Will it someday ?

If the mind decides, will the heart at some point learn to obey ?

God is so nebulously fragile ...

When the realistion of the fragility of human existence and of all the people around you hit you, you are humbled to a point of such intense beauty, simplicity, vulnerability and love and there is an aching need in you to wipe out every tear and pain... God is so close emotionally, it is amazing we don't see it all the time...

                                               ---------------------------------------

We grow in beauty by acceptance not in rejection.

The Goddess you fail to see ...

 3 women ...
 9 days ...

 Are you drowning in that fiery woman ?
 The one who is so powerful that you are left breathless...
 Bold and assertive,
 Sexy and demanding...
 Confident and supreme ...
 Shakti...
 Pulsing, throbbing energy
 with absolutely no apology...
or mercy ...

 Or are you chasing the auspicious,
 the gentle one that makes thing worthwhile,
 the one who ushers in goodness,
 the nurturer,
 the inspirer who propels you to adore her ?
 the one who makes you rich...
 with her presence...

 Or is she overwhelming you with her knowledge,
 her deeply intuitive intelligence,
 her play with all things fine,
 raising your vision by
 the creative fire in you that she stokes...

 Have you adored her today ?
 Drowned and overwhelmed
 and drunk in her energy...
 until satiated you lie in her arms
 and in her eyes see that she was always all three
 and a thousand more...

 Which woman did you see these nine nights in her ?
 Or did you see all of them in your woman tonight ?

                                  - Srividya Srinivasan

[This was written during the navrathri time. For me navathri is all about the men and the woman or women they see around them. The aspects of the goddess that resonates most to them and matches them... While the women go around busy with their golus and sundals and silks, while the garbhas and the dandias hold their sway, my eyes have scanned the men curious to see how they adore the goddesses they have each been blessed with... I somehow find it difficult to comprehend how every festival the woman starves or fasts for the longevity of her spouse or the masculine element's well being, and even for a celebration of the feminine aspect it is she who again praises her own self and worships her own femininity ...isn't the resonance and reflection in shiva's eyes that best acknowledge sakthi's fire and identity ?]

This torturous journey has to go on ... it is the journey of a soul ... reaching its levels...  

          Srividya Srinivasan 

Precious magic...

My dearest...
Don't bring the mundane,
the logic into the precious...
and kill the magic ...
instead ...
bring a touch of the precious
into the mundane...
to color it with magic...

- Srividya Srinivasan

It is a fragile world ...

Dearest,
It is a fragile world ...
And our bubble of happiness
needs but a little prick of reality ...
for the magic to crumble...
Just a cold dash of logic
for it to crash...
Just a blink of an eye
for the charm to vanish ...

What is it that binds us ?
What deeper yearning that
connects us ?

Somewhere a soul is craving
for resonance..
It is yours and it is mine
and it is everyone we know...
And yet we cloak our fear in ego ...
and hide our vulnerability with our pride....
Even if deep down we know ...

If we be very still...
and don't still the voice of madness within...
We will know the preciousness of being vulnerable ...
the utter truth of it...
the magic of staying true ...
to our deeper selves...
We will seek the other
so that the best in us is kept alive
and the other is a custodian of our vulnerability fragile ...

And yet we allow the cloak of
indifference,
the mask of triviality
and the mundane to enter
at their will,
to cast their spell on us...
We allow the death of the divine
celebrate the sanity of
logic and reason...
and call the magic madness...

Hush... my dearest ...
I am vulnerable right now
Gloriously and beautifully so...
Never been more fragile ...
nor more alive...
and words are a poor fill
for the richness of a singing heart...

It is a fragile world o dearest
and our souls just embraced...
Did you feel it ?
I did...

And I am caught in the magic of it still...

               Srividya Srinivasan - 10/10/2011

I smiled at you today ...

I smiled at you today ...
A big broad, disgustingly happy smile.
And you were grumpy...
Grouchy...
Not in a mood to return it back...

So I left my smile behind to do its job...
grinning to myself ...
'cos I knew it could make your day
more than I ever could.

It sat there beside you
waiting for a chance ...
to sneak and spread its sunshine...
as You went about your day...

It thought it had a chance ...
When you sat with your coffee,
Your mouth almost smiled
as you cracked that code...
And I relaxed that it had almost got you...
when you put on that music that you liked...
But there you were, frowning in concentration...
happy in your isolation...

And suddenly I come online...
And your eyes lit up ...
And you remembered
that I had left a smile behind
that you had not returned...

