To the Stranglers

This is a sad day-I am struggling to save myself from getting drowned in a quagmire of indignation and disappointment today. I still cannot overcome the sense of disbelief which gripped me when I discovered that the press had accused you of writing a sexist song. Why did that have to happen to me? I have already spent two hours in the morning listening to the song over and over again trying to analyze its lyrics and mulling over its semantics in a desperate attempt to detect misogyny in it. But I still cannot fathom what was there in the song which made so many consider it to be disrespectful towards women-maybe, that’s because English is still an alien language for me; a mystery which tantalizes and teases me every evening that I meet her in the company of Joyce or Woolf or Banville or Poe but remains nonchalant to me every time I try to have a rendezvous with her by myself. But it is equally likely that I have been in love with you for too long to be willing to admit even to myself that you could write a misogynistic song, though there is certainly something sexually evocative about it. Well, did you intend the lyrics to be sexist? Strolling along minding my own buisness/ well there goes a girl and a half/ she's got me going up and down/ she's got me going up and down/ walking on the beaches looking at the peaches/ well i got the notion girl that you got some suntan lotion in that bottle of yours/ spread it all over my peelin' skin baby/ that feels real good/ all this skirt lappin' up the sun/ lap me up/ why don't you come on and/ lap me up/ walking on the beaches looking at the peaches/ well there goes another one just lying down on the sand dunes/ i'd better go take a swim and see if i can cool down a little bit/ coz you and me woman/ we got a lotta things on our minds (you know what i mean)/ walking on the beaches looking at the peaches/ will you just take a look over there (where?) there/ is she tryin' to get outta that clitares?/ liberation for women/ thats what i preach/ preacher man/ walking on the beaches looking at the peaches/ oh shit/ there goes the charabang/ looks like im gonna be stuck here the whole summer/ well what a bummer/ i can think of a lot worse places to be/ like down in the streets/ or down in the sewer/ or even on the end of a skewer… Well, yes I just listened to the song once again and it is indeed laden with sexual innuendos but I still cannot feel anything save perplexity as I try to understand why did it outrage women and journalists who acrimoniously alleged that yours was a band of male chauvinists and the song was distastefully sexist. It also won’t be easy to try to quit being in love with you. I have spent so many Sunday afternoons downloading your songs from the internet, reading your interviews available online and watching videos of your songs on Youtube that nothing seems to be of gloomier prospect than weekends without you. Ah! Those afternoons have been a veritable feast for my senses. Every time I listened to Hugh Cornwell sing ‘Golden Brown, texture like sun…’ I found myself being transformed into a lotus-eater enjoying the melancholia, the day dreaming which languor invokes. I on the other hand, found that my heart was replete with an ineffably exciting energy whenever I watched JJ Burnel croon ‘Something better change’; can listening to a song ever lead to the release of endorphin in the body? I am not sure; my knowledge of biology has always been rather poor. As I discovered more and more of your songs, I so much wished that I was a young woman living in England in the 1970s so that I could attend your concerts, admire your irreverence, despise the mainstream media for being hostile to you and investigate the revolutionary potential of your songs. I don’t know if I like ‘No more heroes…’ better than ‘Get a grip on yourself’ but I listen to both of them whenever I need to reassure myself that my solitude does not make me lonely. I am not sure who I think was hotter-Hugh Cornwell, the lead singer with a maddening, haunting voice or JJ Burnel, the bass player with disheveled hair but I know that their sensuality laid in the eccentricity which they exuded as they performed. I have been so madly in love with both of them along with the astonishingly strange songs which they created with Dave Greenfield on the key board and Jet Black, playing the drums that I almost loathe myself for not discovering them earlier and for allowing myself to let my taste in music remain weak due to listening to too much of Bollywood music as a child. Yet the question shall always chafe me, vex me if you actually have a sexist song or two-I am too scared to listen to ‘London Lady’ lest I should actually discover that you had, in your enthusiasm to portray yourself as bold and menacing, allowed yourself to do something as banal and commonplace as write a misogynistic song- in your otherwise brilliantly original oeuvre. It is excruciating a discovery that you who composed a song like ‘Strange little girl’ could have referred to us as a ‘piece of meat’. But then JJ Burnel said in an interview in 2011 “I think probably politically we f@@@ed it up. We made so many enemies we screwed up a lot of people…. I never got the sexist thing.” I think I will believe him. He thinks that you are still a viable band; maybe I shall get to attend your concert some day in near future. Maybe, I can meet JJ Burnel and clarify for myself if lyrics of ‘Peach’ and ‘London Lady’ actually had sexist connotations? Were you ever a votary of male chauvinism?

