O Kafka My Kafka

O Kafka My Kafka! thy prophecy has been done,
The world has fallen to the dogs, they stole away our sun,
The end is near, the signs i hear, the masses all still sleeping,
While we become the fools in debt, your words are ice, unbending:
But O heart! heart! heart!
O the numbness, toil and strife
Where on these pages my Kafka writes
Still killing me to life

This is my homage to the writer. Heavily inspired by (only a few changes to) the poem "O Captain My Captain" by Walt Whitman. See the poem at www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15754

I had only heard of Kafka before we had his novel "The Trial" in our MA course. I did not attend much of the lectures then but I read it and little did I know then how much impact it would have on me. The novel was harrowingly bleak, disturbing at times and very disjointed (he had not finished the novel before he died) and the protagonist, Josef K (now you know the inspiration behind my moniker: the surname K has been used by many other authors as well) resonated with me deeply. Here was a man who led a sheltered bourgeois life before he was arrested one day accused of a crime of which he didn't know he commited. The matter-of-fact narration, the suffocating landscapes and the weirdness of it all left me completely bewildered, but nevertheless divinely purged after I finished it.

Then I read his other stories: "The Metamorphosis" coming first to mind. I will not budge when I say that this is the MOST PERFECT story ever written. There are so many layers, so horrific yet so beautiful. It is one of the few times when I can say that I emerged a different person after reading it. I had moments of epiphany, glorious and yet so brutally true. I can read it again and again, and it will speak to me in ways i will never comprehend before. This is art at its best. There is no moment of stasis: it leaves you in a state of chaotic whirlpool of emotions leaving a catharsis at the end, but always thirsting for more. This is what Franz Kafka does for me. He is THE genius of the 20th Century (many great writers agree with me :D). His alienation, awareness of his mortality, his doubt in his abilities, his impulsion to write without regards for the consequences, his terminally un-Jewish Jewishness: all of it is so real. Yet his life was not a bed of roses: he lived and died hard. Would i have taken a Kafka afterworld if offered to me? My heart says yes, my head says no. Maybe its better to be cocooned in our superficial existence. Or maybe not; I'll never know.

When i joined Mizoram University last year for my M.Phil I looked at the new course syllabus for MA and found that they had offered a course on European writings (Kafka, Camus, Grass et al) as an optional paper for 3rd or 4th Sem students. Like a kid buying a new toy I eagerly asked the head if they were teaching the course (I was willing to sit in every class just for the joy of the experience) but I was disappointed to find out that due to teacher shortage and other reasons, they were only doing Pop Fiction from that paper. I have deep respect for pop culture and I do not mean to degrade the course but given a choice between studying Kafka and Camus or a Mills & Boon novel and Barbara Cartland... (you know where I'm getting at). I find it sad that MA students will not have a choice to opt for the paper even if they want to (whether any of them will want to is another matter) but I sincerely hope that they will put the course up for study sooner rather than later. And when they do, I will be there (provided they allow me to sit) to revisit those very moments of humanity.

a beautiful smile

the freedom of being locked inside
all the space within to hide
stone and steel is all i feel
these scribbled words tell my truth
for my world is just a square
pick me a flower from out there

a beautiful smile
i can see a beaten man with a beautiful smile

the days pass with regret
the nights with vows unkept
heaven knows its all too real
i would cry if i could feel
as i breathe one last hopeless sigh
the hourglass stands as time pass by

a beautiful smile
i can see a beaten man with a beautiful smile

i will let my last words pass
to shelter my outside mask
but i can see at the end of the mile
a beaten man with a beautiful smile

Author's note: This was written in 2002 (i think) as lyrics to a song i wrote. A certain band whose members are now a part of Them Clones recorded it, much to my dissatisfaction with the outcome. The tune was too peppy for a supposed sad song (a twist beat ala the one in "That Thing You Do" so you can imagine). I have never been able to rewrite the music to my liking, so I have kept this lying about unused, unknown. Even though I know this is far from my best, i have always had a deep connection to it somehow.

I want the reader to know that I purposely do not label my verses "poetry" and will refer to them as lyrics or verses.

when i have kids

"My father still reads the dictionary every day. He says your life depends on your power to master words" - Arthur Scargill

The force and the certainty of this statement is very provoking to me. Even though I am no expert in structural linguistics nor do I claim to have any sort of mastery over words, I hold a firm belief in the cliche that language is what makes us "human" and i mean human in every sense of the word. Language carries with it not only grammar and usage but all the cultural peculiarities, the slippages and silences, and hence what one CAN feel is conditioned by language (which includes signs, of course). My bilingualism (i will not count my superficial knowledge of hindi and japanese) has made me occupy a space that can be located at any point in and between my two languages (i will not get further into the varieties of Mizo and English). Homi Bhabha's notion of 'hybridity' comes to mind. I guess this answers many basic questions about the identity of the postcolonial subject. This hybridity can be dangerous for a rapidly changing society like mine because one can privilege a language (and thereby the cultural connotations) over another. The globalized world and the power machinery in function is slowly but surely erasing the markers of language/culture. It seems we are headed towards a certain juncture in our history and there is little we can do to change it. But I am digressing; this is a topic for another day.

