The Parable of Food
There once was a little fish that swam happily in the sea. One day the little fish met a bigger fish. And the Big Fish said to the Little Fish:…
Musings
“Here Comes the Sun”
For glad spring has began,And to the ardent sunThe earth, long time so bleak,Turns a frost bitten cheek. – Celia Thaxter, American poet (1835-94) From Frank Sinatra to the Beatles,…
A Tuneful Irish Tale
“Accomplished fingers begin to play.Their eyes mid many wrinkles, their eyes,Their ancient, glittering eyes, are gay.”– W. B. Yeats, Lapus Lazuli The old man in the Irish cap sat on a…
Beyond the white house walls: A story of courage, conviction and unrelenting pursuit for justice
As I stood before the iconic White House in 2010, during the presidency of Barack Obama, I felt a mix of emotions. The weight of history, the power of the…
Modern Times and Ancient Truths
Eighty-nine years ago this month, the film Modern Times, starring Charlie Chaplin, was released. Considered one of the greatest movies ever, it was a comedic but savage critique of industrial capitalism…
“Father, forgive them for they know not what they do”
Spoken by a fellow in a time when tolerance and trust, faith in the essential goodness of human beings, belief in turn-the-other-cheek stoicism, all were still possible. It was innovative…
Are the Dead Nostalgic?
I was asking this question recently when the nightmare of the Israeli genocide of Palestinians greatly disturbed my reflections and took me in another writerly direction. Now I wish to…
Late Stage imperium: Darkness visible “I can’t go on…I’ll go on”
When I contemplate what the future holds, I see a darkness visible. An inferno of tragic fuckwit inflicted by the ambulatory head wounds known as the political and financial elite.…
Aging Gracefully
Two women whom I have seen so far to have aged gracefully are my Amma (mother) and Zeenat Aman. These ladies do not have much in common; they belonged on…
Musings: “Dear Self, Never focus on the Negatives”
Some thoughts on self-love and self-care I live a rich life. In no way do l mean having accumulated vast wealth or material possessions. It means that after living “a…
It’s 2025 – And So Sudden
This brief essay is a personal reflection by the author on reaching the year 2025, coloured by nostalgia for the 20th century and a mild disappointment about the recent decades,…
Happy Another Chance
Indeed 2024 has been full of cruelty, injustice and suffering. But it has also been full of courage in the face insurmountable odds, refusal to despair, faith in our Creator…
The Christmas Lesson
Funny how so many ‘ so called’ Christians kneel and perform such pomp and circumstance every December 25th. All the beautiful Christmas decorations and wonderful seasonal songs are in fitting…
Was it Jesus Walking Upstairs?
The year was 2004. I was teaching Special Education at a parochial school in Washington DC. I co taught students with mild learning disabilities in grades 5-8. The post 9/11…
An Open Letter to a Half-Jewish Friend
You are always relentlessly pointing out when Jews are being harmed, murdered or denigrated by others. Perhaps you view that as a reason for their being self-protective and needing a…
Beauty in Destruction (The Glass Tea Cup, lesson on sustainability)
A few years ago, I got a FedEx delivery the day before Mother’s Day from Cambridge, Massachusetts. I remember the package for two reasons. It was an overnight Express delivery…
Making our dictionaries meaningful again
This is a story from over two decades ago when a passionate environmentalist friend from New Zealand, who lived as I also did in the northern Thai town of Chiang…
Echoes of Resistance: Music and Poetry in the face of tyranny
Music and poetry have long been part of dissent, a tool of resistance, and an art form to express concerns, jubilation, remembrance, and heartbreaks. They are worthy forms of summation…
Anecdote, History and Kashmir
An anecdote is a concise, frequently personal narrative that communicates a certain point or idea. Anecdotes are frequently used to shed light on a person, location, or occasion and can…