The Raven and the rain...

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door.
`'Tis some visitor,' I muttered, `tapping at my chamber door -
Only this, and nothing more.'

Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December,
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.
Eagerly I wished the morrow; - vainly I had sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow - sorrow for the lost Lenore -
For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels named Lenore -
Nameless here for evermore.

And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain
Thrilled me - filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating
`'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door -
Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door; -
This it is, and nothing more,'

Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer,
`Sir,' said I, `or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore;
But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping,
And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door,
That I scarce was sure I heard you' - here I opened wide the door; -
Darkness there, and nothing more.

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before;
But the silence was unbroken, and the darkness gave no token,
And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, `Lenore!'
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, `Lenore!'
Merely this and nothing more.

Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before.
`Surely,' said I, `surely that is something at my window lattice;
Let me see then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore -
Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore; -
'Tis the wind and nothing more!'

Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,
In there stepped a stately raven of the saintly days of yore.
Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he;
But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door -
Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door -
Perched, and sat, and nothing more.

Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,
By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,
`Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,' I said, `art sure no craven.
Ghastly grim and ancient raven wandering from the nightly shore -
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian shore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,
Though its answer little meaning - little relevancy bore;
For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door -
Bird or beast above the sculptured bust above his chamber door,
With such name as `Nevermore.'

But the raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only,
That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour.
Nothing further then he uttered - not a feather then he fluttered -
Till I scarcely more than muttered `Other friends have flown before -
On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown before.'
Then the bird said, `Nevermore.'

Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,
`Doubtless,' said I, `what it utters is its only stock and store,
Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful disaster
Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore -
Till the dirges of his hope that melancholy burden bore
Of "Never-nevermore."'

But the raven still beguiling all my sad soul into smiling,
Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird and bust and door;
Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking
Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore -
What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore
Meant in croaking `Nevermore.'

This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing
To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom's core;
This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining
On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamp-light gloated o'er,
But whose velvet violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o'er,
She shall press, ah, nevermore!

Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer
Swung by Seraphim whose foot-falls tinkled on the tufted floor.
`Wretch,' I cried, `thy God hath lent thee - by these angels he has sent thee
Respite - respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore!
Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe, and forget this lost Lenore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

`Prophet!' said I, `thing of evil! - prophet still, if bird or devil! -
Whether tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,
Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted -
On this home by horror haunted - tell me truly, I implore -
Is there - is there balm in Gilead? - tell me - tell me, I implore!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

`Prophet!' said I, `thing of evil! - prophet still, if bird or devil!
By that Heaven that bends above us - by that God we both adore -
Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn,
It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels named Lenore -
Clasp a rare and radiant maiden, whom the angels named Lenore?'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

`Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!' I shrieked upstarting -
`Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plutonian shore!
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!
Leave my loneliness unbroken! - quit the bust above my door!
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!'
Quoth the raven, `Nevermore.'

And the raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;


And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming,
And the lamp-light o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted - nevermore!
Edgar Allan Poe, 1845.

I wish I could encounter and engage with the raven perched on my chamber door more often than I can. I wish I could devote myself to reading Poe more frequently than I do. I wish I could read 'quaint and curious volumes of forgotten lore' for a living. I wish, I do wish.

