Travel, Tentativeness and other Travails

In the eight odd months since I quit my job (that means, technically for the last eight odd months, I didn't need to apply for leave "to go on a ride"), I have been on probably three rides.

One was to the forests near Narsapur (where incidentally M and I lost our way in lush, monsoon-replenished trees, grasses and nullahs and ended up trekking /stumbling our way for something like 5 hours before we found our Bullets), a invigoratingly good and relaxing time, but for all purposes a "small" ride.

One was to a Dhaba around 35 kms on the Nagpur highway. I was alone, just wanted to eat and drink in the sights, smells and slipstreams of an authentic trucker's Dhaba, (and also belt) so did just that. I remember this so well because I hadn't put on a jacket (this was in end November) and it was really, really cold getting back home at almost midnight. Going by the cold it was as freezing as the stretch from Kargil to Dras (no I don't mean in terms of temperatures) but still.....

One was to a friend's farm on the Shameerpet stretch for the New Year.

Apart from these three (alleged rides), zilch.

Three rides (even if we remove the "alleged" tag) in eight months would be a bit of a shame for any rider / motorcyclist / biker.

And a real big shame for me.

So let me clarify.

I did want to ride down to Jaipur for the Literature Festival. Didn't happen for a variety of reasons, along with the usual waves of (post poetry-writing) tentativeness attacking me.

I missed out on Rider Mania too, (this time near Mumbai of all places), which means I will need to wait another year before I get to see, feel and experience the magic of 500+ Royal Enfields parked (or burning rubber) together.

It didn't help at all that the Lit Fest at Jaipur and the Bullet Fest at Vikramgarh (near Mumbai) clashed, so I couldn't prioritize and choose one over the other till the last minute and ended up going to neither.

It now looks like I will be missing the Kala Ghoda Festival too (folks are traveling from today and someone has to be home and secure it for them to enjoy their travels in peace).

What this means is that in all probability, I will seriously get around to doing some (long overdue in its own way) road-related ramblings :-)

And probably some quick (ride-out-in-the-morning, ride-back-in-the-evening types) trips where hopefully all this tentativeness will fall off me, blow off me, vanish away...

One thing is for sure. I will do some cycling again, since I got the cycle repaired yesterday and rode out on it today morning. The skies were almost like those I talk of in "Unslept", but I wasn't thirsting for it to rain today and I also ventured out on a stretch that is different from that mentioned in the poem.

I was unslept though. :-)

Every morning in Africa, a deer wakes up

"Every morning in Africa, a deer wakes up. It knows it must run faster than the fastest lion or it will be killed. Every morning a lion wakes up. It knows it must run faster than the slowest deer or it will starve to death. It doesn't matter if you are a lion or a deer (or relapsed cyclist). When the sun comes up you'd better be running (or cycling)".

Reproduced in entirety -- yes, I had jotted it down on a piece of paper -- from a poster seen just above the cash counter of the Irani Cafe where I had my Chhai today morning, way back home on my first major cycle ride in a while. The little bits in the parentheses were of course not there on the poster.

To India – My Native Land

My country! In thy day of glory past
A beauteous halo circled round thy brow,
And worshipped as a deity thou wast.
Where is that glory, where that reverence now?
Thy eagle pinion is chained down at last,
And groveling in the lowly dust art thou:
Thy minstrel hath no wreath to weave for thee
Save the sad story of thy misery!
Well -- let me dive into the depths of time,
And bring from out the ages that have rolled
A few small fragments of those wrecks sublime,
Which human eyes may never more behold

And let the guerdon of my labour be
My fallen country! One kind wish from thee!

By Henry Louis Vivian Derozio (18 April 1809 – 26 December 1831)

Soil

What colour would you call that now? That brown
which is not precisely the colour of excrement
or suede?
The depth has you hooked. Has it a scent
of its own, a peculiar adhesiveness? Is it weighed,
borne down

by its own weight? It creeps under your skin
Like a landscape that's a mood, or a thought
in mid-birth,
and suddenly a dull music has begun. You're caught
by your heels in that grudging lyrical earth,
a violin

scraped and scratched, and there is nowhere to go
but home, which is nowhere to be found
and yet
is here, unlost, solid, the very ground
on which you stand but cannot visit
or know.

By George Szirtes from "The Budapest File", found on www.poetryarchive.org

George Szirtes on the poem - "Soil" takes place in England on a train journey. I was taking a ride I think from London upto Yorkshire and I looked out at the soil, the earth and I thought I recognise that colour -- where does that colour come from? And what does it mean to me? It seemed to be saying something, it seemed to be saying something and it brought to my mind the subject of belonging -- to this soil, or to that soil.

George Szirtes

"Poetry's only obligation is to the truth. Whether this truth is widely popular or not is irrelevant. It should be the best truth possible and that is the only quality that gives it any hope of survival." - George Szirtes (from www.poetryarchive.org)