The rains, Sylvia Plath...and more.

Pabda maach and a Bunuel flick. Not the best of combinations. But just the push I needed to raise myself from a Sunday afternoon stupor and actually do something.
I thought I could write. Now I realise, I can’t. Or maybe it’s the keyboard.
Ruskin Bond once wrote, that pencils are always a better option. At least you can chew on the ends when you’re thinking. You can’t chew on your keyboard.
I like Ruskin Bond. And I agree with him.

Last couple of days, it has been raining. Along with the muddy soles and tangled wet hair and sodden textbooks, the rains bring in that earthy smell. Brishtir gondho. Even when you’re indoors with the stereo volume hiked up so you can’t hear the pattering against the windowpanes, you’ll smell that smell. It always made me feel pleasantly lazy. And made me fall in love with the rains even more.
This time, that feeling dampened. Don’t know why or how. Maybe it’s the monotony of the college days. Or perhaps the prospect of a long dripping walk through Park Street. But I always enjoyed that. Did the rains change, or did I?

Sylvia Plath has been taking up quite some of my time in college. No, it’s not poetry. It’s “The Bell Jar”. A fascinating read. Fascinating enough to squeeze in a few hurried pages between classes or when the teacher turns towards the blackboard.
The book reminded me of “Taxi driver”. Funny, I know. What could such a captivating Scorsese flick have in common with a novel by Sylvia Plath? Most people who’ve seen the movie and read the book would say I’m barking. But somehow, as the story proceeded I could sense a bit of Travis Bickle in the protagonist, Esther.
The last line looks funny. Maybe, I am barking.

Dinner’s ready. I’ll end with this:

“…Laugh at the night,
at the day, at the moon,
laugh at the twisted
streets of the island,
laugh at this clumsy
boy who loves you,
but when I open
my eyes and close them,
when my steps go,
when my steps return,
deny me bread, air,
light, spring,
but never your laughter
for I would die.”
( From “The Captain’s Verses” by Pablo Neruda )