I had checked the meaning of 'errata' in Chambers online dictionary only a little while ago but now, i can only vaguely recall the meaning. It has something to do with making errors.
Yesterday, I had began reading Pessoa's 'Death of Ricardo Reiss' and had learned the meanings of a number of words associated with the sea-prow, gangplank, quay. I have already forgotten how to use them in sentences. English is increasingly becoming alien to me; the language baffles me more and more, it disappoints me. Do i suffer from Dyslexia?

Feminism, the Sex Pistols and…nothing!

A youngish woman sits by a desk in a small room reading a thick volume that bears the title ‘_ Companion to Philosophy’ on its cover. She seems thoroughly engrossed in reading but every once in a while, she nods her head in a peculiar, dromedary-like manner. On a laptop on the desk, music blares.
She presently begins to shake her head vigorously but rhythmically to the tempo of The Eleven by the Grateful Dead which is playing on her laptop. She evens puts the book away and stands up; she begins to dance. But it is not really dancing what she is doing-she is gesticulating with her hands raised over her head which she nods in the same fashion, reminding one of a camel. The next song which plays on her laptop is The fish cheer by Joe Mc Donald and then plays, Because the night by Patty Smith. She continues her gesticulations through the next songs My Baby by Janis Joplin and God save the queen by The Sex Pistols. As the vocalist croons ‘No future, no future…’she gleefully yells out those words too at the top of voice.
It seems as if she is imagining herself to be at a concert.
She is dressed in a pair of faded, baggy trousers and an equally washed out t-shirt with the image of a man printed on it. The man’s eyes are shut and his mouth is covered and next to this rather curious image are the words, ‘Martin Niemoller, concentration camp detainee in Nazi Germany’. The t-shirt is very loose too but it is still obvious that its wearer is extremely thin. Her hair looks unwashed and disheveled and her face, though clean, looks woefully pale and plain as it has no makeup on it. Her eyebrows- very thick and dark and almost masculine- are rather conspicuous in her otherwise nondescript face. If visage is the mirror to the soul, then she seems to be a hippie at heart. As a matter of fact, if one scrutinizes the glass covered book case on the wall next to the desk, one would find copies of poetry of Allan Ginsberg and On the Road by Jack Kerouac. No wait! The copy of Collected poems by Ginsberg is on the desk itself next to The Book of Evidence by John Banville and a bunch of print-outs of what seem like academic papers; the page on the top has the title Immigrant as pollutant.
As the song Society by Eddie Vedder begins to play, she returns to her chair and resumes reading. She reads without any movement of body or head for another fifteen minutes or so during which more songs featured in the movie In to the Wild gets played.
When suddenly the lull gets broken and Stayin Alive by BeeGees gets played, she jumps out of the chair and moves her long, narrow fingers as if she playing her invisible guitar with passion. She also increases the volume of her music player which soon causes her much vexation. A middle aged lady suddenly appears at the door of the room.
“What are you doing? Do I not tell you all the time that this is not your college hostel or your rented flat? This is our house and you cannot play all these strange music in such a loud volume.” The lady scowled and reproached the woman in the discoloured t-shirt with Martin Niemoller’s image printed on it.
“But it’s only eleven o’clock in the morning and it’s a Sunday. It’s not eleven at night.”
“Yes, you are right-it’s a Sunday. Have I not told you hundreds of times to bathe early on holidays? What perverse pleasure do you get in resembling a vagabond? What would our relatives and neighbours think if they see you in this condition? “
“I don’t care about people who are so stupid as to judge me on the basis of my clothes.”
“You don’t, do you? Well guess what, I care and I will ensure that you do too.” The middle aged lady said menacingly and then added in a softer voice,” Do you realize you have not had your breakfast yet? You complain that I lose my temper too often but what option do you leave me with but to get angry when you behave in such thoughtless, sloppy manner? Now, go and bathe and then have breakfast. I have made egg rolls today.”
“But why did you? I mean good for you that you made them but am not going to have them. You know that I have turned vegetarian. I am not going to eat eggs.” The youngish woman looked resolved to oppose this time.
“Ah! Practice vegetarianism when you stay alone in Bombay. I have brought you up on a diet of fish and eggs and meat; you have to eat them here. “
“But I don’t want to, ma. “
“Don’t argue with me now.” The lady reprimands the woman again. “Turn off the unbearable noise immediately and go to the bathroom now.”
The woman storms out of the room, looking indignant.
The song which is now playing is the We are the Sleepyheads by Belle and Sebastian but the stern lady closes the music player on the laptop and she shuts the tome which the woman has been reading; the title of the essay which she has been reading is Feminism and Philosophy.

