poem: Alone

disclaimer: 'I' referred to in the poem is not me.

Even when the world around
carry on their noisy chatter
I feel alone in the crowd that surround
my mind shuts out, my senses scatter.

while I speak well and always smile
to the faces I pass, all day I glance
my mind feels void all the while
amidst its purposeful happy stance.

To live in a world where I am loved
where happiness broods ,comforts choke
but no more free to speak out aloud
my mind is hidden beneath its locks

I am a stranger to my own thoughts
I dare not think for fear of sorrow
while around me , my life clots
where every day is like the morrow.

story:Waiting....

it was tuesday. he had told that he would be back on tuesday when she gave him a tearful farewell last week. had he told a lie to comfort her, to spare her the sorrow so that he could say goodbye while she smiled?...... no...she mustnt let these thoughts take hold of her...he was true to his word. even her father thinks so...so if he says he'll be back he WILL be back. she was leaning onto the window panes , her face pressed onto the glass , craning her neck to catch the first view of his smiling countenance when he came down the street , singing to himself.....and she would give him her best smile...he had always said that she had a beautiful smile.....her mother kept calling to her from the inner recesses of her home..but she was determined that she wouldnt budge till she caught sight of him....she stayed there reminiscing the sweet moments he had presented her with. it was sad that her father did not encourage her meeting him....he liked him but was wary about her meeting him on a regular basis...but thats how all fathers are made ,arent they?.....she heard a distant sound...the sound of a shuffle her ears were straining to hear...was it really him or was it her mind playing tricks on her.......her mother called yet again.... " i am coming..he is here"......he came straight to her house ,not noticing the waves and hails of her neighbours.....she knew she always came first and she liked it that way......her father came out...he gave a sigh...the candy man has come yet again....he liked him but did not like his child getting addicted on candy...nowadays she refuses to go to school every tuesday unless she gets her ration of candy......grudgingly he bought her her favourite brand of candy....when the vendor was about to go she, nibbling on her precious peice of candy but with tears peeking from her baby blue eyes, asked,"when will you come again?"....he smiled and said"next tuesday" .........and he left....she stared after him and came inside...her mind hardened for a wait till next tuesday.....

Book Review: The Final Theory

This book is an entertaining read for physics enthusiasts;still, the book is in such simple a language that even those who are not too deep into physics can appreciate it. It revolves around astrophysics but the terms used are elaborated for the sake of non physicists so that at no point the reader is at a loss . The story in a nutshell: Einstein ,during his last days was bent on finding a unified theory which would explain all electromagnetic and gravitational phenomena. But his followers believed that he passed away without getting hold of the theroy. the story begins when the protagonist gets a call from a detective asking him to go to a city hospital where his teacher at princeton (with whom he had published a paper on two dimensional representation of the universe) is admitted with fatal injuries. The teacher tells him that Einstein did get hold of the unified theory but was apprehensive of the consequences that would pursue if his theory was used for non- peaceful purposes. Therefore he did not publish his theory.But he did not destroy the theory as it was too beautiful. Instead he gave it to three of his students to safeguard. two of them were already murdered and the third one is in the hospital bed about to die. he trusts the hero with a password which is a set of numbers and asks him to save it from an unscrupulous gang that is after the theory. there begins the story. the hero sets out to find the theory but the police are after him because he is the only link they have in the murder and the gang is after him because they know his teacher had transferred the secret to him. but he himself has no idea what to do with the set of numbers he had. what follows is an enthralling story of adventure , horror and suspense with the scientific terms so dexterously interspersed with the story element that it never gives the impression of a physics journal. Infact astrophysics sets the stage for a suspense thriller, but the reader can appreciate both the science as well as the stroy with equal vigour.The story ends along the usual lines with the good winning over the bad forces still a lot of surprises are in store towards the end of the story.

Where to next??

Stepping into the threshold of my final year in college I wonder 'where to next'.... so many words seem to appear all at once but none are clear enough......CAT? GATE? GRE? and thanks to recession the fourth possibility of a JOB has shifted out of focus.....wherever it is ...it is going to be away from home and after all these years (20 lovable years) it seems real sad to go away and be away....having always been the much pampered baby at home ,having never had to live in a hostel , it is going to be very tough......so the only hope that remains is that wherever it is it will be a very good place and i get atleast one good friend so that the grief of separation is lessened .....
having had completed my education in three to four schools i have learned to be in all sorts of groups and i have loved each institution much better that the previous one ....but i have never been grief stricken at having to leave any even though it meant not seeing one's friends for a long time.....but college ......i have got attached to it more than any other ..and trivandrum is not a bad place after all .....looking back, college was fun the first year ,hell the first half of second year when i really planned going away, boring the later half of the second year, again superb the first half of third year and inseparable the latter half of third year.......more than the people it is the atmosphere there that i love , and whatever institution receives me next should have such an atmosphere ......atleast half as nice.......now is a time when you are supposed to decide where to head to next but your head is so clogged that you put it off until there is no time left ....... a lot of tests to attend and ofcourse some to prepare for and in the midst of all this have some quality fun because this may be the last best year you ve got .......so here again is a big bag of small worries ........ and all in the midst of a university exam that hasnt hit the right chord yet!