Musings: Autumn, Nature, and Self-introspections
Autumn (fall season, from September 22 to early November) can be a metaphor for transformation that takes place in nature as well as in our personal lives. Autumn is a…
If Good-Hearted Aliens Ever Come to Earth, They will be Shocked Out of their Wits by the Injustices and Distortions They See
There has been much creative imagination regarding what kind of inter-actions human beings are likely to have with any aliens from outer space if they ever actually come to earth.…
Me And My Bicycle – A Narrative: Part II (2000 – 2024)
This is a two part narrative account of my experience with bicycle for 55 years. My bicycle experience can be divided into three historical periods: 1.1956 -2000; 2. 2000- 2017;…
Me And My Bicycle – A Narrative: Part I (1956 – 2000)
This is a two part narrative account of my experience with bicycle for 55 years. My bicycle experience can be divided into three historical periods: 1.1956 -2000; 2. 2000- 2017;…
Caged in Oligarchic Contradictions
A contronym is a word having two definitions that contradict each other. Two examples are the word bolt, which can mean to lock with a bolt and to flee, and…
The Empire Owns Us
In today's America there is no need for a contract for millions of my fellow working stiffs. With many states like mine ( Florida) having 'Right to work laws', unions…
The Immense Hunger
Like all living creatures, people need to eat to live. Some people, eaten from within by a demonic force, try to deny others this basic sustenance. All across the world…
LOYAL to the EARTH
If you choose loyalty, bypass being merely patriotic. Patriotism is a political tool used mostly by propagandists to stir emotions and further an oppositional agenda – an ideology. Loyalty is…
Sick, and Sick of It All
Sometimes it takes our bodies to return us to our souls. And our little pains to remind us of the indescribable pain of the savage killing and dismemberment of innocent…
The Unexpected
Despite calendars and clocks and all the mental gymnastics we use to control life and time, surprises are at the heart of existence. This may seem like a truism, but…
And I Feel Fine
Is it the end of the world if we blow it? For the first time in history humans have the power to communicate with just about everyone everywhere and look…
India at the Crossroads
Returning from India after visiting my elderly parents each winter, is always filled with mixed emotions; a confluence of feelings, that of regret for not being able to care for…
A Visit from Uncle Joe and Auntie Jill
A few days before Christmas Eve, the President and the First Lady travelled to a well-endowed children's hospital in Washington D.C. Their visit was in keeping with the long-standing White House tradition…
An Immense Hunger
Now that our revels are ended, the holiday celebrations and feasts, if one had them, just a dream melted into thin air, our hungers perhaps richly satiated temporarily or not,…
Solitude: A Source of Empowerment
Today was a quiet Sunday morning, I sat by the window sipping masala chai looking at the dew on the jasmine leaves spread across the backyard window, I noticed an…
Chance Encounters as the Walls Close In
“Apple Blossom – Blue Sky” by amandabhslater “A treasure stumbled upon, suddenly; not gradually accumulated, by adding one to one. The accumulation of learning, ‘adding to the sum-total of human knowledge’;…
Mumbai lost intellectual vitality of old days
Dr Ganesh Devy, linguist and scholar, is perhaps too optimistic about Mumbai playing a big role in making an intellectual contribution to the idea of civilisation. He made the plea…
When Christ cries and Anti-Christ laughs
I was born,brought up and got fermented as an apprentice rebel in the Roman Catholic Syro-Malabar Church in Kerala. Me and our village poet Josukuttan were ex communicated at the…
A Paean to the Past
I grew up in a country that thrived with diversity. I grew up in a country where we were taught to accept diversity of cultures, languages, religions as a normal…
Do People Change?