Femininity

Makeup caked my face giving it a pasty, ghoulish appearance. I had painted my lips garishly red and put an excessive quantity of kohl in my eyes as well. I had also draped myself up in a golden hued sari which shimmered under bright lights. The bangles in both my scrawny hands jangled as I walked while my thin neck hurt because of the unwonted weight of the heavy gold necklace that was dangling from it. I had worn high heeled sandals and donned new, elaborate coiffure-things I had never done before.
The view that the mirror had presented when I stood before it was dreary-I could be either a woman of the street or a lady of an ultra-conservative, affluent and patriarchal household. I was not sure I wanted to resemble either but I was determined to appear in public dressed in this fashion. I wanted to find out for myself if by dressing up in the conventional, feminine fashion, made me feel feminine-a feeling that had eluded me for the eighteen years that I had spent with the gender identity of ‘woman’. I, thus, attended my cousin’s wedding last summer to evoke the femininity latent in me. As I walked besides my mother into the hotel banquet hall where the wedding reception was held that evening, I was determined to not feel awkward or embarrassed of my gaudy appearance. Women are supposed to exude feminine charm by being graceful and pretty and since it is widely believed that cosmetics, ornaments and a winsome smile are what women need to assert their beauty and grace, I decided to test their efficacy under my mother’s experienced guidance.
I had not been in the party for even ten minutes when I became aware that several pairs of eyes were on me. My aunt-the groom’s mother-came up to us and said, “Nalini, is that you? Oh you look so grown up and beautiful! The sari is suiting you well too. Your mom cannot complain that you have pathetic dressing sense anymore.” She grinned and began talking to my mother, in whose smile I thought I saw, a hint of pride. Maybe she would finally forgive me for turning up at the last family function in clothes which I had deemed to be appropriate for the occasion but which, according to her, had made me look little better than a rag-picker amidst all my well dressed relatives.
My other aunt-mother’s younger sister-inspected me now from head to toe and commented, “Did I not tell you that you are actually not bad looking? See how you have been transformed into a pleasant and attractive young lady with a little effort! Do you feel the difference?” She asked me, sounding triumphant.
“No, I don’t feel any difference yet. But these things take time; how different is it from Buddha’s enlightenment? I am sure that I would start feeling like a lady soon. Thanks, aunt.” I replied, smiling what I felt was my most alluring smile and went ahead to find myself a place to sit because my legs had already began to ache. I heard say as I walked past her, “Don’t jump around in the sari.”
This aunt of mine loved me dearly-she had given me the enlightening advice after I had refused to accept an expensive salwar kameez as a present on my last birthday-and had instead asked for a volume of Poe’s works-that to feel like a woman, one needs to behave like a woman. “How exactly does one feel when one feels like a woman?”I had asked her. She and my mother had exchanged glances and then she, with the air of a detective on the verge of unraveling a mystery, said, “Dress up well first. Inculcate grace and behave with a polite restrain and soon you shall know, what it feels like to be a woman.”
Thus, at the wedding I had turned up dressed up as well as I could in expensive raiment and behaved with as much as I could with what I imagined feminine grace was and waited to begin to feel like a woman. I heard the enraged voice in my head telling me that I look ridiculous. It said caustically, “How can make up and gold arouse femininity in you? What the heck is femininity anyway?”
“Femininity is grace and poise, I think-qualities which young ladies in my position should possess.” I replied.
“But grace and poise are not intrinsic qualities like honesty or intellect. They manifest only in one’s demeanour and one can fake one’s public deportment. This in turn means, one can pretend to be graceful and stuff. How can anything that be faked be an essential quality of a woman? I still don’t know what femininity is!”
“You are right, I think. But I cannot listen to you now. Let me give my mother and aunt a chance and maybe, we would discover what it is to be a woman.” I replied to the voice that loved Emilie Dickinson and Wilkie Collins and just like me, was eighteen years old. I was engrossed in conversing with the voice in my head when Tina, my sixteen year old cousin also dressed in a sari, walked up to me and said, “Why are you sitting alone, looking all confused?” Before I could say anything in reply, she said sounding suddenly gleeful and excited, “Guess what has happened? A couple of guys-they are cousins of the bride-just asked little Toby about you! I have already spoken to them; they are engineering students. They are really funny and one of them is very cute. You have to speak to them. Come with me!”
I was taken aback but I was pleased with what I heard-was I becoming ladylike, finally? Men have never asked about me; in fact, I was not sure what were they asking about me. “What did they ask Toby?”, I said to Tina.
“Oh, the normal stuff. They asked your name, your age, if you are related to the groom, and what you study. Ah, they just passed by. Look at the two guys near the window to your right!”
I looked in the direction at which Tina pointed and saw two boys, maybe in their early twenties, glancing at us. I felt perplexed and heard the voice again, “So, is attracting male attention is very important a part of being feminine?” I had to wait no longer, I felt I knew what being feminine entailed. I turned to Tina and said, “Well, you know me. Tell them that I have a tooth ache and cannot speak.” My cousin looked at me, with astonishment in her mien. “You are strange!” she said and left. “You may tell your cute guys that too if you please.” I replied as she walked away and then the realization dawned on me that to be feminine, is to bear on one’s shoulder the encumbrance of a million pretentions-I have to be coy, graceful, charming and look beautiful in a way that would make men ask about me. “Do you want to be that?”The voice asked. “No, it’s too heavy a burden. I am happier being free to look clumsy, to behave awkwardly and to brood without having to talk to men simply because they are cute. I am happier being me, unfeminine and unattractive!” I and the voice soon started discussing how we had both day-dreamed that very afternoon about living in Murshidabad during the period of political turmoil which followed Nawab Siraj ud Daula’s defeat against the East India Company at the battle of Plassey. I thought I heard some other voice-probably that of my mother saying, “Oh there is Nalini! She is staring blankly again.” But I paid no heed-I and the voice were already courtiers displeased with the inaptitude of our new Nawab, Mir Jafar!

