I for Inspire!
March 9, 2010 § 8 Comments
So this is a sort of tag. Thomas came up with it and did it on FB as a note. And here is my attempt at it.
You are supposed to write down people who inspire you. It’s fun and yes you do realize a few things in between all that 🙂
Shelley and Ayn Rand.
Well guess they are sort of opposites. Yet they do meet somewhere, maybe it is at freedom of expression and well in inspiring me 😛 I came across Shelley in my 10th textbook and his Ode to the West Wind inspired me to start writing poetry. I came across Rand in 12th, when my school librarian recommended her to me. She started a new revolution within, helping me form a stronger base about myself.
Enid Blyton and Agatha Christy
I wasn’t much of a bookie, till about 4th or 5th. Like many in my gen. I was more of a cartoon and T.V. fan. But my mom somehow managed to make me start reading. While I did read a lot of different authors like Perry Mason, Hardy Boys etc, these two stood out. Fatty is one of all time favourites and am still try to learn a bit of ventriloquism. Of course the various Canines in her books might party be responsible for me not hating dogs even though I fear them. In fact I respect them 😛
While I was never a fan of Miss Marple but Poirot! I think I have finished them all. Guess the epitome of her writing was The Murder in The Orient Express. “Sex sells” but then she never wrote anything “sexy” and yet is one of the world’s most read authors.
Vikram Seth and Amitav Ghosh.
While I am tempted to add Rushdie to the list, I stopped with these two. Probably because their style and way of writing opened my eyes to a whole new world and specially a whole new way to write.
Seth’s Equal Music drew me. It also showed me a whole new world- Western Classical Music. It also opened me to a new way in which to pen emotions. His Suitable Boy, again is a classic. When I completed the book, I knew somewhere within, that I had finally learnt how to draw a complete picture.
Ghosh again is an inspiration. I can still see the way in which he introduces the heroine(think Pia was her name). I have read about 4-5 of his books and love them all. His narrative never tends to be boring and his work always seems to combine emotions, imagery and action all at the same time.
Khalil Gibran and Paulo Coelho.
Coelho thought me to believe in myself. Gibran reaffirmed the belief and sort of kindled something within.
Jonny Depp, Will Smith, Amir Khan and Kamal Hassan
One thing which will come to your mind, when you see the above list is the sheer variety of roles the above take up. Who would have thought Willy Wonka is Captain Jack Sparrow. Will Smith is a solid actor. Guess his best performance was in Pursuit of Happyness. Amir again is someone who fills the screen and brings the character to life. Kamal, well there are many memorable movies, again it’s his acting.
Heath Ledger.
Yes he gets a special mention. I have a couple of his movies. But the Joker. OMG! I was left in awe and for about a week I tried pretending to the Joker.
Tchaikovsky and Beethoven
There are many a poems which have been written under their influence. Whenever I lack the inspiration and feel downcast, I turn to these two. No words to describe them. Their music takes you along and you sway and feel the pulse and everything feels so so different.
MS Subbulakshmi
The dedication and the devotion. Music is about throwing your soul into it. She did it.
Theirry Henry, Leo Messi, C Ronaldo, Ryan Giggs and Zizou.
There are many many great players out there. And this might, really not be final list. But I like for various reasons. Henry, my favourite player. His dribbling, finishing and well the overall way he plays 🙂  Messi my second favourite. Young, fast and awesome. Timid and does unbelievable stuff. His pass to Inestia , his header in the finals. I almost sprained a leg.
Giggs, must a surprise to many who know me. But I admire him. He has been playing at the top-level since times before I was born!!  Zidane, well every knows him and I love his poise. Ronaldo, well I cannot lie. Come on, everyone tries to do step over like him. Ya I call him a ballerino, but hey! I want to try my hand at dancing too! 😛
Nadal and Justine Henin Hardenne
Nadal is pure power. He is like a bull. I only wish I could keep running like him. Henin well, she is grace, elegance and class. Some how I have never been a fan of Roger, but this lady seems to make for the class bit.
Meryl Streep
Am not much of a movie person, but some how I seem to have seen a few movies of hers. She has this thing about her. Something subtle, something that makes you notice and admire.
Calvin and Naruto
Calvin is a legend. Naruto, well it is the only manga I read. Calvin makes you realize all those small things and reminds me of the time I was a kid. Naruto well, the energy, the belief and the attitude.
-TO BE Continued-
I know, I know abrupt way to end this. But there probably are too many people who inspire me. Truthfully I am someone who looks for inspiration in everything. Probably why if someone is angry/sad, it climbs on me too. I guess I am sort of sensitive to everything around me. That’s a lot of “I”s I guess 😛 Anyway maybe I should update this list every now and then. As you can see I haven’t mentioned friends/family. There are many who would make it into such a list without second thought, but I have sort of kept it to people whom I haven’t met.
