Blahsphemy

Yes the day is coming to a close. With it will go another year. Like a forgotten dream. 

A stranger walked into a bar. It was full of his kind. Strangers.  

This rain is never going to fall, the old man grumbled looking at the blood red skies. It was their fourth year without rain. But the planet had abundant groundwater resources to sustain them for a couple of years more. In fact their planet was like a water filled balloon made of rock. Hard on the outside and brimming with water inside. Their predecessors had dug wells through which water was drawn to the surface. They had taken great precautions not to contaminate their resources. All the waste water was shunted over to a nearby planet called Earth and disposed off using special carriers called Cumulonimbuses.     

The light from the lift illuminated the dark corridor. Thirteenth floor, chimed a mechanical voice. Funny he thought, the building had only 12 floors.   

All the lines were taken. Ideas recycled. Roles acted out. Codes cracked. Programs debugged. There was nothing new left. The world was slowly sinking into boredom. That's when he tried to recreate the atom bomb.  

The evening was perfect. Sam landed up from office early. They cuddled upon the sofa making the most of whatever little time his hectic schedules permitted. She was making tea when the phone rang. It was Sam, and he said he was coming home now. 

When the lights dim The darkness sings For that's when  Silence comes to play

The message in the bottle read - We lost WiFi last year. Please don't send email.  

I realise what I have become. I have become my father, my mother, my in laws and my relatives. I have become what I never wanted to be. I want out. I don't want to be what I am. I want to be you. He recoiled in horror at the words from the mirror.

The brain died long ago, all that remains is that heart. He looked in disbelief at the rusty heart dutifully pounding away. A heart without a brain, what a predicament.

Another ending awaits  It's December again The days are numbered 31 to be precise

Add a drop of ambiguity, boomed the microphone. He froze in his tracks. How in the world can a machine make such a demand? More than that how can someone add a drop of ambiguity? If he defies the machine, then he will be annihilated on the spot. a drop of ambiguity please, the command sounded again. He reached for his coat pocket and a single shot rang followed by a heavy crash. Good job, boomed the machine.      

This is the land of the crotch smilers. Their faces are always lit by a blue haze. They panic when their lights die. They flock near power outlets. What a story, thought the human who was glued on to his handheld.      

Did you hear a laugh? Yes I did. But that's impossible, I didn't laugh. Then who did? I don't know, as far as I know I am the only living being in this mortuary.

I wanted my soul back, his pleas fell on deaf ears. For there was only him and the devil in that room. 

He knew that there was something evil lurking in that dark alley. He saw a dead body lying among the garbage bins. The face looked similar, it was his own.

I can always thaw them and reuse them. That's the best part about memories. They never go bad, remarked the brain.  

I am a writer. I write short stories everyday. But now I am stuck.  Hmmm, that's a story, replied the wise owl. 

Gone are the days when you could buy death for a few dollars, lamented the dictator. Nukes have been banned, AIDS cured, earthquakes predicted... what a shame.

Our lives have become exotic movies without any subtitles. You speak. I speak. They say. No one understands what we say. Nor do we understand them.  

You better hurry, the world is ending. You smiled, I cried. We were on a spaceship to nowhere.  

A tea bag died its natural death The hot water was blessed with its soul My morning has started screamed the brain As taste buds welcomed the warm brew

   I am bored. These placid waters are sucking the soul out of me. It's eating me from inside. I long for a waterfall. I long for a flood. I long for a storm. Look at these fools unwinding on my banks. Wait till I am my fierce self once again.    

I saw a lion mating with a girl. She wanted to make leaders, said the lion. That's when a pail of ice landed on me. That's your ice bucket challenge sir, remarked someone. I disconnected my cables from the mainframe. Maybe I am Neo waiting or my Trinity. By the way, how did you manage to read my mind? 

He took a sip of whatever was there in the glass. His face grimaced as he gulped it down. Leftover blood never tasted this good, he thought. On his way out he unsheathed the carbon titanium sabre. As he clicked his door shut, the building shook as if shuddering from what was to ensue.   

You are old.  The man in the mirror ignored that taunt.  You have even become deaf.  The face tried to hide the scowl.  You have become senile too.  He grimaced and turned away.  Off late, his soul has made it a point to make fun of his body.  

I held him in my arms He was my friend Now he is just a lifeless body As I offered him to the flames  Memories rained down my cheeks

The ego was getting inflated by the second. All it needed was a pinprick from above. And one day it burst spilling everything that was helping it swell. It wasn't a pretty sight. The noise it made was deafening. He used to love it. Soon people used call him pompous, haughty and what not.  

The watchman peers out of the iron gate like a caged animal. He has been guarding something that's not his own. You can wallow in the fathomless boredom inside his eyes. Why not befriend him with a few peanuts or a cup of tea? If you are lucky you might hear about how long has he been trapped and who his owners are. Go on smile at him. Let's get to know this animal.  

The concrete ship sailed above the vast expanse of green. They stood like time travellers in a film that has been paused. The wind howled like a mad wolf. The rain pummelled the ground with a vengeance. This is Armageddon, thought the earthworm.  

