Spider

I was followed home by a spider. Over tea, the spider told me that she was scouting. What she was scouting for was a secret. For the spider's many eyes only. She told me of webs spun and creatures trapped. She talked of patience and prey. She talked of unpleasant deaths- unpleasant for the now deceased. However the most interesting experience the spider shared with me was this little game she had come up with- Playing With The Prey. "Oh, it's just a little something to amuse poor little lonely me," she said offhandedly and followed her apparently flighty statement with a stare so piercing and knowing that I couldn't look away. She took a sip from the tea cup.

I sat on the edge of the spider's playground. I watched as the spider frolicked around the perimeter of the place. I watched and so did the prey. It lay there, in the center of the webbed playground. Wrapped in layers and layers of webbing, its eyes were the only part of its body that were visible. If eyes could talk, its eyes must have been screaming. I could almost here those screams. It was fascinating to watch its eyes follow her every move. Slightly out of breath from all the skipping and frolicking, the spider sat down besides me, while the trapped prey continued staring at her. "Ah! Look at him!" she said pointing with her many legs towards the prey, "Such an attentive audience! He knows how to make a woman feel wanted. He hasn't taken his eyes off me. Not even once!" She looked at the prey with tender love. "Oh! I do think I love that poor bastard!" She declared to the night. Without glancing at me, she got up and set off towards the prey. When she was a foot away from the prey, she kneeled down and kissed his forehead. Five seconds later, she had her fangs entrenched deep within his throat. I watched as the prey went from being in death throes to being dead. I was so entrapped by the spectacle before my eyes that I lost track of time completely. Done with the prey, the spider leaped to her feet and started prancing towards me. The sight of her, brought me out of my reverie. "Would you like to play?" She asked nonchalantly as she passed me on her way to the exit. I followed her out.

I woke up to find myself wrapped in layers of impending death. My eyes were the only part of my body that had been left uncovered. "How did it ever come to this?" I asked myself. I could see her flouncing about the playgound. Her spirits were up amongst the birds. I closed my eyes, unable to witness the horrifying spectacle. I knew what I had to do. I had known it. Deep down, I had always known. I sighed mentally. "She and I... if only... No! There is no time for that! It's never going to happen! Do what you have to do!" I ordered myself. "You are not a very good spectator, you know." She said from the edge of the ground, her echoing complaint reached me and faded away to oblivion. "Look at me! Please, please, please, pretty please," she implored of me ever so sweetly. "Oh man. This is so fucked up." I thought to myself. I opened my eyes. As she saw me open my eyes, she started scurrying towards me. I bit down hard and in the process, broke a tooth. She kneeled next to me, her many eyes staring at me with complete love. She kissed my forehead. She looked into my eyes just as she was about to say hello to my jugular and smiled that smile that only lovers know. My eyes smiled back at her and so did the poison that now traveled within me, sailing in the broken tooth. My last thought before the poison took over me completely was that she will be joining me as soon as she tastes my blood.

I went into the darkness satisfied.

A Joke.

He was going to be the clown,
The joker he was to be,
Face paint and a stolen red nose,
And with a dead reindeer buried in the closet,
He set out to plunder the land of glee.

When he walked the plank,
He fell into a glass of water.
He waged a war to capture the hill,
The ants defeated him still.
Yeah, he is pretty funny,
But is he a joker or a joke is he?

Chased by the bandits,
He hid behind a scrawny bush,
It hid his toes pretty well,
The rest is an immortal joke.

What is he doing?
Running around in circles,
Is he trying to collide with himself?
Well, let's wish good luck to him.

Now, we step into his house,
A dilapidated shanty it is.
There he sits in front of a broken mirror,
The candlelight illuminates his face for us to see.
Rivulets of bleary brown scar the white face.
Are those tears we spy?
Creepy.
They go so well with that fixed smile of his.

The joker turned into a joke.
By candlelight his baritone turned into a squeak!
We love him still!
Don't we?
For be he a joker or a joke,
He can make our troubles flee!

The Land.

He was a tiny speck on the mutated landscape. He ran... from me. He ran and I followed. It has been over two decades since the chase began. We have turned into companions of sort- Him, me and the chase. The hate, fear and the thrill of the chase, binds us together in a bond strong enough to stand the test of time. In-fact time has ceased to be of importance. We have transcended time. Ah, the miracle of hate which is strong enough.
On that particular day, I came across a brook. As with every habitat in this land, that brook was infested or rather inhabited by mutated fishes and amphibians. At times, I feel as if I am the mutant in this land, that it is I who infests it. The brook rippled with his presence. A presence which had entered the realm of past tense not more than a day ago. His reeking scent was everywhere- on the rocks, the purple grass, the green clouds, the underground trees. It inflamed my hate. It was my fuel, my food and my inspiration. I decided to rest under the red shade of a rocky outcrop, where he had rested not a day ago. This land is so fucked up and it is perhaps, more beautiful than before! No, no, no! That is him talking. This land is evil! It needs to be purged! It needs to be purged of him! With a hand on the hilt of my dagger I drifted off to the land of the dreams. Each one of my dreams was real. Each ended with me sinking my dagger to the hilt within his chest. Each dream ended with the dagger piercing his black heart. Each one of them ended with his end. I could almost taste the satisfaction of witnessing the fear creep into his eyes at the sight of me. I could feel his defeat.

Wake up.

A jab. A punch. A jumble of claws and arms. A scratch here. Blood. The dagger finds the jugular. My breathing returns to its normal rate. The adrenalin rush passes by leaving behind a shivering me. I stare at the dead carcass of the mutant dog that had tried to attack me. Man's best friend. Ha! What a fucking joke!

