn't make sense to anyone except yours truly. Writing was my consistent companion, my best friend that soaked in a processed all things life threw at me. And with this challenge, I sign up for a commitment to keep at it, only to realize how much I need to stay in touch with this writing side of me - this catharsis, this metamorphosis, this coping mechanism through the maze called life, and reducing it to a task that needs to kick in my programmed commitment is kind of a paradox, I also realize. But thanks to the course corrections that come at us, when we least expect. This challenge is definitely a gentle nudge to me, into bringing this stray back to the writing therapy.

So a huge Thank You to the Universe, to the creators and the participants, including me - given that I look at myself as a third party. Well, I need to check back with my parents about the number of times I was dropped on my head since everyone that knows me enough is pretty convinced that I was dropped atleast once. Now circumstantial evidence points at multiple times, as you might agree by now ;)

"Because" comes very handy to me. Being the pseudo intellectual that I am, I enjoy breaking down things, making sense out of the world around me and the age old 'program' that looks for the commitment "Because" to keep at the ambition of doing the mildly ambitious things my otherwise non ambitious self signs up to do.

But this "Because" led me to some epiphanies as I was pseudo meditating this afternoon, while in my mind's eye, there was this word "Because" that popped up as a sign. Then I deduce that this because is as important as it isn't in my humble existence.

While I discovered that I do things "Because", there's a big chunk of my life that defies this word. I realized that I find myself on autopilot by and large, doing things without the customary "Because" preceding them. I sit here, feeling intensely blessed for all those things that defy the Because. All those things I do and I don't for what, or why. All those little acts of love I live through without a reason, without a season and without a preposition.

B dear Brethren that loves to blog - is for Being. The punch in the Human that's supposed to be.

Because there's no need of a because to Be in the Being.

:)

 Photo by cottonbro from Pexels

A-Z Day 1 - A for Abstract

"She is a Light Weaver.

And I am a Power House.

What are you?"

She asked.

"Nothing"

I paused.

"I am nothing"

"Butterfly?"

She suggested, seeming like she didn't hear me.

"Doesn't it feel light?"

She pursuaded.

"Right and Light both"

When looked back into where it started.

Images of caterpillars and larva flash in the Nothing

Of my mind.

"But nothing is the same in me now"

I intended the pun.

"So, I am nothing"

"If not for this challenge, I would have mused in my silence,

Silence muffled in this duality of a Illusion.

Paradox, that I am, my nothingness dons a pop up studio.

Capturing visions out of nothing.

Those impressions float into the fluff of these words.

"Or a Black Hole may be?"

The persistent little imp rejects the moniker of Nothing.

"Point?"

I smile.

As she takes a bow.

She loves me and my nothingness.

She loves the No-Body, that dwells in this body

Which doodles in words, muses in phrases

Knowing

She's Nothing!

Photo by luizclas from Pexels

Birth

In the Abyss

Of the purest awareness

Where light is the whitest

Embraces are the tightest!

Abstract like a linger

Of fragrance and florescence

And

Love, devoid of physical

Psychological contracts

A dimension so pure emerges

In dual, Non Duality.

The elegance in loving glances

The fluence in silent nuances 

Merge as a Power

Unconditional shower

Of all things bliss

In the abyss

That She is, He says

Knowing not that it takes 

One bottomless depth

To fathom another!

 Photo by Elianne Dipp from Pexels

Verse

There's a hack

Under the shack

By the Ivy arbor

An umbrella, filtering the rain

Soothing the light

Like a lamp shade, 

Holding us together

In an embrace.

When you grasp me and I lace my hands

Securely on the small of your waist

Paving a path

To the capture in time

A mixed media of emotion

Spreading across the shack, the hack

Your back I got, it says.

It doesn't quiet say

But it's here to stay

Frozen in an eternal maze.

 Photo by Julia Hym from Pexels

Vers-US

 

“Here’s a challenge” She said

“Don’t let go of the hand

Do all you want, swirl, take the tram, compose a song

Water the plants, sip the espresso, brush that hair!

Do it all, with these fingers entwined 

With a grasp we both share.”

“You call that a challenge?”

He scoffed in mock shock!

“That’s an atrocity, a tyranny to say the most 

And stupidity to say the least.

“It takes a stupid to know another” she quipped

Tightening the grip on his palm.

