Character

The priest preached honesty through morality and taught that it is important to not lie to others. The philosopher taught that utmost, it is important to be true to one's own self. The wise disciple did not remain confused between the two, but understood that both truths, when imbibed as one helped him grow as a better person. Philosophy taught him wisdom, principle taught him integrity. He chose to remain true to himself for personal enrichment. He also chose honesty with others, especially his dear ones, not for any reasons of ritualistic morality, but because when he said he loved them, he gave them a commitment and believed they have a right to know. They should know.

Her Weakness

She Is Not Strong. She Gets Spooked Easily And Is Afraid Of Almost Everything Unusual.
She Is Not Strong. She Cries For The Smallest Of Things That Prick Her.She Gets Hurt Easily.
She Is Not Strong. She Has A Heart That Melts Easily And Lets The Words Of Its Language Flow Into Forgiveness.
She Is Not Strong. She Is Scared Of People, Of Being Accepted,Yet She Knows She Must Express Herself And Not Let Her Individuality Dissolve In Conformation.
She Is Not Strong. She Values Her Friends And Ends Up Allowing Them A ''Second'' Chance Over And Over Again.
She Is Not Strong. She Believes That Truth Can Be Bitter And She'd Rather Not Say Anything Than Say Something Hurtful.
She Is Not Strong. She Finds It Difficult To Resist Herself Whenever She Feels A Need To Speak From The Heart.
She Is Not Strong. People Are More Important To Her Than Her Ego.
She Is Not Strong. She Cannot Open Up To Others Easily, Out Of Fear That They Might Use It Against Her.
She Is Not Strong. She Gives Precedence To The Emotions Of The Heart Over The Rationalities Of The Mind.
She Is Not Strong. She May Compromise Only To Avoid A Fight, To Escape An Argument.
She Is Not Strong. She Is Not Stringent About The Rules She Lives Life By;She May Bend Them Depending On The Situation.
She Is Not Strong. In Relationships She Can Get Insecure But She Loves To A Fault And No One Loves Like Her.
She Is Not Strong. She Cries,She Accepts,She Embraces,She Forgives.
She Is Kind,She Is Discreet,She Is Sensitive.
She Compromises, She Accommodates,She Listens,She Heals.
She Loves.
Her Weakness Is Actually Her Strength Masked.
She Is Strong. She Is A Woman.

Walks of Life.

 Revisiting old lanes,strolling through avenues bygone,raking the fallen leaves of memory strewn on the parched ground, dead from years of wait, of thirst. A ground which once mothered the many happy trees, then fruitful of love,of joy...
The same land now lies dry and beaten,with the fallen dry leaves from the same green trees.

 I walk on with a heavy heart, till the sun of the next day pushes the dark clouds of gloom away and till the dawn of realisation sprays its soft light on me. Light, in which I see the experience of yesterday teaching me to enjoy life in its moments and to reminisce of past travels, not with nostalgia, but with the maturity to use them as a reference for future journeys. 

  

The Colour of Patriotism

  Mix the fervour of red and the brilliance of yellow, get saffron. With a dash of the Ganga blue and the mustard of our dharti, we get green. However, primarily, white remains unadulterated in its purity-with the chakra in its centre-a wheel rotated as one by the twenty-four spokes of each state, in the background of white peace.

 Futile quarrels and uprisings that believe in division and bring discord to this harmony are truly blasphemous to the national flag and to the nation. Jai Hind.

Happy Independence day!

The Tricolour!

Enquiry

 When you think of the 20th century,you see how distinct each decade was.With the drama of the 60's,the flamboyance of the 70's,the funk of the 80's,the coolness of the 90's,we notice each decade had a style of its own.Will the 21st century ever be able to revive the past glory of music and fashion or continue to be just the way it's been since the millennium?

  The reason for this monotony could be the boom of technology and ...well,technology.It is like a white sheet of concrete spanning the entire century!What's more appalling is to realise how indispensable it has now become for us.Even as the youth,we can clearly regret the world drifting from the wholesomeness of nature to the superficialities of excessive technology.What was once meant to aid human beings,has now made robots of them.What a pity it is to see how mechanical the world has become.It is sad to know what was originally meant to simplify lives,has actually made them complex.

Principle.

Never,ever compromise.If you have no choice,rebel.Try to change that which causes you to bend.Or try and understand if you can.Not with cynicism,but with a willingness to embrace your difficulties. But never ever give up on yourself.Trust me,you owe it to you.