The blood washed off The evidence collected The case filed  Nothing proven Nothing denied Nothing gained Night becomes day Summer embraces winter Deaths and births never cease What's there to wonder Whether it was murder or suicide Whatever it is the truth is death  

I waited for the flames to claim him He was my long lost friend Now lost forever to memories An occasional tear My aching heart sheds  For he was me and his grief mine 

She is back in another family Another husband, another wife,  And she is right in the middle. The tears have started The blame game is on The spectators are keen Its going to be a bloody affair.

I am the lost brother The one pried from a surrogate pyre To devour the prodigal heir    

The answers are already there. For the questions that are never asked. That's how life goes on.  

Forgotten lies all painful memories  Only to resurface again like nuclear submarines Threatening everything that is fragile

Try forcing that poem out It's like a cock laying an egg Keep pushing till kingdom come

Spiders crawl all over you Still I confide my secrets without fail For you are the web    

When the curtain falls everyday.  We both play our parts to perfection We are a happy tragedy. 

My brain has cliched, exclaimed the writer. For whatever I write sounds familiar. Every word I choose has been used before. Everything is cliched, even my eyes, my tongue, my skin, my body. I have seen it all, tasted it all, felt it all. The whole world is cliched.  That's new, exclaimed the critic.  A cliched world.  Wow, you are a genius chanted the crowd.        

I am this, I am that. I was this, I was that. A time comes when all that will pass. Like water under the bridge to nowhere. Some times you are the nut. At times the wrench. Never a bolt that latched on to the truth. Deep down we are all something, something that no one realizes. A fast bike, a crazy song, rich man's perfumes and what not. They don't define you my friend. You are just another face in the crowd.

We are all cheap imitations What we really are we won't know Until the real moment dawns

She could see into my soul with that instrument, he thought. No I can't, she replied. But, how did you know what I am thinking, he asked? Another nut case, she just smiled and shook her head. 

You have been warned again Attempting to master Haiku is fruitless son Five, seven, five is nothing 

This drama never ends abruptly Remember, pain is something that lingers forever On the stage called life

Guffawed he, spewing venom It's nothing but my brain's minor indigestion  Something only time can cure      

He danced when they asked No one asked whether he was ready  That's what puppets are for 

Faithful was he our dog Faithful we never were to him ever Everything is pardonable he wagged 

Two flies on the window One is inside and the other outside Two worlds separated by glass

The trap was all set The prey gave in without a fight Spoilsport, snapped the angry trap

An old face popped up Only to burst the bubble of memories How ugly we were then

The answer is no. The words mocked him. He crumpled the paper on which the alphabets had conspired to ruin his day. He searched for the right words deep inside his heart to console himself. Little did he knew that all that he had were a few vowels that wailed.   

You have wasted fifteen days of your life. He looked at the screen in disbelief. That's exactly what it took me to fix this damn machine, he guffawed.

The dogs were close. He could hear them sniffing. They won't recognise me, he thought. I am an alien now. They have changed my body and my mind. That's when his favourite dog ran up to him and licked him like he used to do always.

After a zillion excuses, he finally confronted the blank sheet. They stared at each other like lovers, then friends and then foes. They just stared and stared. So that the blank paper turned whiter and whiter and his face darker and darker.  

The man was murdered by his own shadow. Everyone looked at the front page of the newspaper in disbelief. How can a shadow kill someone? Try asking that to the paranoid soul who jumped off the roof  mistaking his shadow for that of a serial killer. 

The blind man's eyes followed him. It was rather unnerving. He shut his eyes before he plunged the knife into the poor man's heart. 

Their sweat is acidic, it can burn holes in your suit. He remembered the words of his master, as the capsule shuddered to a stop. Welcome to Acetamia, a recorded voice echoed. As the transport capsule disappeared into the green horizon, he was reminded of his mission. He was bestowed the task of collecting the love juices of the Zoomboids for research. As for the Zoomboids, the only way to make out whether these elephantine creatures were aroused was from the way they sweated.

It rained heavily enough to wash the dirt off the car. It was parked under a tree with yellow flowers.The tree belonged to the red house that was a few yards away. But, no one knew whom the car belonged to. It was just one of those nameless cars that wait patiently for their owners to return. 

The night refused to go. The song refused to end. Little did they know that a beautiful memory was being born. 

A story is waiting to be born. The pregnant pause was a dead giveaway. Everyone waited with bated breath as the logs crackled in the fireplace. 

The. Did you just start a story with the? Amazing! You are so fucking cliched. 

The line never changed. It was born to be so. Legend has it that he went down history as the straight line. 

The mad man looked familiar. Where have we seen him? Think? Didn't we see him in the mirror, today?

