DAYS IN COUNTRY

morning in the hills. Lying still in repose for a bit longer is an option, but one would miss out on markings of pre-history. Dawn, inspiring Sun, a call to Adventure, exhausting Walks, that probability of discovering something unheard.  

GREETING A NEW SEASON

Spring has still not erased its imprints. The successor could have waited for another fortnight. And yet forcing her way into the drylands and dense habitations is Summer of 2018. Two days back the zone heat was 38*C, typically a mid-april show, but now a curtain raiser to some blistering months ahead. It may be a popular name in the western culture, synonymous with warmth, joy and happiness; but no one born in south Asia gets named SUMMER !

AMARYLLIS in the garden pot.

ANCIENT INDIAN RIDDLE

Harappan / Indus Valley Civilization's historians love to speculate all the time - Who inhabited those early cities ? What were the people like and what trades did they practise ? Ancient India continues to live within the contemporary one. For proof that the sub-continent has preserved its traditions through past millenniums, witness the two images (TV grabs) the one above from Karnataka hills and one below from Sri Lanka. Cooking some food  comfortably and by preference in vessels made of clay, as folks did 2,000 to 3,000 years ago and much earlier; they illustrate how POTTERS and POTTERY were central to the HARAPPAN Civilisation. So yes, Potters too lived in those settlements.

GAYATRI DECONSTRUCTS

"Gayatri Spivak is an academic superstar" - reminds Kuntala Lahiri Dutt. Derrida's translator Spivak was back home from Columbia, where she teaches, and decided to lecture a bit. To a full house in attendance Spivak spoke on the impossibility and yet immediacy of the task of translation. Notice the deference she evokes among her followers.

MAYA AT HER ANNUAL FIESTA

Legend has it that its goddess Maya (Maia) who bestows spring upon earth. Within that small span between winter and oh so warm summer every growth in soil sparkles with colour and the spirit of rejuvenation infects beasts, avians, humans alike. Poet writes, Youth sings, Composer discovers inspiration. Celebrate life while you still have the spirit, is the sentiment. 

INDIA ART FAIR 2018

Winter slipping away and spring just in, the annual festival of Art - IAF opened its doors to the art-lover. It was a generous assembly and from classic to contemporary, fairly representative too.  Vaikuntham's traditional India portrayed in deep colours and with their identity markings seemed to occupy every other gallery's walls. Dippy Menon's heroine announcing her freedom from bondage here.

VAIKUNTHAM at ART FAIR

FIRST BLOOMS OF SEASON.

somedays there are guests that show up like long-awaited news. And there're ones that home in and set you to wonder. The guy holding a travel bag at door who seems delighted to have located you, was erased from memory and album till this moment of renegotiation. Your response decides whether you're willing to journey back in time or are forever in the present. (In the image, a guest that was awaited).

APPA DEEPO BHAVA (Be Your Own Light)

Focus on the lamp's wick
as you light it,  let it light other ones
ruminate on your action, reflect
stay true stay right


find a patch of grass
lie flat upon it, all fours
look up and immerse
as your being shrinks
and gradually disappears

it was brief
it was fleeting
this journey we made
together, but for that span
what a life it was !