The Pendulum.

  While at the Moazamjahi market today, three varied sights caught my eye. At the two extremes were the birds-free in their flight, alighting on the land and flying as they wished and just inside the arch, the vendor's cat, tied to a pole by its master; with eyes shifting focus from me, beckoning to me to unleash it; to the flying pigeons, with deep longing to exchange lives with them.
 
  Amidst them I stood as the human being-Chained by limitations, but liberated by my freedom of choice to go beyond them.

                                                                     

In Reaction...

 Women have been forced to think they're the weaker sex. Some of us become rebellious and try to prove to the world we are as good as our counterparts by being more like them.We do not need to show the world we're as good as men. By doing so, we are using men as a yardstick to quantify our greatness. Men are men.Women are women.We do not need to reach your stature to prove our equality. It is no race to ''reach'' the ''finish line'' called men. As far as we are concerned, there is no cul de sac!
                        
                                                                     

The Three Elements of Nature...

 Look at the faint beam of sunlight effortlessly streaming its way through the denseness of the clouds and the foliage, to softly alight on the rippled, but serene water, leaving it just as undisturbed as it was before their sacred rendezvous, even though they meet everyday-A contrast to humanly romance, which tends to die with time, the beauty of nature is enhanced in growth and time.

                                                                          

Have you not thought so?

When you look at me,you may see prim and proper; polite and socially acceptable; reserved and quiet; serious and philosophical; premeditated; practised; rehearsed! But I'm not any of that.I  am just another person in the world, waiting to be accepted by them..No, by herself .

                                  
  P.S- Dance into delirium. Lose yourself into oblivion! Free yourself of all your inhibitions. It's only your opinion of yourself that matters. Learn to love yourself! And do not write this off as preachy nonsense. I do make sense at times. :-)                                                          
                                                                         

The Mergence

 No poet intends to write according to the iambic pentameter,or the trochee ,or the anapaest.It's magical to note how things written from the heart and hence meant to be abstract,unintentionally find discipline in the intellect of the mind.

                                                               -By Sofiya Sujad
                                                                                           Art by Markin Andrey

Nostalgia

...there's something quaintly romantic about writing in pencil on the dried,yellowed petals of wrinkled paper.Possibly another remindful refresher to us of the beauty resting in the hue of charcoal,lamented by the scent of yore and the frailty of the parch(ed)ment ,in a world of the stern black print on the cold white screen..

                                                    

And things are not what they seem....

In an attempt at protecting ourselves from the world,most of us become introverted. Some of us,however, choose to don a different identity-these are some of our ostensible extroverts who are so protective of themselves;they don't even want to disclose they're hiding under a shell..

          
                                                                                                   
                                                              

Spontaneity ....

......is the essence of our being.

We are different people in different moments.However,the qualities we retain ,which in turn determine our 'nature' are those we have prided ourselves on and have clung on to all this while.That,in no way, changes the fact,that we are different people in different moments.

 

The artist calls it 'The Dance of Change'.

                                                                                                 -By Sofiya Sujad
                                                                               Art by Jimmy Quek Prabhakara

Solace

 Love you see,is never more for a person,or less for another.Love is no figure;no number that can be measured in words of degree.Love is just there.Or it isn't.And when it is,it is equal for all it's given to.To say,''I love someone more,'' or ''I love someone less,''is ridiculous. What is less,and what is more,let me tell you,is the degree of attachment we have for a certain person.And yes,I guess that can be measured and quite often be mistaken for the depth of one's love.

Solace.

 

                                                                                           

Unity In Duality..

 Eternity and evanescence have a very deep bond.Not that of duality,but of unity.They seem to be diverse,but are in essence one.Take the sunset for instance.Ostensibly,the sunset is ephemeral-It seems that the sun dies ,to give birth to darkness.But we fail to see that the sun dies every evening,only to be born again the next morning.The sun sets only so that the sun rises.The most beautiful things in life,appear evanescent,but are eternal.The most beautiful things cover their eternity behind a shroud of evanescence,only so that their beauty is all the more exalted while it's missed.
                                                  

Literary

 An Essay To Compare Porphyria's Lover With The Duke of Ferrara

 Even though Porphyria's lover,Porphyria's murderer and the Duke of Ferrara,husband of his latest Duchess may be unified in character through the commonality of unhealthy obsession,a love not love but mere possession,we do not fail to notice the not-so-glaring,subtle differences that make these two men distinct.