From you, I never could look away
Just like the besotted hero in a Hindi flick
To you, I never could make myself say
Just like the heroine of old Hollywood movies-coy , meek

I thought I shall dream of you
Just as do the women in Mills & Boon novels
I thought I shall pine for you
Just as do the singers in the videos as their faces grovel

Am I in love with you?
Or with the lonely lover due
To whom thrives the culture factory
Am I in awe of your beauty or of the powers refractory ?

Of the ghost of the culture consumer that has possessed me!

Conversation

Clitoris.
Oh! Oh no! read the apology on my face, my friend
It’s so common a word, I know
Yet I cannot, at this moment, recall its meaning
Yet I cannot, at any moment, claim I know its meaning.

Do not glare at me, do not
let me see disdain flicker in your eyes
So what if I have never used it in a sentence?
I know what lummox means and that you think of me to be one

I knew what procrastination means at thirteen when
I had mentioned it as my hobby in a class-mate’s slam book
And crepuscular was what I whispered to myself
Before I began day-dreaming during school recess.

Ah! Do I see a ghost of a smile on your lips?
Just like the one I had seen on my mother’s when
One afternoon I had asked if she knew who a valetudinarian is
And she replied that she did not.

Do not smother your laugh please
For I am not upset at all, I
Who slept with the lexicon by my pillow
Who called a bully curmudgeonly once in the playground

For I never have indeed looked up the meaning of clitoris.