“And a tyrant to tone another”

“On second thoughts let’s shelve this holding

And the day unfolding

How about we stay in the present, meditate, cogitate, culminate ?”

“Do you ever state anything straight and

Clear?”

“Oh what’s in it that’s obscure? Are’nt we kindred spirits? 

Isn’t that what you said when you knelt down to propose?”

“Ahh, the spiritual alternates this cryptic ritual

Of me doing and your dictating!

What’s a poor spouse to do? To grouse and pout over the spiritual bout?”

“It takes one spiritual being to fathom another

Put those sensors up, decipher the soul

In the spirit let’s grab these hands and maneuver through slinky life demands!”

“Would you ever say anything straight and clear my dearest of dears?’ That’s what the heart fondly hears!”

“Ok then, thank your lucky stars, for the twinkle around the hands that wreath, and get an earful of this 

I love your from my heart’s abyss”

Photo by Anastasiya Lobanovskaya from Pexels

Influence

 

What have you?

Let me take a peak

Through  innocence's untainted panes.

My view crystal clear

My soul, a clean slate

What have you to show, what have you to scribble?

The village that you are, who would help me grow

Would you administer a caress or deal a blow?

As I sing and dance, jump and prance

Would you revel in my peace 

Give my purity an extended lease?

Would you leave finger prints or foot prints

Scratches or smears?

Through this panes that I watch, a flawless view

How would you enhance, or distort it?

Keep it plain, give me a good sneak preview.

For I grow up and become the world

In this relay race, let me be like I am

Frozen in the peace, seeing through the untainted panes

Of creation made in undiluted purity.

Pictured - Two dew drops of innocence, looking through their pure paradigm.

Obverse

 

Once upon a Christmas morning

An Elf so benevolent 

Worked overtime to load Santa’s sleigh

He wrapped a pair of feet

In red velvet Ballet shoes

Topped them with a silver bow

With sparkles and a golden glow!

By the chimney the pair waited

With many blessings and a breath baited

As they lent themselves to my unassuming frame

Bestowing a gift, realizing a dream.

The pair of feet

Lead  me to nowhere

Nothing awaits, no form no care.

I glided through pavers of love

Stopped and stared and inhaled  the magic above.

Once upon a Christmas morning 

Bliss knocked my socks off  

I was transformed to a land far off

A benevolent Elf slogged his heart off

To deliver a present 

The present!

Firmly planted there in, a pair of feet!

A grateful heart and a dream complete.

Veiled

I shift around, sift through

Swiftly I transcend 

Through the lanes of the brains

Letting them emotions

Getting not the best of my attention 

Like quicksilver 

I shape shift

Shades that many, like pixels in a picture 

Shuffling around in a camouflage 

Sly, slipping by

Flowing with the go, while going with the flow

I confirm to what contains me

No rigid angles that refuse to fit 

I fit in yet stick out

Like a defense mechanism 

Like a genetic mutation.

The many hues my scales don

Honing my histrionics.

Don’t be charmed

I am a charade

A make believe passing through

A mirage!

On that side of this defense fence

You’ll see me

When Nothing exist 

In between.

(Pic credit - George Lebada, Calgary Canada )

 

Brussel Sprouts and Bok Choy

(with a sprinkle of broccoli florets)

Along comes 2021 and I realize we are into a brand new decade along with a brand new year. What did that inspire in me? Nothing more than what stayed inspired for the few decades I walked this earth. I made sure not to make any resolutions, because my attention span is shorter than my 5 year old toddler's. So why fight the inevitable? Right?

While I didn't make any resolutions in black and white, I did, somehow, manage to do a purge of sorts in my brain. As always, being the tosser that I am, I made mental notes to toss away some expectations that weigh me down - expectations such as finally getting to write that book that I'd been trying to write since I was three. Now if you are one of those people that are encouraging me to write a book for ever, My sincerest apologies - I have officially, in writing (no pun intended), let you down. But I'll compensate for that in other ways, and you know I will :)

Speaking of expectation that weight me down, I should, but of course, tread the egg shell laden path of my weight loss goals. They too, officially, are given up. I came to make peace with the fact that gaining and losing is a way of life and it is going to happen when it is going to happen. Yeah, the non-dual philosophy got on to me quiet well and I seem to be at such absolute peace with my non ambitious, over weight self more than ever. Talk about coming of age.