I remember being almost a God once. Many years ago, I used to wander this land, hoping to find a cure for its illness. I was its savior to be. After all it was I who now possessed the dagger of The One God. The true God who came forth before this land was struck with whiteness. I was, therefore, his heir apparent. I used to look upon the creatures of this land with compassion. I wanted to make their pain my own. I wanted to assure them that I will make everything as it used to be once again.

On that night many years ago, I stood upon a flat rock, which elevated me some some fifty feet above the rest of the land. I raised the dagger to the orange skies, the dagger gleamed in the moon's bluish glow. A mutant hyena saw me. More importantly it saw the dagger. It climbed the rock, its belly touching the floor and its head bent forward in a posture of reverence. As it reached my feet, it raised its head towards me and instead of love and hope, its eyes held hate. A boiling, raging hate. My dagger went to work for me, while the mutant was still in mid-air, its open jaws aimed for my neck. As its headless body fell off the rock, I knew that there was someone else who wished to be a God. I became aware of him. He was a mutant. He wanted this land to accept this cancer. He wished for the mutants to stop fighting their illness. He had, it would seem, fooled some of the creatures into believing that they were an improved race. That their mutant nature was something to be proud of. He was one evil motherfucker. And when I glanced at the horizon, I saw him staring back at me, with a dagger of his own. He was there and he had a following. He was going to die at my hands. He would die before he could corrupt this already corrupted land. So began the chase.


p.s - To be continued...

We?

I come unbidden.
Don't fight me.
Sail with me,
Waves of music,
Whirlpools of joy.
Come.
Come with me.

A breath for a breath,
A heartbeat for a touch,
A smile for a glance,
A sigh for a farewell.
Come.
Come with me.

Can't you see?
You don't need to.
I don't care,
I just want to be with you.
Is that enough?
To carry us through?
Through to the end?
Are we strong enough to face the rough?
Are we?
Are we even a we?
Are we?
Come.
Come with me.

A brush of lips,
A gentle kiss,
A bite to scorch the soul,
A need quenched,
A need never satisfied,
A pool of needs,
A storm of wants,
Amidst them we stand.
Still. Stationary. Hand in hand.
Be at peace.
Come.
Come with me.

Consolation to the Foolish.

The tents have been removed,
The rides have been shut,
The carnival is over.
There is a silence in the darkness,
And I can no longer feel the rhythm of your breathing besides me.
As the sense of loss rushes through my veins,
Infusing into my very bones,
It ends in a high pitched whine,
A shattering scream.


The world falls around us,
It breaks into pieces.
Shards of broken mirrors,
Amidst them we stand.
Not together.
Not alone.
A shadow to each other,
Dark silhouettes, barely visible,
We are but vapors of misty breath.


A lifetime from now,
In the middle of a crowded street,
Or maybe an island long forgotten,
A place not known,
Not to us.
We will meet each other again.
You will be there,
I will be there.
The world will stand still.
Our world.
And like the crashing of waves on the rocky beach,
You and I will be one.

Descent.

I lost my way again. I lose it often. Somewhere between thoughts and converting those thoughts into words. What comes out of my mouth is not what I had thought. How fucking frustrating is that? Very.

Am I the only one who suffers from this handicap(?)... am I? Words on their own are so incomplete as a means of communication. Why are we taught only the language of words and not that of the body? While words can be hidden, twisted, manipulated, silenced, held back... the body screams everything it feels. All you need to do is to know how to read it, how to listen.

I am standing at the edge of self-destruction again, staring at the vast, seemingly infinite chasm below. I have taken this leap many-a-times. Will I take it again? I do not know if self-destruction is even the correct term. It is to fall, to fly. When there is no end to the fall, isn't it as good as flying?And as you fall, you lose everything that is not you and what is scary is that you are likely to fall apart if all you have is you. That you are at your most incomplete when you are complete, when you are just you.

The feeling of incompleteness gradually recedes, the regrets fade away in the background. And then you experience peace and contentment like you have never before. You are you and that's it.

Boredom settles in. You build again. You build, you reach for the sky and then you stand at the top again, to take the fall. You build not to touch the sky. You build to jump, to fall, to fly.

It.

I woke up to find it standing by my bedside.

I remember when I had first met it. I used to live somewhere else, the bed I used to sleep in was different and I was much younger, I was somebody else back then. Over the years I have met it again and again, it has never changed... not one bit. Even though it is to me what a butcher's knife is to a hen, I thought I should at-least make small talk with it. Ask it how it has been. After-all I've known it for so long.

Still groggy from sleep, I was about to say something in the form of a pleasant greeting when I saw its face. That face filled with hate, devoid of any features. Its body a swirling, crawling mass of everything I hate... Everything I fear. My stomach gave an unpleasant lurch.

"What is it that you want this time?" I whispered.

"I do not want anything. I wish to tell you that something is wrong."

"What?" I blurted out. My pulse was racing like a fucking racehorse.

"You know that I am not at the liberty to tell you the 'what' and the 'how'," it paused, drew in a deep breath, the sound of it like the screech of a sand paper on a black-board, "All I can say is that you are in for a lot of pain in the near future."

"Please. Please, tell me. Just this once." I begged.

"No. You hate me. You fear me. I'll tell you this today, that I am you. A part of you. I am your intuition. I am your conscience. You know all the answers, if only you can open your eyes."

"Motherfucker."

With a cackle of hate-filled laughter, it was gone.