#AboutLastNight

Liquid courage, they call it;
A swig is all you need
To take life by the balls
And to chase your dreams.

One swig
And you'll stop being scared
Stop wishing you'd dared
That one time
When you ran away.

It's fight distilled from adrenaline

It's the balls to say what you mean.

Liquid courage
One swig and you're super human;

You're doing stuff they said you can't
You're breaking rules
You never believed in
You're saying words
You rehearsed
A hundred times in front of a mirror.

A sip to remember
That you're the boss
That it's your job
To take charge
Send that mail
And goddammit, ask for that raise!

Your best friend
Leading you to the dance floor
That lying bastard
Who says you're a bomb
When you're probably more a nunchuk
And that REALLY shouldn't be
Your song.

Your wingman
Who hates to see you crash and burn
But knows she's so damn far
Out of your league
That you probably shouldn't even dream of her.
A swig is all it takes

For "Hi, what're you drinking?"

That idiot
Who told you "You have a dream""
"You have a gift
Damn, you should perform your poetry
It really speaks to me"
Except they've been swigging
Pretty damn hard themselves.

Aged for years
With wisdom imbibed from
Oak casks, and brewing tanks
Microscopic bubbles of yeast-fuelled logic
Pushing their way into your mind
Telling you what you already know
Just don't have the impetus to go for.

Liquid fucking courage.
Because for some reason
Without one swig
You have a duty to suppress it
You know what you want
But you're denied it
Flight fights back
Flight comes in first place
While you cower in the back
"Bhai daaru lao..."

How to Meet New People After Half Your Life is Done

As a product, you're a problem
A long-term investment
No guarantee
Prone to short circuits
And hell for maintenance.

But even the battered defects you own
Have been accepted by some
But when you grow, you meet many more folks
With whom you have to make things work.

Of course, you come with an instruction manual
But that's buried deep in packaging
Which nobody will try to open
Unless you're doing some tagda marketing.

So let's try to make sense
It's an easy enough process;
Just a few steps.

Step one.

Get out of your corner

And try, na, once, to talk?

You’re fun sometimes, you also acknowledge,

So, can a tentative introduction go too wrong?

Step two.

No, don’t run away just yet

You’re human, not on a final shoot for Seinfeld

Don’t let the raised eyebrows daunt you

You’re a star, your new friends should flaunt you

Step three.

Okay maybe that was a lie

Human beings never grew out of the playground

We were annoying little shitheads as kids

And there’s still enough of us around.

Step four.

But remember, you have some friends

And you’re fairly certain they’re going to stay

So maybe take some courage from that

And make the stage fright go away?

Step five.

FYI, they’re really not worth it

You’re not fighting the playground mafia here

You won’t get bullied now, if you don’t find a group

You won’t find that you’re out of the social loop.

Step six.

Who am I kidding?

No, this isn’t a commentary

Imagine, me?

Confident, stage-smart, street-smart, will-talk-to-clients-at-a-meeting

Me?

Commenting on introvert society?

What is this pseudo-sympathy?

So what if my ears are red right now

And my palms are sweatier than the last time?

But honestly

Have you seen those photo-series?

Behind the scenes of perfection?

The background to every airbrushed video?

The “seedy underbelly” of the show?

Did you wonder if that could be true

For people walking all around you?

Because here’s step seven, from behind the scenes.

Weigh your idiosyncrasies

Find which are okay with society

And if you play your cards right

You’re not weird, but quirky.

Which brings us to step eight

Wherein all you can do is wait

To either be found by, or to find

Someone who is of like mind

But this isn’t cause for celebration

Because then things hit new escalations

With step nine, you tread with care

You’re worried just how much to share

You’re mentally flipping through 25+ years

Of complexities, oddities and fears

And as you introduce each one

You’re fully prepped to see them run

Because you’ve watched these oddities take shape

And even you know you’re a little strange.

Step ten is for those lucky ones

From whom the audience didn’t run

Because now you can finally rest

You’re in the presence of one of the best

And you’re free to embark

On the next monumental task.

Step eleven is what we call sustenance.

It’s what forms the basis for everything else

Piece by piece, you build up on

Each step which has come and gone

So your marketing strategy is now in place
You're ready to launch; complete, with game-face...

But did anyone ever bother to ask...

Why do I need to strategize to ensure I get to socialize?
What even, are you offering as a prize?
The right to interact?

Where did it begin to go wrong?
How are we letting this go on?
Who gets to decide
Which person fits, and who is better off on the outside?

May I hazard a step twelve?
I've been using it, and it's treating me well.
Don't bother.
Really, stop.
Why should you market yourself at all?
Especially to just MAKE a friend
Because that's a beginning, and not the end.

Don’t bother with making a case for you.

You’ll find your niche, like back in school

You’ll find that one other little girl

Who finds it fascinating to be in your world

And you in hers, and that’s all you need

Don’t  bother to bring her up to speed.

You’ll find each others’ oddities

Before you find the normalcy

Ideally, one day, we can all move on

And leave the marketing wars to Flipkart & Amazon

Because we're all broken

We're all oddities

Without a return policy

And why shouldn't we be?

Nobody cares what happens to perfection

It will be fine, it's programmed to be

We're all looking at the flawed

Because that is where there will be magic to see.

Resolution 2017

"It's not affecting your life na?"
See, I know it's not
Not directly
But it is personal.
Because you took away
The dream that there's hope
For millions
Looking to move up
To move out
To move on
From worlds that don't understand them
And I take dreams very seriously.

"But you can't change anything, so just move on"
But why?
One day
One country
Now one man
Changed everything.
And made it okay
To hate.

And hate causes wars
Hate causes hate
Hate burns and corrodes
Hate divides
And divides
Till the root of life
Is hate.

So why not?
Why can't one voice
One poem
One... Me
Change anything?

Nobody says anything
Because it's one country
Fuck them
Is about time someone
Kicked them in the superiority

For a moment there
We were living in a world
Where people wanted to love
Where "law" was friendly
Where the CEO of Google
Didn't have to call in personal favours
To let me in
To my own country
Where every news article
Didn't put me behind new bars
Where my anatomy
Was not making me a target
Where I had an option
To not be afraid.

And it wasn't political
It wasn't business
It was social
It was intrinsically human
To care.

And you know what?
I want to care.
And I want to get started now.
Because
The debates will begin again
Colour
Race
Religion
Pro-life...

...pro-life, that's funny
Did anyone think about life
When they took these calls
To build walls
To keep people out
To pick a thread
And slowly unravel life?

I want to make it harder
For everyone around me
To ignore people
To feel removed
To stay out of it
To "what's it to do with me?"

I'll tell you what it's got to do with you.
Not saying anything means
It's not "him"
It's you
Building walls
Banning people
Ignoring the world
Outside your comfortable
Air conditioned
Perfect
Living room.

One man
And his division
Will multiply
And add
To the voices
Till one
And one
And one
And one
Makes many
Who all took it very personally.

So what I'm going to do
Is care.
And talk about life.
Because let's do that a little.
Forget the objective
Forget the politics
Forget the dhandha
Forget your unfounded fears
And get personal
Because it's all personal...
It's personal as hell.

#Resolution2017