If you want to do this, you can 🙂
The poem that inspires me-ODE TO THE WEST
November 17, 2009 § 15 Comments
There is always that one thing which changes our lives. One moment which changed my life, was when I started writing poetry. I still remember that day. We had a free period and it was after the short break. And suddenly something forced me to start writing. Ever since that day the way I look at myself and the way others have looked at me has changed.
Not that I never used to write before, I did, but it was about once or twice in a year. I have no clue who or where or what I will be if not for that one single moment. And the inspiration for to pick up the pen again, ODE TO THE WEST WIND.
Of all the poems(written by others) , this one is still  something very  special to me. It was a part of our English syllabus(our 9th and 10th grade English text books were one of the best  I have ever had) . The last two stanzas- carpe diem!
If I were a dead leaf thou mightest bear;
If I were a swift cloud to fly with thee;
A wave to pant beneath thy power, and share
The impulse of thy strength, only less free
Than thou, O uncontrollable! If even
I were as in my boyhood, and could be
The comrade of thy wanderings over heaven,
As then, when to outstrip the skiey speed
Scarce seemed a vision, I would ne’er have striven
As thus with thee in prayer in my sore need.
O, lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud!
I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!
A heavy weight of hours has chained and bowed
One too like thee: tameless, and swift, and proud.Make me thy lyre, even as the forest is:
What if my leaves are falling like its own!
The tumult of thy mighty harmonies
Will take from both a deep autumnal tone,
Sweet though in sadness. Be thou, Spirit fierce,
My spirit! be thou me, impetuous one!
Drive my dead thoughts over the universe
Like withered leaves, to quicken a new birth;
And, by the incantation of this verse,
Scatter, as from an unextinguished hearth
Ashes and sparks, my words among mankind!
Be through my lips to unawakened earth
The trumpet of a prophecy! O Wind,
If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?
You can read the full poem here.
It still moves me. Â IF Â WINTER COMES, CAN SPRING BE FAR BEHIND?
The mirror shone…
March 8, 2009 § 12 Comments
And the mirror shone,with the image,
There stood the love,
There was the symbol within.
The sight was beyond might,
And the will of man,was his own.
He did belong to himself and Earth,
And those who see no face in the mirror,
Are the once who are in darkness.
Switch on the lights he did want to tell,
Yet how to address that which has no face?
That which rots will always rot,
That which grows shall always,
For you cannot be discriminated
Unless you your self choose so.
If the sky looks dull and glut,
Then the spirit shall be alight,
If it does choose to see the light within.
If the tools of men failed be perceived,
Then shall darkness have a victory,
Let the spark of solitude and the society’s
Misnomers do isolate ,in fear of itself.
That ,that curse is a gift,
That not  to belong leads to a search,
And the identity that which is googled,
Will be found,in love,in what we value.
To that we walk,we parade,
Those whose spirit is in integrity,
Who refuse to lie down
And to all that,bow,
For the sweetest rebellion
Is victorious when it seeks not to avenge
Itself in the name of revenge.
To rebel is to accept yourself
And that the face you do see,
Is not meant to be bound but free.
For in freedom alone dwells love,
For a bundle of life is in projection,
To seek the stars and greater levitation.
In dreams love does haunt
To seek the greatness so perceived,
Accidents lead to discoveries,
And so love to solution of mysteries.
Love to be alive,
And to abide to your light.
Humanity is at par with destruction when
In comparison of virtue-
Beyond that lie a very very few.
Sin is sinister and love is not a dagger,
Yet to preserve itself,shall it spill blood?
Is ale  spoiling the unspoiled to give
Negation a victory and to rejoice,
The death of our kind? Or is it the spirit
Of invention,to the man who drank it
As an unknown poison and found heaven?
Or neither but a state of natural invention,
Just so to place the mind a while away
And ultimately free from the bound day?
A metaphor to freedom?
Why is man bound?
And alone his love,with wings,
Always to be flown?
Why is it that we seek solace,
Even though we know out own face?
Now do we bind words into form
And say a noise is right,
The others utter and see your rite?
What sense of order do we see,
And beyond that what do we perceive?
Is disunity,A state of mere callous
Misinterpretation ,a stray mutation,
For us to marginalize our life?
But finally does come a day,
When we do breach innosence
And climb the ladder and pass the grey,
And into the clouds we do pass,
This a metaphoric heaven,
We seek not bliss,
But mere sense of equality-
Be valued as you are and not
What you are meant to be.
If earth was to be such,
Than a beggar will not be a king,
But to do so,must learn the arts
To raise and in character appraise,
The minds of those who fought past
The fiends,those many armed monsters,
The cruel nature of human disunity,
A stark stray-hail! OH! Hail,the society!
In spirit,realize the curiosity!
Love is such,turn on your light,
And in it you shall see the face of life,
Be bold and smile,for what you see
Is what you perceive,illusion or not,
It is a de reguier reality!
In the light of truth,
One will lead,not mere instict
But that which speaks logically,
A known or unknown tongue,
Hear it and learn to be,
Yourself and in that free!
Love yourself and forget disunity,
The world will be what it wants to be.