 The speaker from 'My Last Duchess' talks of his former wife with a cold,'almost' indifferent temperament(except from the deep-seated sense of ownership he has of her) and a sort of apathy for his (mis)construed fondness that his wife has for 'who-we-know-as-Fra-Pandolf'.Although he lists all the things about her that upset him,we get the impression that he's merely,very technically telling us about his disappointment in her-not deeply expressing it.His tone smacks of arrogance and coldness but is not charged with the emotion of the jealousy we expect to arise from that deep-rooted sense of possessiveness.We get to know him as a tyrant who expects his wife to be his slave ,to obey his commands at any order and give him all the attention she can and if she cannot do so,she should be ready to pay a price.The Duke,is portrayed as a
pragmatist-he expects something of his beloved;he wants her to live up to his expectations;if she cannot,she must suffer.He is very technical in approach.He is unfeeling.


 On the other hand,the lover of Porphyria is an intensely psychotic,cold-blooded,murderer.However,one cannot say that he is emotionless.He is,most definitely a person given by emotions.Correction there,given by emotion-a deepseated obsession.He is mad.He is deranged.But he has depth.The tone of the speaker in the poem 'The Lover of Porphyria' does
not sound apathetic at any point.He sounds obscenely passionate.He is driven by emotion-of love,or hate-that is debatable.This quality of his,this intensity,this passion,is the reason he differs from the Duke.


 Also,one could argue that the Duke,morally speaking,is slightly holier than Porphyria's lover for we do not know exactly what he does to the Duchess.However,we know for a fact,that Porphyria's lover murders her.


 Besides that,if one were to support the Duke,they could say that the Duke had a strong reason to punish his wife(however wrong the deed might be) -the jealousy, she'd given him ample reason
for or atleast he thought so.However,Porphyria's lover knew for a fact that he had all her love and even herself to him.The murder he so very enjoyably describes makes him sound like a sadistic butcher who has little reason to commit the sin.


 Fundamentally put,though the Duchess' husband and Porphyria's lover are united by intention ,they differ in their approach because of their nature.One is a cold-hearted tyrant of a husband,one is a cold-blooded murderer of a lover. 

                                                                 -By Sofiya Sujad

Serendipity

 When I look back, I realise that I've never intentionally searched for the things I cherish most. I've only seeked. Sure, there is a certain mystique about such serendipitous finds.

                                                 

Worth a thousand words...

Photography is art that is still.Painting is art that meanders through the colours of life.Great are those photographers who can capture the flow of life in their snapshots,for it is a talent all by itself to seize the fluidity of something that can never be still.Aah.. ''precious moments''.

                                                     -By Sofiya Sujad

When words romance thoughts...

On Love

The beauty of love is its simplicity.Its incomprehensible,indefinable simplicity.The least I can say and the most about love, is that love can only be expressed through silence.The rest,I can only express.For language is a prison that cages emotion,limiting it ;whereas silence is the closest we can get to expressing the inexpressible.

                                                 -By Sofiya Sujad
                                                  Art by Kulchitzkaya Nadezhda

Description

 Just after I've inserted the cd of a movie into the rom,I eagerly await the hourglass to vanish and click on the media player.Then I let the suspense arising out of a seemingly long wait, climax with the time-bar's disappearing and the mouse-icon's dissolving into the screen-into oblivion actually,for I watch the movie uninterrupted by any distractions.Confessions of an aficionado.

                                                                 -By Sofiya Sujad

The Clothed Fear

  You see,the problem is not with the less popular choices we want to make.No,the problem is with us. We're too scared to take chances and we're constantly trying to play safe.
 However,that in no way,condones our invalidation of the off-beat.It merely serves as a perfect disguise of our gravest inaunthenticity,fear-the fear of risk;the fear of the 'what if';the fear of failure;the fear of the odd,but utmost-the fear of being you- the fear of exposing yourself, being vulnerable...being hurt.
We're cowards ..and our cowardice is so deep,we don't even admit it to ourselves.We ..can't.We're so weak.


                                                                  -By Sofiya Sujad
                                                                                          Art by Bulanova Lyubov  

Fairly Rough

  When I make the final copy of my rough draft,I observe that I write it with a sort of numbness or maybe even a nonchalance,for it's my first draft that is a materialisation of the inspiration which got me fired to pen my sentiments down.The next moment,I seem to you know,lose that passion.I feel very apathetic while writing in fair.


