Don ' t Take Life Too Seriously , You Have Just One !

BY R.K.MISRA

Strange things  happen when you’ve gone too far, been up too long, worked too hard and you’re separated from the rest of the world.

These words are not mine but a weird  filial  relationship developed with them as I sat in the New Jersey home of my daughter mid this year. Last year , a nerve wrecking 2017 had turned me , a journalist based in the Western India state of Gujarat, into a cross between a hot dog and a cold cucumber roasting on a Teflon’ tava’. Gujarat, the Indian Prime Minister’s home state was up for grabs(elections) and politicians of  varied political hues were targeting voters with a rare anatomical aggression. No part of the body was safe. They would touch toes, lick feet, appeal to the heart, fool the head and even kiss the  arse. Post-poll, the order stood reversed. All along their face remained the only constant !

But this is not about them . It is about me and myself. A journo  clothed in the hustle and bustle of Indian politics, the break came as ‘me time’. Quarantined  from India, the world opened up. Distance brooks neither direction nor discomfort when you confront yourself starkers. What is life all about? Is it just chasing opaque politics and putrid politicians or is there something more to it. What happened to ‘Leisure’ lessons learnt in school  when William Henry Davies  sought out your class teacher to tell you…”What is this life if full of care, We have no time to stand and stare, No time to stand beneath the boughs And stare as long as sheep and cows”…and going on to end….”A poor life, this if full of care, We have no time to stand and stare “. Or my childhood favourite, Walter De La Mare dwelling upon words as ‘Antiques’-“Those quaint old worn out words! Fashions in miniature: Pious, amiable, reserved, serene, Modest, sedate, demure! Mental poke-bonnets- and no less effete, Why, even their meaning now are obsolete “.

Those were times when questions searched answers. Now questions are answered with questions. Therefore one question leads to another. Do we  take our selves too seriously, most of us, Indians in India ?

Watching the average american in America, even the indian there, an emotive envy grips the  being. The same lot of people from Jhumri Talaiya to Jersey  but what a transformation. They work their butt out five days a week and let their hair down for the remainder…not a care weighing them down…

The matter of saying apart, troubles do torment but it is the way we carry it that matters.. Heavy weights sink, feather weights soar. Same goes for the fine art of writing. Quaint and Quirky(QnQ) is my ode to the spirit of the ancient mariner and to the Willian Henry Davies and the Walter De La Mare s of the world…

And to me too, an object lesson, to write without a care in the world…

About the pebble in my path and the stone that stops my stride,

the world that laughs at me and the guffaws that puff my pride.

Of the guy in yonder village whom time nor tide did touch,

for he scattered joys aplenty and cared for all so much.

 I have things to say that bridge, man to man divides,

of the mullah smoking pot and the pandit with four wives

And the soldier who won all battles and lost the pouch below

To the leader with a flat bottom and not a grain ne’er the top to show

Of loves that came a calling but flattered to deceive

Of wives who bore the brunt but seldom sat to grieve

Of men who sermonized, pontificating at will

Their hands sullen and dirty, groping in the till

what’s so right and very wrong said the voice so stout and shrill

until me too got the better and the emperor lost his skill

Pen-is might, the sword too slight ruled men of letters, so upright

The ants got wise, rode up the divide and the pants fell down chasing scabbardly delights

The tales don’t end for there is lots to write, words to carve, sentences to slice,

Emotions to hang, meanings to bang, shadows to chase and hurts to erase…..

So folks, all ends mark a beginning. And so I end to begin…...

Happy readings !

…Write, for I must, read, if you may !