Ladakh

Through a gaping break in the wall, the crackling wind gives a low whistling call.

“Clean and cold in summer we blow; a mystic vision we shall endow.”

Beyond lies a desert cold, a massive massif to behold.

“Cross the daunting mount over ahead, on the rocky bed come tread”

The land beyond is brown and gray. Animals not on this land foray?
“Leave the treacherous pass son, come. To the beauty come succumb.”
Not a lone soul I see, no hut, no patch or a single tree!
“Behind the wall you stand blind, across a miracle you shall find.”

In a heady dream I cross, and let the beauty me engross.

 Snow has the mountains capped. In a slow wind the black tunic flapped.
The land beyond is pristine. Such vast clarity I have never seen.
In the valley a river gleams, scattering light as the sun beams.
Flowers flourish in the valley unplucked. A fresh breath my lungs sucked.

Feeding goats spots a fur-tail. Aghast! Down the hill it flashes past.
Struggling goes down a big mass, silently dragged into a crevasse.
A lone raptor makes a mating crow. The voices across the valley grow.
Another loner comes by in a glance, across the sky they fly, in a mating dance.

With gloves on my clammy hands, I cut across the mountain lands.
Dry smoke comes across to me in wisps; I taste cooked meat on my lips.

I thank them for the mutton they share, and eat it with an amazed stare.
The big landmass I see is the most pious prayer for me.

A Very Grey Matter

Your Brain is a complex living organism, my friend. The sooner you realize this, the better. It may lie, quietly in your head, trying to take you mind away from it, but believe me, it is thinking! It is plotting, making plans for itself, without you knowing!
It is a seasoned spy, your Brain. Don’t fool yourself into believing that you can read this article without it knowing. It traces all your steps, letter by letter! As you raed tish setnece, it is arleady triyng to con-fuse you! (It shall not play the trick again, don’t worry. The trick stops the moment you find out.)

Now pay ATTENTION! Try reading this with your eyes closed. Let not the Brain find out what is now to be revealed. Try not reading this aloud either, may it hear what I am about to tell you…
Ready?
Good!

YOUR BRAIN, my friend, IS A CONFIDENCE TRICKSTER! Think of the people who jump of buildings, bridges, cliffs and ships! The ruddy swindler tricks them! It convinces limbed animals that flight is their second nature! It shall mumble secretively in your ears, ‘the swine flu, so can you’.
 Others are duped into believing that the Davy Jones’ Locker is second in command when paddling from Mumbai to Madagascar!

Your Brain is also the cause of a billion troubles and troubled bullions! Let me reinforce my idea with an example. Ever heard of Mr. Henpecked Husband? The docile urbane fellow? Well in case you haven’t, let me introduce him. He is the fella, who ran for his life when a fat foul banty (of the domestic variety) threatened to dismember him. Could you blame him for chickening out?
You must be wondering, why we speak of him in the middle of this revelatory parlance. Well, we do so to reveal the Brain’s nefarious hand behind this altercatory episode. The roots of the squabble between Mr. Henpecked and the Domestic Foul lie in Mr. Henpecked’s cranium. He carried with him, his nemesis, a Pea Brain; and the hen loved peas. Pecking it out of his cranium would have resolved all issues, but the Brain convinced Mr. Henpecked otherwise, and the troubles began!
I spoke of troubled bullions earlier. ‘What relations does a Brain have with money?’ you would ask me. Let me tell you, the quandary monetary perplexities ending in beggared dispositions are all the Brain’s handiwork! Mr. Henpecked’s example comes in handy here as well.
 While avoiding the pecking and running about, Herr Henpecked’s attitude did not go down too well with his spouse. She sewed him up, dragged him to court and then sued him. The poor chap lost all his gold bullions in alimony and so it goes.

Some individuals inquire about the Virgins

It is in the nature of the Brain to dupe, but even the most dishonourable cheats, will shy away from the Brain! It is a mental! Last I heard it was seen convincing a bunch of guys that going armed, into the biggest hotel in one of the biggest cities in the world in a small boat, high on Lysergic acid diethylamide was the best way to spend a peaceful afternoon. Furthermore, to top it all, it also convinced the bunch that any casualty of this highly entertaining episode was to anyway be greeted by 72 Virgins. ‘What more can one ask?’ the bunch of loons said and departed. (I also hear that the loony goons went ahead with the plan and one of them was caught alive. The virgins never came for him. He was underage; that might have been the reason. The virgin did not want any legal trouble now, did they?)