Aha !
My smile jumps on to you...
Sneaks into your mind and
enters all the way to your heart
to end on your lips ...

And you break into a smile
to type this :) to me.

                ---- Srividya Srinivasan 7/9/2011

A song for a happy room ...

Hide some smiles here and there
to pull out on a rainy day...
Pack some hugs and cuddles away...
to use up on a cosy day...
Sprinkle your room
with laughter and giggles...
And fold those memories away...
The nasty ones at the bottom
and the nice ones at the top...
Shake out those sad thoughts...
And empty those tears away...
Keep your dancing shoes close at hand...
And turn on the music loud...
Now hug that pillow by your side
And lo, your room is done...

          - Srividya Srinivasan [26/8/2011]

The biggest challenge
is to
be a
dispassionate observer
of the drama
of your life
unfolding
where it is just
one person
in the play!
You.

If...

‎'If the child in me could play with the child in you, what a wonderful world it would be !

-- Srividya Srinivasan

For the love of coffee...

Coffee...My earliest memories of coffee is waking up to the smell of it as it permeated the house at about 5 in the morning... As amma (mother) offered her cup of love to get Appa's (father) day going... Appa would roll it back and forth like a Narasus coffee Ad ( A famous coffee brand in south India) and drink it piping hot until it would scald his tongue ...And as one would snuggle deeper in to the thin jamakalams (ground covers) and porvai (thin blankets), it swirled around you, the smell of it lulling you into a warm blanket of security and timelessness...

As i grew older, i would brave the early morning cold, and too impatient to wait for the coffee, climb the ricketty wooden ladder, onto the dangerous asbestos and over the ledge to get to the open terrace armed with a book to mug (study rote) from... and with the grey dawn just breaking... snuggle up beside the chimney as wafts of warm air and the smell of coffee lured me down again...

Paati (grand mother) would grind the beans sitting in the middle room between the kitchen and the Swami (god) room ... I remember the thrill of turning it, the crunching noise, the coarse mix coming out to be ground again... On a rare day, one was allowed a couple of turns at it...

And Paati's love for coffee... It was always a lota.( a small mug) 'Ennum Konjam kudendi Kalyani ...' And the lota would be tilted so as to not waste the precious last drop...

Then the rendam (second) coffee.. which of course meant it was a weaker version... The coffee powder was subjected to a second dose of hot water, obviously a lesser volume and mixed with the milk once boiled. But one drank the consolation prize all the same, pulling a face but not refusing the offer...Of course, the three 'o' clock afternoon coffee was a different affair and accompanied with some light snacks...

Appa's baptism of all the innumerable children that our house was blessed with, was to secretly walk across and at the earliest opportunity sneak a drop of coffee into their lips... (I am going to have the whole family jumping up to deny this but I have an elephantine memory for impressions, so i will stand my ground on this)... I have been a witness at least thrice...

When I got married and went into a tea drinking house, i felt like i had lost a personal wake up mantra... How I would long for that smell, taste and flavour until i almost felt sick... and babuji's mother would casually stroll in and say i need you for something and sneak me into her house and quickly make me a super coffee with ' vegam kudichuko' and i would like a cat that has licked some cream or like a man who has had a secret swag at his drink innocently swagger back... I could handle the innumerable pink teas for the day... I have had my coffee...

Years ago, when I was in the US and had dropped into Ramesh's place and saw him religiously grinding his beans and smelling it deep, and a few years ago, I saw Bala filtering the powder with a tissue to get the perfect taste ... these caffeine memories are forever etched in my memory... i grin I know what it means to be a coffee lover...

I have recently managed to like tea, the various teas without milk... but coffee is a lifetime of memories... an integral part of my existence, one that i can't just drink away...And when some old mama comes home and says ' A1 coffee' when i offer it to him, i have this stupid grin plastered on my face... I know I have arrived ... I recently stumbled on Narasus coffee powder in a store next to my place and it almost felt like Amma had moved in closer... I felt I had to call and tell her the news...

And everyday I ping a dear old pal... and we share a kaapi some days online...

A coffee talk with a friend got me started on this today ...

So did your kaapi make your day? Cappuccino? Kaapichino ? Kaapi ?

Heart Strings...

There are some who come into our lives...
for a brief instant and are gone...
We treasure them and always remember them
but we are ok to let them go...

There are some whom we can never recollect
and they hardly touch our lives...
And we move on
with no memory of each other...