Poem: Weightless

I stared in fear at the dark gloom
the calm waters with their turbulent depths
and saw,staring back, a loser's face
beckoning from the menacing black

I take a plunge into the icy cold
and could feel thorns on my flesh
but i go deep, down and down
weighted by my guilt

I reach the bottom, the end, and
laying down my weights i move up
now my sorrows lie buried in the secretive depths
while i float high above
on the peripheral calm, weightless, free!

Favourites

My favourite lines of poetry.....


i dont know what this is called or who wrote it....it is about someone who was exiled to a remote island and his frustrations at the isolation and abandonment all around him...

I am monarch of all i survey
my right there is none to dispute
from the centre ,all around the sea
i am the king of the foul and the brute

and now comes the best lines
"oh solitude! where are the charms
that the sages had seen in thy face
better dwell in the midst of alarms
than reign in this horrible place"

given the context of the poem these lines are quite fitting and true.

some lines from the light of other days by thomas moore

context: someone who had turned old lamenting at the loss of his cheerful boyhood years and "the eyes that shone now dimmed and gone"...ie.the friends he had lost

when i remember all
my friends so linked together
i ve seen around me fall
like leaves in wintry weather

i feel like one who tread alone
some banquet hall deserted
whose lights have fled
whose garlands dead
and none but he departed.....

touching in the context of having to leave your friends.

now something simple yet good

i guess this is by wordworth

"'tis my faith that every flower
enjoys the air it breathes"

shows the beauty of life

and now a malayalam poem....
this poem seems like a narration by a woman who is about to marry but reading deeper we see that it infact speaks about a persons appointment with death......

ente veli by g.shankarakurup

"kaalamen shirasinkal aniyikkyayaai mulla maala
bhaalathil chaarthi kazhinju varakkuri"
although it seems like a bride getting ready infact it means that time has adorned my hair with white flowers(meaning greying of hair at oldage) and has brought in wrinkles in my forehead.

most of these i came across at school but it is now that i appreciate their beauty more.

The TRANSPORTATION Problem

A day in the life of a CETian

may 12 2009,

rise and shine ....my day begins..... the day goes wonderfully well until i plan to go to college...since it is study leave time the college buses plying my route are cancelled so i should 1.opt for public transport or 2.decide not to go to college....since i cant rest without prowling around the college today i chosse,though grudgingly , option 1. i set out with a heavy heart towards the bus stop....since i have lately turned into an optimist, i beleive that a decent kulathoor bus( decent in the sense it doesnt have limbs and heads of people sticking out of every possible opening).....

At the bus stop....
for the first half an hour i do not pay any attention to other buses as i am sure that my bus would come......15 minutes later i doubt my beleif and decide i would get into a kulathoor bus even if it is crowded....still 15 minutes later even the crowded bus seems a distant hope and leaving my optimism at my feet i decide to board the next bus....
the next bus is ,incidentally, a very crowded one but to keep my word i get on and brace myself for the ride....after a short distance but a very long ride we reach ulloor and i get down ...phase 1 of my journey successfully completed...
ulloor is a place which receives 50 percent of the suns rays on a global scale and having fortunately worn black i selfishly absorb all of it ....after another 15 minutes i am half cooked and turn golden brown ;and still no sign of the kulathoor bus i get on board an attingal bus....again the entire world seems to be headed for my destination...i wedge myself into what looks like a void....either due to my height or due to my passive wooden expression, people usually mistake me for a rod and by the time the bus reaches chavadimukku i have several women clinging on to me for dear life....i detach myself from them and squeeze out .....after safely landing on solid earth i turn back and wonder ..where was the space i came from?...the bus resumes its journey like a container containing a large compressible fluid.... phase 2 successfully completed!

now the walk begins...
since i detest carrying an umbrella the sun again bears me faithful company and after 5 minutes of walking a fully cooked me mount the college stairs and head to the class...

and then to hours of soldering a mini project that eventually did not work......skipped lunch didnt get time to have tea and then fortunately got a bus that took me home ....
good day
good day...