Littoral Dreams

One evening, I was walking down the shore. The skies wore an ethereal blend of colours. It was dark, but not night yet. Clouds were carrying the seeds of rain and also the night. These clouds were bordered by the silver lining of the sun in some places, and somewhere else, the same sun was painted over with crimson, orange, yellow, and purplish hue. And as I continued my stroll alone, I saw something shining in the distance, in the sea. Curious, I stopped and started following the shining that now is slowly being carried to the shore by those many crashing waves. To my surprise, it was like the object was being carefully held and brought by the waves. As if the waves were deliberate in ensuring its safe delivery. Like with an infant, it was passed cautiously from one wave to another. And as I slowly walked into the tide to get a closer look, I saw it was a bottle.

It's getting dark now, and though it's a full-moon night, the moon hides behind her cloudy veil. I had to get back to my room, and as I started wading my way back to the shore, hoping to catch a glimpse of her in the sky, for a moment, I felt like my legs were being dragged back into the sea. And there I fell when the next wave shoved me to the beach like I was some hollow raft. Except, now my hands were holding onto something. It was that strange shining bottle!

I stood up and studied the thing closely in my hand. A bit unnerved and excited at the same time. There, I saw a face painted on the neck of the bottle, and it was of an angelic, beautiful young girl. And there was a piece of paper inside, neatly scrolled like her elegant locks of hair. As I carefully took it out, it read, "Look nigher and you shall find". Perplexed, I looked to the ocean itself for what it could mean. What strange fantasy would have dreamt of this moment? Thoughts flashed in my mind like those millions of drops that have begun to drizzle. It was then I saw something else attached to the bottle.

It was an Oyster. And as I slowly opened the shell, I found the most beautiful of all sights my eyes have ever seen. It was a Pearl as pure as starlight. And as I took that Pearl to my hand, there came a sudden burst of light from the dark skies. It was the moon in her brightest, and she revealed herself from the cloudy veils of the night to me. At that instant I saw, the shining of the Pearl and of the moon to be the same as if my moon has hidden her spirit in this oyster shell for me to find. For now, she is closer to me than ever. And standing there, with the pearl and her form in my hands, holding it close to my heart and drenched in moonlight, I melted away, to be the one with her.

-Harishna

(10/07/2021)

The Residual Love

Yesterday night, the daily dose of discussion was about waste. Yes, the different types of trash that we generate and come across in our day-to-day living. While some are physical and can be removed or cleaned off easily, some remain like indelible stains. Some wastes are psychological. They cling to our souls, only to pester us emotionally, polluting our minds, robbing us of our dear precious life force and peace. Now, these 'internal wastes' are quite tricky to remove as we usually fail to notice them in the first place. Often we take these 'malicious bloatwares' to be part of the genuine package and thence begins the trouble. Nevertheless, the thought shared here is about what remains after love. Of all the different varieties of waste that we carry, this is perhaps the most ubiquitous and even diabolical. 

We know what happens to those giant stars once they run out of fuel to burn. If they were big enough, these stars would get crushed by their own 'self' to become an object of unimaginable density. It would even end up becoming a black hole from which even light can't escape. Or from another example, think about our nuclear power plants. They generate much-needed electricity by splitting an atom. But, after a while, the nuclear fuel ends up being radioactive waste which will burn on itself, emitting deadly radiation to the world around for many decades to come.

Now, think about love. Not just romantic, amorous love but all kinds of love that we feel towards the other, be it a human, an animal, or something else entirely. Imagine the love that we feel constantly during our lives. The needs and desires to love and be loved. Try to see the many forms it has taken and all its myriad manifestations. Try to see all the emotions that we have had to bear associated with this idea of love, all that pain, confusion, and chaos. 

Here, I do not intend to write about the glory of love. Nor am I going to demonize and discredit the experiences and expression of love. Here, the attempt is to look into and try to make sense out of the idea of ‘residual love’. The love that remains and lingers on even after its glory days. The leftover pieces remain even long after the core has burnt out. It’s about the idea of ‘after love'. What happens to love in the end? Does it collapse unto itself like a dying star? Or would it continue to burn like the radioactive residues from a nuclear reaction? And what happens to those living with these decaying residues of love? Again, my intention is not to find any answers but rather to ask these questions themselves. 