Many have been fallen for these cheep tricks my friends. Why do you think the mummies kept their brain out of their bodies! Do not let the brain ruin you. Constant Vigilance is the call! Listen to the appeal of the brainless!! Beware! Beware!!

Puddle-River

It was mid-day. The heat was scorching. The moon was shimmering in the dark ripples of the lake. Mirages formed on the road to the lake. The heat waves blurred the road, as the winds rising from the frozen lake formed icicles on the nose. Sweat dribbled down the icicles, forming a puddle in the ground. The immense puddle of clear liquid, acquired a life of its own as it flowed into the lake. Mudskippers formed a colony on the dry sandy banks of the puddle-river. As the river flowed upstream, forests emerged from behind the clearing in the grass. The grass, thick, high and elephantine, grew on the tracks the elephants had formed. The mice moved among the grass, scampering and trampling. They flattened enormous patches of grass as they moved towards the bush in the forest, behind the clearing.

The clearing in itself was not very clear to the naked eye. It was very green, with numerous small trees jutting out of the bare ground covered in weeds. It was clear to the birds though (Their eyes, covered with a nictitating membrane, were not naked.).

The forest started where the weeds extended into the forest floor. The puddle-river meandered through the forests, depositing silt on the banks and creating high mountains. The mountains were a chain of fertile plains. Mountain goats prowled the plains, ever growling and hardly cussing. They cussed more and growled hardly, if the truth was to be told. Truth, although, did hardly ever heed anyone; he was not a person who like being told. So, the goats growled and cussed.

Three men had come down to fish in the river. It was a well-known fact where they had come down from, but sadly no one lived by the river to know the fact well.
Fishing in the puddle-river was not easy. The water was perspiratoryly saline. Most fishes did not care for such water. Those fishes that did, behaved like fish out of water, in the river.

When the puddle-river entered the lake, the view was orgasmic. Many a breath taken tourist had driven home asthmatic from the scene.

The meeting of the river and the lake, said an Old Timer, signified intense passion. Such passion can’t be described.
An old timer’s call should be respected.

THE END

The Cubicle

It is a cubicle. They have placed me in the centre, exposed to scrutiny. Not that there is much to scrutinize, other than my unimpressive computer screen. The screen shall be peered upon, checked for irregularities. Not that it is to be regulated, not that there is a regulator. The jobless overworked specimens, burning with jealous agony, gawk at my bland underworked screen.
The cubicle, if ‘carefully glanced’ at, shall open itself to you. Don’t misunderstand me, it holds no profound secrets. The fact is, with just two walls, my cubicle is hardly a cube. It is as open as a cube can be. It offers no protection as I sit facing it, my back open to the unknown!

This is no anxious, terror driven, piece, heh heh, Nah! No monster out of my dream is this cubicle! I would place a temporary niggle, a disturbing draft and the cubicle in the same set. Like any niggle or a draft, you would want the cubicle to go away, or moreover ‘become a cube’!
It had to be molded into a cube! There are not many ways two walls can form a cube! (In addition I was not sure whether the authorities would have been very pleased with my idea of uprooting walls from other cubicles and adding it into mine. So, I sat down to think.)

I think better with some music on at times, so I put on my headphones.
Some guy humming into your ears is not the most soothing incident, even under the most abnormal circumstances, but headphones, man! Magical things these are! Never would I have let any guy anywhere near my ears!
As I tuned in, I discovered, FIRE and invented a WHEEL (tubular air filled rubber structure)! Well? I Keed! I discovered new ways to make cubes. It involves a headphone and a piece of good musical work.

If you have Tailored your mind to like Swifts and the kind, read no further, go fornicate thyself in a corner Young Sir!

So yeah, I figured that cubicular problems of mine had solution in music. Music formed an intangible cover, an amoeboid layer, (like the protection layers around hot aunts, overtly hairy men and retarded kids taking a bath in Lifebuoy advertisements, with a dog or two sometimes thrown in,) but just a little more thicker and cubish.
Now I sit safe! Music is my savior! Hail Music! Hail Storms! Peace Out!