Because there is so much personal anguish, unhappiness, and human mental and physical suffering in the world, many people often wonder how they might personally change to find happiness, contentment,…
How the Personal Becomes Political
Looking into the long reflecting pool of the past, I find myself wondering what it was that made me an activist against injustice. I was born in New York City’s…
The Coca-Cola-ization of ‘God Bless America’
“Whoever controls the information, controls the imagination.” --George Orwell “Logic will get you from A to B. Imagination will take you everywhere.” --Albert Einstein “Imagine there’s no countries… It isn’t…
There Is No Escape From Telling
By the lake’s lapping shore above the town and the railroad tracks, my wife and I stopped and marveled, struck stone silent by two dazzling Baltimore Orioles, clawed together as…
Caught in the Draft ’73
One surmises that the volunteer military system devised after the Vietnam debacle erases what had transpired before. Perhaps we all need to revisit that terrible era, when phony US incursions…
Old habits die hard, hence another New Year wish
As a child, I would watch with trepidation-tinged excitement and fascination the conversation between one of my uncles and the long-haired, sickle-sword wielding “velichappaad” (oracle through whom a revered deity,…
Resisting the forces of fear
Turn, turn any corner Hear, you must hear what the people say You know that somethin' is goin' on around here It surely, surely, surely won't stand the light of…
Pluralism and acceptance – The senselessness of separation
“You don’t need religion to have morals. If you can’t determine right from wrong, then you lack empathy, not religion.” Anonymous This anonymous quote that I received as…
Where Have All the Colours Gone?
Long, long ago — a very clichéd way to start a narrative — but none the less, long ago, I remember there was a time when my grandfather would graft…
Nostalgic for the Future
Despite its pedigree as a fundamental element in civilization’s greatest stories, nostalgia has come to be associated with treacly sentimentality, defeatism, and spurious spiritual inclinations. Homer, Vergil, Dante, the Biblical…
Unshackle the youth to realize a Republic
If we were to imagine our journey towards the 73rd Republic Day as a long, tiring and sometimes treacherous trek through the Himalayas, then looking back we can be proud…
Wishing You All a Very Nutritious New Year!
It has taken my slow brain a long time to figure it out but finally, as 2021 comes to an end, I have found a sure shot way of bringing…
Potatoes & Chillies in the New Year
“Oddly enough, it (potato) was introduced to the Himalayas by two Irishmen, captain Young of Dehra and Mussoorie and captain Kennedy of Simla, in the 1820s. The slopes of Young’s…
Looking Back and ‘Looking Forward’ with John F. Kennedy
“The President’s been shot!” he shouted, clamoring his way down the stairs in the dorm. The upper-classman! I was making my way to the third floor, and he was…
The Banners of the King of Hell Advance
“Vexilla regis prodeunt Inferni” – Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy: The Inferno Try to look ahead and see if you can see what’s been coming for decades. Try to climb higher…
Decolonizing Minds, Including My Own, About U.S. Capitalist State Settler Colonialism
Where so many mainstream writers miss the mark is that whereas dispossession was a zero-sum game, these would-be settlers, mostly peasants, were fleeing feudalism at home. “The discovery of gold…
The End of the Speed Limit on the Highway to Nowhere
There was a time when time was time and space and speed had some human meaning, for people lived within the limits of the natural world of which they were…
Indore: A Memoir
A memoir is a sort of autobiography. You record only those things that have affected you. You don’t do any research for it, except occasionally to check a date or…
The Houses of Dead and Crooked Souls
“A house constitutes a body of images that give mankind proofs or illusions of stability.” – Gaston Bachelard, The Poetics of Space There is a vast and growing gulf between the…
Drinking Coffee in the Early Morning Rain and Thinking of Donald Rumsfeld
It’s been raining incessantly for three days. It is a cool early morning in the beginning of July and I have just made a cup of coffee. Now an electrical…
A BACK to the FUTURE DIALECTIC
I wish to write a little on a couple of terms, one of which, Ground or Grounding Dimension, I learned from an essay by Larry Dossey, and the other, Floating…
We, the People, the Humanity and Our Entangled Future in Global COVID-19 Pandemic
“He who does not bellow the truth when he knows the truth makes himself the accomplice of liars and forgers.” CHARLES PEGUY - French Author (1873-1914). Looking Beyond the Erroneous…
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