The floor gave away. It was holding up everything on it all these years. It remembered the fresh cement smell when it was built way back in 1886. Soon everything changed. People started walking all over it. The heavy furniture started bruising it. Anything dropped carelessly left permanent scars. Chemicals were spilled. Holes were drilled. Carpets smothered it. The weather left cracks. Not to mention the constant pressure gravity exerted on it. The floor held on nevertheless. But today was different. It suddenly felt too weak. Too weak to go on. Or did gravity become stronger? It lay there in pieces wondering about what went wrong.  

She was white. All her kids were black. The world laughed. For everything about her life was in black and white. 

 The prophet is back. He is there on that rock overlooking the sea. That's where he gets his visions from. Maybe I should also try climbing up that rock one day. Who knows what visions are there in store. 

Everyone wants to look into everyone else's houses and forget all about looking at their own houses.

It's too comfortable in here. I need a bit of uncertainty to be content. That's when he heard that strange sound. It was like a gazillion bees humming. In an instant he was a happy soul.  

Mr. Stavilansky, can you send your ego downstairs, the public service system pleaded. What kind of a request is that, he wondered. But then anything can happen when you are high on  Prozac. 

 There was a flaw with the system. The flaw was that no one could find out what it was. So they toiled day and night to find a flaw that became the flaw by its absence.  

He had planned everything right. He sneaked past the guards. He bypassed the alarm. He hid on the loft till the building was empty. Now all he had to do was to climb up the turret and jump. He looked at the world that lay before him before he took the plunge. Little did he know that it was at the same moment that gravity decided to quit. 

I hate famous people smiling at me from magazines. I hate them for being what I am not. I hate them because they have nothing to do with me. I hate them because I have nothing to do with them except hate them.

Egos pumped by weights. Skin glistening with sweat. Mirrors reflecting vanity. The battle rages everyday.    

The daggers were drawn. He could see the cold steel in her eyes. All she wanted was a provocation. He decided to lie low. That's what set her off.

The path was clear. But he strayed off it and drove straight into a ditch. He cursed Buddha for telling him to choose the middle path and took another swig from the bottle. 

Logic commits suicide, screamed the headlines. He found it to be funny. For he had always fought logic along with the masses.  

The song on the radio sounded familiar. Little did he know that It was going to be the last song he would be listening to in this life. For, the nuclear bomb's trigger was tuned to go off when the song stops.   

The sacrificial lamb was bathed and fed. He was led to the altar and garlanded. They are making me the king, thought he.  

The war seemed to be over. The victory cries muted the slow ticking of the atom bomb's timer.  

The faint whiff of an unfinished story lingered in the room as he walked in.  

Why did all men fall in love with her? She had everyone from the king, the courtier, the artist and the warrior at her command. She can be classified as a kingdom in herself and no one will object. But, there was one man who hated her. And he was her son.   

Who are you, asked the mirror? I am you replied the man; a fragile reflection of the times.

You are the most uninspiring person one can hope for, screamed his brain. He smiled a faint smile as he plunged the morphine filled syringe into his arm.

It's been indeed a pleasure to meet someone who has such a wide collection of books. Could you please tell us for how long have you been collecting books? Well, I have been at it ever since I came in here.  What kind of books do you prefer? Whatever that suits me is welcome?  Have you given away any of your books? At times people do come and borrow a book or two. And  some of them forget to retune them.  What are your plans for the future?  My plans are quite simple, collect books.  How do you plan to extend your collection? Looks like you have run out of space for new books? That's nothing, everyone in my family helps in one way or the other. They all love books. That's quite a family you got there.  Yes, I am lucky. They make me proud. Thank you for sparing us some valuable time.     

The first line started with 'the' again. The writer was getting frustrated. He could've chosen to start the first line with a name. Then that name had to be someone, some place or something in his story. But he never used to write about anyone, anything or anywhere in his stories.  

The heart should go, chanted the crowd. He looked at his executioner. Was there a trace of remorse on his face? Or was it plain boredom. Before he could figure out, his heart was plucked out for all to see.  

Slow was born to race. He hated his parents for naming him Slow. No matter ho fast he was they still called him Slow. He just hated being slow and Slow. 

One growl was all it took to sever a lot of things. It said I don't respect this pack. It said I don't believe in the rules. It said I don't belong here.

The world was freezing over. There was ice everywhere. Even in hearts. That's when spaceman Spiff got a message. You will see a red button in the middle of a huge white dial, just press that and the world will be saved. He didn't know what to make out of it until he yanked open his ancient refrigerator's door.

There she goes, there was a shout from the crowd. This snowflake sure looked different, wondered the gladiator. She walked up to him, stepped on his toe and whispered in his ear;  stop dreaming Chuck.  

The river was dry. It had been like this for years. But today was different, for there was a blind man who was thirsty on its banks. Someone had tricked him into believing that there was water.  

He was moving fast. Way too fast for his brain. So when it happened his brain was not there. The judge listened to his story, yawned and adjourned the court. His brain was not there too. It was in bed with his wife. 

The predator and the prey found themselves in the same cage. They eyed each other casually. For each knew what was to come.   

Today the sun will go around the earth twice. Which means today will have two days in it. Then can we call the second part today?