Speaking of age - I feel it more than ever, this ageing process, thankfully not as much in my skin as in my wisdom, as yet! But we'll get there and we'll age gracefully - sans fillers and lifts, that we are pretty sure of. The anarchy of the teen tones down once in a while and spikes up - I keep up with that quiet gracefully, so all else should be a cake walk, literally! 

Speaking of literally, I know it was a slip of the key board usage and it doesn't fit in there in the above sentence. This literally abuse is quiet literally getting on to me - so bear with my jumping on the 'literally' band wagon and truth be told, I am quiet literally happy that I don't literally use literally like in every other word I speak. 

Speaking of speaking - I was told many a time, that I am a master of jumping topics and digressing mid way from what I am supposed to be talking. Which brings me, ever so gently back to Brussel sprouts, bok choy and broccoli florets. Apart from all these starting with a B and being the butt of all kids cartoons' barf inducing foods, and a trope of a title in this dope of a blog post, they aren't as infamously pathetic tasting as they are hyped to be. In fact, they make an appearance in my most loved veggie list of all-times. There are more hyped things in life, for the wrong reasons, like these wonderful veggies and I won't make a laundry list of them as they would mildly qualify as being opinionated and judgmental of popular stuff in main steam living.

Speaking of main stream living, I don't indulge or participate in it. I am literally happy in my small space, firing up my wok and tossing around these delicate darlings with a douse of soy sauce to be paired with a bed of, steamed snow white jasmine rice. I am content with this little blog space, taking my heads off to myself, where no one listens. It might qualify me to be a looney - but labels I care for, not! So I'll leave it at that.

And to the few of you, may be two of you (grin) who read and applaud to every word I write here - Mucho Gracias.

And to the world wide web - here's a toast for a healthy, happy, healthy, peaceful, healthy, prosperous (did I say healthy?) new year and new decade.

May the Gods and Gurus rain down upon you every thing you wish for.

The “How not to” guide for dummies

Disclaimer - All the below listed stunts are performed by professional easy goers - Please don't attempt to recreate these at home. The list is just for your reading entertainment. User discretion is advised.

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How not to lose Weight.

Start off by cultivating a serious hobby - a good suggestion is to hon your baking and cooking skills. Make acquiring all kitchen paraphernalia a pastime of sorts - those enameled cast iron pans made in France? Oh yeah - they retain the flavor of foods like no other pans can. The copper clad tri ply stainless Sautee pans? - but of course, they take the preparation of your vegetables and meats to another level of yummy. Buy those trending instant pots, air fryers - douse those cottage cheese blocks in a marinate of yoghurt and spices. Make cooking a cathartic hobby - dig through heirloom family recipes and cook at the drop of a hat. 

Then buy all the fancy table ware - remember we eat with all our senses and eyesight plays a great catalyst in creating an appetite. Listen to your skinny friend talk you into portion control. The world of baking is evolving like never before. Choose to make macaroons, bake gluten free vegan cupcakes. Craft that perfect panini with a generous basting of Avocado oil.  Let the taste buds have a party of sorts.

While you wear that step tracker, remember it is not your master. You are not its slave. You don't need to listen to it nudging to stand up and urging you to set goals. Don't set goals. That well meaning family member gifted you that wrist band alright. It can be used to keep time actually. Use it for that.

Speaking of time, all they say about it is absolutely true. Don't waste your most productive early morning hours breaking a sweat on the treadmill. Instead go for a leisure walk. Converse with the critters, spot the birds, smile at all passers by and wish them a happy morning. Heck you have the mask, it doesn't matter. Practice smiling with your eyes. It shows. Peoples eyes light up in response sometimes. Don't let grumpy, motivated people that zoom past you like gazelles in a NASCAR race dampen your spirit to stop and smile. Keep at it. The world needs genuine, caring smiles more than sculpted derrières.

And if the urge to keep at losing weight continues, take a snooze. There's nothing a good nap doesn't help us transcend. If you are not the napping kind, find a cozy corner in the nook, and settle with a good book, feet up. A cup of hot cocoa helps like nothing else. If still in doubt, grab a cozy throw and keep some crackers handy. That's almost as fool proof as it can get.

This  "How not to" would be a series - God willing :)