In scarifies and sacrilege and absurdity,
It sees joy; Then,love to be,
Be not tamed but be free to set free
the wisdom of freedom,
To the rocks,they might wake,
To restore the order of insanity.
Love is that we lend ourselves value,
And that is the end we seek,
Truth is not the end but means to an end.
The light shines the brightest
I live on forever.
November 17, 2008 § 9 Comments
Note:-The first stanza is inspired by the poem “the brook“.
And people may comeÂ
and people may go,
but in my eyes,
i live on forever.
For the world is nothing
but what i perceive
and a coloured chart
which has my blood
and my thoughts
as the hues which
lend it,its meaning.
Nothing is bigger than what i see
and nothing is smaller than what i see,
all are as free as i see them free.
Everything to me revolves around me
and imagination is a world where in
everything has its own capable need.
from nowhere descends thoughts,
except by instinct
and in it i will dwell till i go extinct.
Words are mere forms of expression
thinking the base to factual actualization.
Yet behind art lives a thought
which captivates and helps cultivate
a sense of belonging to fulfill
the aesthetic longing.
In a world of azure skies
and pretty ornaments
who skid along the vast screen-
as if my thoughts from somewhere
wanted to know the way to heaven’s street,
walk across me-the belief that though
tangential might be the senses hold,
it is what helps us tell and be told.
At that point we see and try to be
and belong to this nether land
under the sky which holds the universe
and so the horizon dream.
History in yards and yards of cloth
and palm and paper and what not,
yet nothing can be learned
unless within them they have a yearn.
Tomorrow’s life is today’s dream
and yet today we see ourselves
the harbinger of our doom tomorrow.
Every step we take
and every action we commit and help make,
we induce and refuse the forces
within which act as the futures prefaces.
In grandeur and beauty we might fall,
yet their magic lasts as long as we a part.
And when the haze disperses,
we find in our mind’s purses
that we have been spell bound
by something that was built with a pound
of flesh and ounce of blood
and beyond that the thoughts on which
the lusty past fed.
Yet in pitiable reverence we seek to praise
those who moved the stones
and covered a scar with a tattoo
instead of the thinker who
decided that it shall be made beautiful.
Want is creed essential
as belonging is vesper real.
for if not a faith be there
and if not a God to, we plead,
the only want which shall live
is that to live alone
and not the wish of some
glittering crown
nor the heart of rustic brown.
And to live we shall think
for survival is the base
and life the face,
and that face shall be clean
and serene just like
it should be-not with a hung
heart and a formless love,
but one which goes higher than the clouds.
Misery is not what your friend has
and you don’t,but what you have
and that your friend doesn’t.
Yet for the one who truly owes
there is no misery
as he is enough profound
to know what is the right sound
and in what he is bound.
Happiness is a spark
of madness ,where in the touch,
if sustained leads to joy-
wet paint
that can either portray a beggar,a saint
or a maid or a triad or natures marvelous
mysteries and life’s magnanimity.
And in joy lies my eye
past misery and history
beyond the forest of trees
and gardens of vegetables and weeds,
where all that i see,
is a sensation which transforms
into me and my hands speak for me.
For never can the eye or hand lie,
the one who is controlled self
is all but his given his soul for theft.
Freedom is not buying wings
nor is it living in poverty
but seeking the pinnacle
which within you,you see.
And for humans and life, life
will flow on and things
might never end from here on
and since my life is all
but worth a vociferous bubble’s
being,it is delight to be alive
albeit the grey illusions
that make neither day nor night.
There is only one fight
that is surely not for might is right.
Forever from the edge of a ocean
within me i travel with devotion-
to me and my proposition.
And people may come
and people may go
but in my eyes
i live on forever.
the light shines the brightest
vivaldi-spring openning
May 15, 2008 § 5 Comments
I just love this.just imagine the amount of inspiration needed to fuel this…
tagged!!!
May 7, 2008 § 9 Comments
Nita has tagged me :).I am supposed to “Think of THE song that most inspires you to write, whether it gives you an idea for a story, script or just puts you into a better frame of mind AND/OR peek into the lyrics and find a verse that sums up the theme of whatever project it is you’re working on. If possible, post a video of the song to convey to readers the full context of the song and the mood it puts you into. Finally, send the assignment to five other writers to do as well.”
i can’t choose one song,so i think i will post one from each language.
hindi:-azeem-o-shahenshah
lol,this song makes me feel all royal and passionate.I tend to write something fresh and fast when i listen to this 🙂 and this is one of the few hindi songs fro which i know at least a little bit of the meaning.
tamil:-Kurai ondrum Illai( i don’t have any wants/problems)
this is my fav tamil song.I just can’t stop listening to this.I tend to write something more serious when i listen to this.
english:-Flipsyde-spun and someday
it was tough to choose from all the coldplays,metallicas,maidens,floyds,linkin parks and a zillion other….but i love this song(and also flipsyde and someday by flipsyde).They get me all serious and rappy.