If people ask me whether I regretted anything in my life at this point of time I would probably say that I regret not knowing atleast 5 languages. By this I mean I should have been exposed to different languages while growing up. My native language Mizo is not rich in vocabulary, but the tonal qualities and the rich rhythms contain certain feelings that defy any easy English interpretation. English functions as the more convenient language to "think" in: due to its lexical flexibility. That does not mean I feel in Mizo and think in English. I move between the two depending upon my situation and context.

Which brings me to my current predicament. Since most philosophy is either originally in French or German, reading their translations in English becomes very problematic. There are times when I would be stuck in a few pages for days because I cannot comprehend what these weirdos were trying to say. If i had a good command over those languages and read them in their original texts, maybe I could "get" them much more. Maybe philosophy is indeed more suited to German than English. I meant to say that my life would make so much more meaning if i can discuss Heidegger and Derrida without blinking because for me these people have made so much more significant strides towards transcending their mortality, which is the main aim of our existence. I can never transcend my situation, my middle-class upbringing, my beliefs.

It is precisely due to this that i cannot move beyond what i am. i am of the firm conviction that you teach children properly in school or don't teach them at all. I can only hope i give my children (if i have them) this opportunity, one which i did not have, to explore the world by giving them access to many languages.

looking in the mirror

if you ask me who or what type of person i am or if i were to describe myself i would ask YOU that question myself. to my parents i will always be that good but rather spoiled little boy; to those that do not know me very well i could be the proud s.o.b or the shy guy. to my old classmates, the effiminate one; to the "vai" i beat up to a pulp one night, the "jungli" chinky; to my juniors in college, the genius/bookworm or to the girl i prematurely ended a relationship with abruptly, the womanizing man-whore. those and many more. i won't deny any of the labels one bit. i guess i would not have any identity without having others relate to me the way they perceive. that, i guess is fair.

but i do have a problem with compartmentalization. i believe that all social identities are performative, whether one plays the "dumb blonde" or "the slightly-unsociable-but-writes-poetry-and-likes-indie music-so-is-better-than-you" character. i guess in that sense i have a post-structuralist view on life. people do not intimidate you once you contextualize their roles. this has helped me "get along" with different people. i think it is possible and dangerous to "other" oneself too much as much as "othering" puts people in binaries which is the root cause of all the hate in the world and yadda yadda.

however, i do not wish to insinuate that i am some transient flowing of empty signifiers, totally characterless. i have chosen my roles, which are neither absolute nor fixed. but nevertheless serves to communicate in any given society. i do find pleasure in a lot of things, big and small.

i have never really been a bookworm. i admit that i should have read a lot more books but i guess i like reading "life" more. i guess "natural" semiotics should have been my forte. it is tempting to tell you that i have the poet's sensitive soul but sensitive it might be, but poetic it ain't. i can never write good poetry to save my life, and i admire the people who can.

I love music. Give me good music any time (except for the death-metal types. sorry but what's the point of a song if you can't comprehend the words?). I can vividly recall as a child my dad teaching me songs like "The Boxer" "I Am I Said" and all those 50s-60s stuff. I found that my teenage years prefigured what would eventually be my preferred choice of music: alternative. I could stay up all night to discuss the lyrics of my numero-uno band Manic Street Preachers,and their ilk. If you abandon me on a desert give me a Stevie Wonder "Songs In The Key of Life" track list on my ipod and i'm happy. i'm in a band (hypothetical, till now) with my friends. whenever we can find the time, we compose and jam. and no you will not see us on demand channel EVER. we are not good enough. it is a purely personal endeavour: to let out the creative juices.

i love football and basketball. i guess that is where we men channel our primitive competitive urges nowadays. my club: Arsenal. My basketball idol was not Michael Jordan (although he was the best) but the frail Reggie Miller (i have a thing for underdogs). Now i don't watch too much NBA as i used to, but i keep tabs whenever i can. Now the game i most often play is Mafia Wars on facebook (yes i have noticed the gradual devolution of my existence thank you very much) :D

and food! i love food. food makes me happy. food is good. i can eat anything except idli and uisa (never have, never will). i have periodic cravings for ice cream, kulfi and sugarcane juice. if a way to a man's heart is his stomach, then those mentioned would reel me in hook, line and sinker.

there is still so much to say... i hope that i have the energy to not abandon this project anytime soon.

cheers!

a few notes of caution

the first blog i kept, i used as a personal diary to substitute for those heavy bounded sheets of paper some call books. obviously people were unaware (thank God) and i preferred it that way because exposing your deepest thoughts to an anonymous stranger who happened to stumble upon it did no favours to my insecurities.

now as a somewhat more mature person i resigned myself to the matter that opinions or thoughts do not transcend my being unless there is an outlet; a witness to my incessant need to quantify my thoughts. so here is my new blog; and in these fleeting times, even if there is just one who is ever so kind to have a glance at the inane ramblings of a narcissist, then I am truly humbled.

i make no promises of pleasing everyone through my writings; and whatever i have stolen i will take care to acknowledge them. if anything else resembles others' opinions and writings then let it be known that it is purely coincidental. i am not THAT well-read.

cheers to all!

a recycled beginning

had a blog way back then but did not touch it for years; so i'm starting anew. hopefully this will help re-ignite my passion for intermittent purgation.