Love is perhaps the most potent force in the universe (though some physicists might disagree). It binds and breaks at the same time as if it is the point of convergence, where both chaos and order find balance in the universe. Simply, love is the light that brings us vision, but the same light also holds the possibility of leaving us blind. So, the idea here is that the experience of love holds the possibilities of both beauty and terror at the same time, and if one does not navigate through this ocean with caution, he/she is bound to fall into the abyss. So, am I suggesting that one needs to be cautious, logical, and calculating while experiencing love? Not at all. Love is an experience of Chance, a beauty of Chance even. For love to bloom and spread its fragrance, it needs to be left alone, independent, and certainly out of our cunning, calculating minds. But what happens when love burns out of its fuel. What happens when the flower of love begins to rot instead of bloom and what happens to its fragrance? What happens when the idea of love itself causes sheer terror and fear in one’s heart? What happens to love and the lover, when it becomes reduced to waste, a dead weight in one’s soul that cripples them. I think this is what residual love is. And this is where most of us live today. Unfortunately!

The stink of residual love takes many forms. It is the fear of losing the ones we love or of losing love itself. It's anger too, and so is grief, lust, anguish, dependence, and on and on. This is when our feeling of love disrupts, clogs, and reeks our natural flow of life. This is where we are uneasy, constantly in fear, and gripped by insecurities. If love makes one feel like a prisoner, being constrained, sans confidence or independence, then that can only be a love that is barren and wasted. Residual love. And someone living in this place, holding on to this residual love, can only collapse in the end, like a dying star, drained out of all their vitality, joy, and love. 

Now, what is the way out? How can one identify and filter out the residual love from their system and restore the flow of life? I think this begins with a simple act of immense valour, in carving out a sacred space for oneself. This does not mean that one should retreat to a shell and remain isolated and insulated from the rest of the world. Instead, it is an act of self-respect. It’s about knowing and drawing boundaries, making sure there is enough room for the river of love to flow through our ‘life stream’ without drowning us. It’s also like pruning our gardens, making sure weeds are removed and each plant could grow together but in its own space. It is also about finding the courage to accept failures, setbacks, and seek and deliver forgiveness and move on. Brute force, strict discipline, or sheer willpower will not help one in cleaning and clearing residual love. It will also take compassion, mercy, and pity as the vanguard. 

All love stories begin with promises of eternal bliss. Love stories often are portrayed as burning bright with passion. But, none speaks of the residual love or the after love. We speak of an afterlife and even curate our lives accordingly to get the best possible afterlife experience. But, I think it’s time we started thinking about after love too. How do we navigate through love when it starts to lose its glitter? How do we learn to share the spark without extinguishing the other? And, how do we move on when it finally ends. I believe the journey to authentic love from the clutter of residual love begins with these simple questions. And we shall live, to learn its answers. And we shall love to earn the answers.  

She was serene, like a cool breeze,

and revealed herself to be the spirit of the moon.

She reflected the essence of the sun

through her light. 

She had no claims, and she owned nothing.

Yet, night and day belonged to her. 

She was the gentle reminder, 

that there is light even in darkness. 

She was the mirror, that revealed the sun,

and hers was the spark that ignited him. 

-Harishna

The Web of Life

The desert winds carry

the key ingredients of life.

The oceanic currents that bring warmth,

keeps us all alive.

In a web of connections,

in this web of life,

there are the chains that link us all,

to this planet, to our world, to our home.

Not all chains are shackles.

Not all chains are to be broken.

Some exist, just to hold us right,

hold us together, to keep us in place.

The mighty of the oceans.

From the tiny plankton to the,

cheerful dolphins, warrior sharks,

and gentle whales.

Life thrives and balances itself

in the depths of the great blue desert.

There is the harmony that follows,

the melody of the many.

It's a beautiful world,

It's a wondrous world of blue.

In the great plains of Serengeti,

the Wildebeests roam free.

There again is a rhythm,

the rhythm of the rains,

of the desert winds,

and a million hoof beats,

that reminds slumbering seeds,

deep in Earths bosom,

that it's time to sprout, to arise.

In the dense forests,

under the canopy of mushroomed green,

life manifests in all its wonders.

Orchids bloom,

so the bees can fall in love.

And that love would carry the pollen grains

so that much more love would bloom.

And so goes the many miracles,

of this potent web of life,

where each string resonates,

as music for another to follow,

even from miles apart,

to dance as together,

as one life and as one planet.

-Harishna

 03/07/2021