                                                                                                                         -By Sofiya Sujad

On Writing

  You're a born writer does not mean that you were born with magnificent writing skills.No,it means that you born with that fire,with that passion,with that love for writing and that is exactly what makes you chisel your works with the skills you acquire whilst you mature with experience.That also,is the difference between talent and skill. Talent is innate;it is the indisciplined child of mother skill,which in turn has guided,mentored and trained her daughter with the wisdom experience has lent her.That is why,we as writers,can never be perfect,for perfection would be a stagnant state of being ,leaving us with no space or need to grow.Therefore,like  talent,we are those children who are still growing with parent skill holding our hand and guiding us towards our future.We as writers,are always evolving.
  Having said that,let me state that writers are not skillful people-they are talented people.And talent,though technically may more aptly be called the child of skill,in essence is the mother of skill,for without talent-that spark,that fervour to write,you wouldn't find the skill necessary to grow as a writer at all.You seek,only if you have the lust to find.

                                                                                                            -By Sofiya Sujad
                                                                                                    Art by Bulanova Lyubov     

Confession

In every thing I say,everything I write,everything I preach,everything I believe in,everything I stand up for,everything I fight for,I find that I've always been trying to protect myself.At the end of the day,it's just about me.It always has been so.       
                                                                        -By Sofiya Sujad
                                                                                                        Art by Budaeva Olga        

Sigh

 Somewhere,far far away,there is a place where evil cant find the bricks to build its abode;where everyone is equally and unconditionally loved;where there is everything one can ever need or want-Such was the backdrop of the picture our grandma's tales wove for us in our childhood....of  a  place we knew then,as a certain ''heaven''.We grew up,only to realise the place was not far,far away.It was childhood itself.We grew up,also to realise that now,the place really is far,far away...                           
                                                                                                                  - By Sofiya Sujad
                                                                                                                 Artist unknown

On Art Again

....on the one hand,art,you see..requires a certain scraping of wounds,excavating the past, reexperiencing all those emotions and standing naked -exposed.That,though painfully confronting,reveals the truth to you,reveals the hurt,giving you the power of bandaging it,healing it.
Art,you see,requires a certain strength...

On the other hand,art can also be profoundly cathartic-a liberation of one's bottled up pain and hence a freedom from the bondage of stifled expression. That,truly is a  feel-good experience of relief from the baggage which had bent your back and stooped you low.You regain the power of standing erect,standing strong once again.
Art,you see,gives a certain strength...

                                                                                                                       -By Sofiya Sujad.

An Essay On The Art of Life...The Life of Art.

 It is but normal to read literature,for technically, words are read.However,I live words.I love words.Having said that,I muster the courage to make a bold declaration-Everything is literature.No doubt there are various kinds of written works-from the more literary prose,poetry and drama to the less romantic -scientific,mathematical or medical literature.When you put pen to paper ,to write poems or novels or for that matter,any of those formulae, or chemical equations; statistics; numbers or even a prescription,you are actually writing .And anything written is literature.That is why it's baffling to me why these people of the (third)world run down and invalidate the importance of literature,when infact,what they exalt-those books of the sciences,themselves are nothing but literature.Strangely,what they look down at with one eye is what they glorify with the other!

   Im not here to judge technology.Im not even here to talk in favour of it.For Im trying to put forward the fundamental idea that I consider science to be a child of art, believing that art provides the root to this very useful tree of science ,which in turn bears many fine fruit for humankind. At the end of the day,I have learned  that art is in science.And science, in art.Isn't it then futile to consider them apart?Indeed,it's true what they say-There is an (in)explicable unity underlying every ostensible duality. 

  Exclusively for reasons my fellow romantics respect,let me acknowledge that art is in everything.Art,Im proud to say,is everything.

                                                                                                                     -By Sofiya Sujad
                                                                                                   Art by Khisyamova Marina

The Winged Word

 There are people who give u the wings to fly.However,there  are some who acknowledge the truth that these wings needn't be given to u.They awaken that bird in you,which though had been comfortably asleep among the cushions of habit and endurance,very willingly realises, that comfort was actually a cage where its flight had been trapped. When this realisation dawns upon it,its impassioned spirit lets go of all its shackles,spreads its wings and soars high.It claws its way out of the grey net, old habit had woven for it.Although it may face all the more perils now that it's free,it begins to live a life of liberty;a life of expression;a life of self-a life of living,a life of life! 

                                                            -By Sofiya Sujad