The Philosophy Cafe
December 10, 2007 | Filed Under life's answers | 2 Comments
The philosophy cafe is just two buildings away. What happens inside, one doesn’t know too well. Though you might call in to complain about the noise. Of course, that is a mistake. Calling in just adds to the matter to discuss. It also probably says that someone is jealous.
I had a great time, yesterday, at the cafe. The only coffee that we drank, was towards the end and it was just a drop of San Andre’s Coffee Liqueur. I had some really fine people around me. And ever since yesterday, people have been asking where I found them. Well I could say that like people collect coins and stamps, I collect people, and then I show off. Or I could tell you the truth, I bumped into them and it has been a happy accident. And yet there are those who don’t believe in serendipity.
There were a lot of things going around. The punch – Sangria – with lots of people helping in to cut the fruits. And all of it got over, almost all of it. Almost all of the 4 litres of it. And then the cafe didn’t require coffee. Things were spoken. People said things that would make Aristotle, Plato and Nietzsche proud. Of course, most world problems were solved. No problem is too hard to solve in the Philosophy Cafe. I am not kidding. Na na, I really ain’t kidding. In fact if you find two fighting fools, send them to the Philosophy Cafe, we’ll screw up their heads for good. All they will then think about is peace and love.
Yes, it probably reminds you of the 60s era, the hippies, rock and roll, and stuff like that. But the essential difference is that the people here are not rebels. They could be if you give them shit, but mostly they aren’t.
Of course being in there is a little bit like being in a bubble of reality or unreality. And when you are out of it, the things are different, way too different. No one really wants to take your solutions. But then again, it is a long road ahead. The Philosophy Cafe does not care about ultimately living the thoughts discussed, it only thinks about selling coffee, which is not really served. A weird paradox but that’s how it is.
So when are you turning 30?
Dissolved
December 3, 2007 | Filed Under Poetry, Travel, life's answers | 1 Comment
You can find me wandering at Rabindra Sadan.
Countless trains will come and go.
Not me.
I am not a train, neither a traveler, nor a passerby.
I have come home, into the shadow of poetry,
I seek refuge from the world of people.
Into the arms of a poet that God loved.
It isn’t a metro station.
It’s a giant painting. a painting that is alive.
The trains come and go, the people change.
Sometimes it is crowded, sometimes it isn’t.
It’s a painting that allows you in,
Let’s you be a part of the landscape, And let’s you go…
When you want to.
Not me, I am not you, I am forever here.
I swim past the words, the waves, the hills, the trees.
I swim in the rivers.
I disintegrate, and integrate as words.
The sketches, they imitate my form,
They know who I am, they smile at me.
And the people, they stumble, against me,
They walk past me without recognizing who I am.
They don’t know me, they have forgotten.
I feel offended but I forgive them easily.
They ask me for directions.
Of the outside world,
But I can’t help them, I never could.
It has been years but no one’s asked
For the direction to a poem.
No one has asked.
If someone did, I could take them there,
And show them my worth.
Sigh!
But do come to Rabindra Sadan,
Pay me a visit.
I will be waiting for you.
Right across the lines that say -
An unknown flower in a strange land speaks to the poet: “Are we not of the same soil, my lover?”