There are some who come in...
with some misguided idea of us..
searching for resonance...
who refuse to let go...
and cling on...
Cutting them off is the kindest thing to do...
to yourself and to them...

There are some who touch our lives deeply...
And our lives are intertwined ...
But when the time comes...
We have to gently untangle ourselves
to let them go...
Loving them but letting them go...
is the only thing to do...

And there are some ...
who are there to stay...
You may not speak to them...
meet them...
But they reside in you...
as long as you live...
and when you try to cut them off ...
a thin thread refuses to snap...
and when you tug at it ...
you find it goes all the way to your heart...

‎Sometimes love is for a moment,
sometimes love is for a lifetime.
Sometimes ...
Just sometimes
with someone
a moment is a lifetime...


---- Srividya Srinivasan

The big Question ?

When I am indifferent to my existence,
Does it really matter that you think I should continue to exist ?

Srividya Srinivasan
[Ramblings]

Where has Rasa gone ?

Equation of emotional resonance...

1. Identification + emotion = Rasa/Resonance/Intensity/life
2. Identification - emotion = Buddha
3. No identification + emotion = Chaos/Conflict/Pain/Difference
4. No identification - emotion = Indifference/Death/A lonely soul

I am a lonely soul at the moment ...who has operated with Rasa till now... Where has Rasa gone ? Bring her back else let me at least become a Buddha !

- Srividya Srinivasan
(Ramblings)

Expansion or reduction ?

Do you narrow the circle until you come to the dot or do you expand it so much that you merge into nothingness... Are both the same? Finally is it ultimate expansion or ultimate reduction... both are infinite and have no end ... A particle in the wave has to have some clue ... It can't just ride the wave...

Is the answer in expansion or reduction ? There is no middle ground.

I need to know... NOW.

There is no middle ground...

What would I do for love?

What would I do for love?
Well, anything my dear.
I would go past my fears...
I would travel across the earth...
I would toss all what I have ...
To walk by your side...
I would bear your child...
Stand by you through the storm wild,
Love you all through ...
Live for you and maybe die too..
And dearest,
if it comes to that ...
I will for love ...
Just let go and
walk away too...

What would you do my dearest, for love?

---- Srividya Srinivasan

They say that the greatest regret is
when you never tried at all.
The greatest regret is in trying it all
going all the way, all the time
And finding it was not worth it after all.

--- Srividya Srinivasan

Respecting my right to speak does not mean you have an obligation to listen . . .

Do I exist ?

Do I exist ?

You think I do.
So may be I do.

Am not so sure though.

If I disappear from the face of the earth,
and if they remove all traces that I ever was,
Did I then exist at all?

I am not there to tell my story.
And you will forget mine too.

So did i exist ?

Pardon the tenses.
The lines in history just blurred.

--- Srividya Srinivasan

B L A N K . . .

What is it called when the body remains but you willfully kill the mind ?
Is it still suicide i wonder ?

--- Srividya Srinivasan

Freedom ?

The bird waves its tired wings against the caged door seeing the open blue skies.
The fish in the net thrashes desperately trying to move to the water it sees.
The bull pulls the yoke, as its eyes go up in the strain.
The man in prison sees the single beam of moonlight that reaches his room
dreams of his lover and sings.

--- Srividya Srinivasan

...

When the child in you dies, everything dies ...

It simply is love ...

To love someone is to acknowledge the role they have played in our lives. To recognize that our paths crossed at some point and that we have been co-travellers for a while in life. To love someone is to accept the truth of interconnectedness of all the people who touch our lives into the tapestry of our existence. To love someone is to accept and acknowledge the existence of a part of us in them and a part of them in us.

From our parents, family, first loves, childhood buddies, best friends, classmates, broken loves, discarded friends, friends turned enemies, online friends, colleagues, clients, people whom we have forgotten, people who have forgotten us, people who ignore us now, people who turn their back on us and whom we ignore and turn our backs on, people we just smile at, people we see past… they are all there in the story of our lives and we in theirs.

We get hurt, angry or feel violated when ‘they’ change their promise of ‘who they seemed’ to ‘who they suddenly become’. When their suitability, usability or conformity changes, it confuses us and we fight to re-establish the original image we agreed to have of them. We do the same to them when we change. But we will always be the victim, the one who was wronged. Even when we ignore, wear a mask or hurt a loved one, it is almost like another alternate being descends on us. Someone truly not us.

So does love really go away? Can love ever go away? Can people ever fade away? Can their influence or memory be just pretended away?


