Logical Musings of an Absurd Mind
What had happened was
Giggles over a picnic spread
Thick layers of marmalade
Stacks of thin crepes
Trickles of blueberry
Glasses of lemonade
Under the mulberry tree
Just dreams of summer
Stained with myriad colors
As in the winter sun I lay
Thinking of you and all
That you just left behind!
On a Sunday morning
A summer-perfumed breeze
Rocks the hammock
A book cover gazes
Vacantly at azure skies
A fly lazily sits on the rim
Of an empty flute of nectar
Thoughts doze off embracing
An idyllic disregard
For chores and such
Until a mundane morrow
In the fleeting darkness
Only dreams survive
On the chariot of dawn
That rises from the ashes
Of a horizon in cinders
Lost to the dying lights
Of lonely burning skies!
The dark broom of night
Sweeps away stardust
From under the canopy
Of a dazzling firmament
Slowly lost in the distance
Book: Like the Radiant Sun
Author: Anu Kay
Genre: Mythology, Magical Realism, Fiction
Review Copy: Himalayan Book Club
Available at: Amazon.in
Recommended: Must Read!
Anu Kay’s novel, Like the Radiant Sun, is an engaging tale spanning a plethora of themes. It is a thriller full of suspense with the mild aroma of a romance playing out in the foreground of a mystical, mythological drama. It has the feel of a Bollywood movie and the enticement of a well-researched and rendered novel.
Is it destined or planned that a precious, ancient text lands in the hands of an archaeologist, Rohan Sharma? He is just the man to appreciate, interpret, and preserve the words outlining a rare discipline of combat with esoteric origins. But is he also the man who embodies the physical and mental prowess to outsmart the baddies desperate to lay their hands on the Marma Kala, an ancient manuscript on martial arts?
Continue reading “Book Review: Like the Radiant Sun”
I thought I’d survive without you
But I couldn’t say goodbye
For the words lay tangled
At your doorstep
Afraid to cross the threshold
Into a life where you
Would not be waiting
At sundown, by the yellow lamp
A book in hand, the kettle whistling
Eager to tell and know
Of just another mundane day
Sequined dreams
In the sky
As I stitch every teardrop
Into the firmament
For you to see when
You gaze at the moon
In my memory
It was a strong heart
But feather-light it floated
Buoyed by dreams, hopes
Reaching the sky so blue;
Tie it firmly with icy strings
Till the cold permeates
Freezes that tender love
For warm and flush
It tends to bleed red
Staining all the world!
What colors do you see,
In this unfinished portrait?
It waits for blue
From the waves
To fill vacant eyes
A contrary wind
Reversed ocean
To bring you back
In the hourglass of the mind
Thoughts weighing us down
Settle like silica at the bottom
Casting psychedelic shadows
On the fragile glass walls
That hold the soul captive
In the kaleidoscope of
Silver-laced desires
Golden-tinted visions
Slowly trickling through
Narrow passages of life
Until all that remains are
Fantasies and fairytales
Forever trapped in time!
The glorious orb of life
Has disappeared behind
The smog of callous living
Heavy smoke stings the eyes
Blinding haze separates us,
A dying earth consumes much
As ashes rain, acids scald
Green is now breathless gray
Blue has long lost its blaze
Brown is the barren land
There are no pathless woods
Where one can escape
From gassed urban prisons;
We know not were to go
No cresting foliage of respite;
Just black gloom sneaking in
From the recesses of our minds
Comeback is a compilation of poems on the theme of bouncing back from a dire circumstance to regain a former favorable condition. The book will be available on Amazon from November 15, 2021 and features some of my poems on the theme.
While I am quite a techno-enthusiast and a fan of emerging tech wizardry, I am not keen on a virtual world as a way of existence. It’s all hep and geeky when used for specific and specialized purposes in a controlled environment. It is scary as an extension of our personal lives, infiltrating our homes.
I am all for virtual robotic surgeries or a few global corporate off-sites, maybe simulated training but I don’t want a virtual holiday or have children don avatars and hone online personas. I would rather have my son scuba-dive than wearing virtual reality (VR) glasses to “experience” the ocean world.
Technology is already out-of-hand in our social spheres. From fake news to fake videos to cyber crimes and bullying to physical and emotional consequences, how will we handle the ensuing psychological crisis? How do people, the sensitive ones, the children, navigate the thin line between reality and virtuality? The more we should be connecting with nature and the world, returning to our roots, and being grounded, the more we are rushing towards self-imposed cubicles and flights of fantasy.
Isaac Asimov feared the robots will take over humanity and it’s happening now as we become mental robots, manipulated by make-believe worlds. The threat is not from artificial intelligence but from our eroding intelligence. Aldous Huxley’s Soma is in our veins; it’s the digital dopamine. George Orwell’s exposition of mind-reading state surveillance and propaganda is larger than we can ever imagine. Every data, every bit and byte, is leaving indelible digital footprints. Dystopian fiction is no more fiction. Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale is reflected in increasing infertility, oocyte cryopreservation, exorbitant surrogacy industry, all in the name of female choices.
Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 came true long back. Reading is now forgotten past time and censorship is a more common term than ever. Now, we binge-watch web series, stuffing our mouths with popcorn and processed food, and our minds with the images created by others. Slowly, we will lose our ability to think and imagine. As we cruise at top speed to emulate the world in Phillip Dick’s Minority Report, we will succumb to the Metaverse in the culmination of all our dystopian nightmares. Taking a spin on the question by Dick, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, will future cyberpunk generations wonder Do Humans Still Dream of a Material World!
The logo of Metaverse is the Infinity symbol. It invokes a universe that keeps us in a hyperloop. Enter at your peril for once in, there is no visible escape route.
Fun fact: The term was coined in Neal Stephenson‘s 1992 science fiction novel Snow Crash, where humans, as avatars, interact with each other and software agents, in a three-dimensional virtual space that uses the metaphor of the real world.[5]
Related:
Yuval Harari warns humans will be “hacked” if artificial intelligence is not globally regulated
Blue Pen Strokes 