Why do we wear masks? Why do we squirm at memories that don’t suit us? Why do we not acknowledge the sides to us that aren’t or weren’t heroic? Why can’t we say sorry? Why can’t we start again? Why do we ignore those who reach out? Why do we put our hands at the back and refuse to shake hands, or meet someone’s eyes?

We are not scared of what we will find there. We are scared that we will not measure up in our own eyes. We are scared of what they will no longer find in us perhaps? We are scared of old discomforts and insecurities arising in us again. We are scared of being vulnerable.

We get angry when they persist, feel violated when they remind us of their affection and refuse to acknowledge them. The more real and genuine they are, the more we push them away. We abuse, ignore, and ridicule their overtures of affection as they force us to remember a better us. They remind us of the promises we failed to meet, the intentions we faked to gain and the most importantly they make us vulnerable again. We are scared of giving them the power of love; afraid that they know us too well and that we have failed them somehow. We understand that by failing them, we have failed ourselves and we would do anything to avoid that admission.

So where and when does love change? Does a relationship ever die? Can the bonds of families and loves ever break?

To continue to love someone does not mean we desire to turn back the clock. It does not mean that we are trying to re-establish status quo. It simply means we are acknowledging the interconnectedness of it all. It simply means that we accept the role they have played in our lives and the role we played in theirs. It means we accept responsibility for that influence.

Love is a continuum not to be confused with our superficial behavioral swings and it does not really operate with a tense. There is no question of ‘I loved you’, ‘I love you’ ‘I will love you’. If we have accepted and loved someone once, we have accepted them forever. They are an integral part of our lives.

It simply is Love.

--- Srividya Srinivasan, 14.2.2011

Waiting at the crossroads...

i am lost.
i have no clue where i am.
i have no idea where i am headed.
Looking back i realise i am
where i thought I should be.
But...
it is not how i wanted it to be.
Or thought it would be.

Sometimes, driving your destiny
listening to your inner voice is insane.
And, reading divinity into synchronicity madness.
Sometimes, wishing for something is the ecstasy
and getting it is the agony.

I look around
and every road ahead fills me with fear.
Which road should i take ?
On what grounds should i take it?

I stand there pausing
breathing hard, legs trembling.
I cannot make a mistake and
take any road and then traverse back.
My legs are too weary.
My spirit too broken.

I wait at the crossroads.

Maybe someone would come by,
retracing their path to tell me
that their road is not worth travelling.
Maybe someone would come by
with the energy to take me along
even on a bad road
where the road may be bad
but the journey good.

I look back thinking I have come far
I realise I have just been going in circles.
I haven't moved at all.

I wait at the crossroads where so many roads meet.

I wait.

Just being.

The graph of your life ...

Take that pen and draw a line
as straight you can.
Make it even and flat
and don't shake your finger so.
It is a safe thing to understand
and with a little effort
the easiest thing to draw.
And when you ask people what it is
they will nod their heads in unison
for everyone knows a straight line.

Now take that pen and start a line
gloriously flow your hand as the pen flows
up and down and straight ahead
thick and thin strokes and those little jiggles
Now ask them what they think it is
and each of them would say different.

If your life was safe and flat
You could almost be dead.
Now look a little closer
and enjoy the ups and downs
the little quirks
the points that stand away from the line
Those are your high points
and your low ones
and the points that you have lived at all.

The spirit refuses to die ...

They can misread you, misquote you, upset you, confuse you, hurt you, abandon you, use you, cheat you, bully you, torture you, ignore you... even be indifferent to you. But what they can never never touch is your inner spirit.

-- Srividya Srinivasan

Evolving...

Evolving is when I am nice
even when you are not.
When I am charming, in love
and graceful in my separation.

How I react when you have left me,
misunderstood me,
forgotten me,
unloved me says only your story.
How i remain is mine.

I am still here beautiful for you.
Smiling with my eyes,
and bubbling with my laughter,
My love and belief in us
filling my heart.

How I sulk, or how I shrug,
How i wait or how I move
How i believe or how I let go,
What I am in your presence
or absence,
When your love fills me
or abandons me
Is all there is to me.

What I am when nothing goes my way
is what I am in reality.
How I love when it is not love my way
is all the love that's in me.

What I am when the world turns its back
is all that is in me.
What I am when I have nothing to give
is all there is to give in me.

I am in me...

And today when i realise this
I am free.
I can love you without your permission,
laugh without your censure,
jump without you thinking me crazy,
go on this mad journey with you in my head.

All the love in the world is in me...
All the love in the world is in me.