Bibaswan Maharana

                                                       जो बातें इतनी होती हैं चाय पर ,  तो क्यूँ न दो बातें हों " चाय " पर ?    देखो आखिर तो क्या है चाय में , यही कुछ आम सी चीजें। चाय की पत्ती , दूध , चीनी , पानी बस इतनी सी ही तो बात है। पर जो लगाओ दिल चाय से , तो समझ आता है अदरक , इलायची , दालचीनी ये सब भी तो आते हैं उस एक चुस्की में। यानि साहब , देखें तो मिलता जुलता सा है चाय जिन्दगी से। बाहर से देखो तो बस वही काम धाम , हिसाब किताब , लेन देन , सोना उठना , हंसना रोना , पर जो हो दिल्लगी जीने से , तो तमाम एहसास , गिले शिक़वे , प्यार , मोहब्बत , शिद्दत , फितूर , उरूज़ , जवाल , सफ़र , ठहराव ... ये सब भी तो हैं हिस्सेदार ज़िन्दगी के।     तो जब इतनी गहराई तक समझा गया है जान को , जिन्दगी को ... तो फिर चाय को क्यों नहीं भला ? ...

T he book slept... The smell rose... He abruptly shut the chattering pages down. All silence, all calm. His fingerprints registered themselves on the rim of his window while he allowed the entry of an arcane. Someone, too far from the knowledge of existence had been trying hard to reach him.    Pivoting his body on the stiff arms anchored to the cold Steel of the railing, he successfully attempted to get the weight off his feet. He raised his eyes amidst the immediate darkness to find some distant lights. Lights that twinkled on some floor of that city building were at least a few kilometers away. That mere twinkle, with a sign of someone knowingly breathing through the night, made him look over there, alluring him to search for some life. The rays of someone's sleepless bulbs managed to pull up glitter in his dry eyes, which were now harvesting moisture from the air!   It took a few hours and many minutes for the number of distant lights to go off one by one. Working the...

Everything fell into the deepening dead-end for every possible question thrown at him and manifested as “Orphic” at the doomed entrance of the start. Each reason that remained ferly for people had dressed up as an expergefactor for the tired desires of life this noceur was leading. Gathering the remains of his now-dead emotions, he took the funeral stage to the city of lost voices and few chosen absquatulate(s). The ashes of his living-dead love were knotted to his dried pupils and the last-breathing desires were stuck to his mapping feet, which said goodbye to the downhill a long time ago.    Searching his way through the constantly distracting burble of the Koshi river his uncombed hairs and unsettled heartbeats finally found their respective existences on the peak of Kanchenjunga. The reveries he had cultivated on the barren dark soil of his infertile love and the quench misspelled as hiraeth got their rooms on the freezing altitude of the mountain that had aggressively agr...

  Not all the doors open to rooms full of lights; some just end up leading you to a dimly lit little space, cozier than any known limits of comfort, a corner of the house that I call my home. It had things magically crafted into my shape as if all those pens, pillows, curtains, small lights, quills, papers, windows, and the little gap which graced the allowed interruption of zephyr during the sleepless nights and sunlight during the lazy mornings were made for me… as if the personified leftovers of my last love have customized everything for the longing needs of my unconscious-self to feel lovelorn! Stepping on the cold marbles of the cimmerian graveyard of my eternal secrets, I mailed a xeric look that asked forgiveness from all those inky souls and bamboo extracts which were my oxygen till lately when I stopped breathing words. All my blank pages were left twattling with the wind gushing in from the half-closed window and there sat my spine hugging the painted sand atoms of the c...

Art by: Subash Chandra Maharana He had left the windows open that night. It wasn’t normal as the calendar read “12 December” in bold red, studded on a picture of a snow bed in some far off place he already had a Saudade for. Supine was he on his ages-old bed that squeaks every time he tries to find some comfort. Motionlessly, there he was lying, almost like a carcass but having a pulse still strolling in some vein of his body. The body named Akshit and that feeble pulse, named, Ziva. Turning around he spotted some stars through the gap his window provided him, a gap that allowed him to keep a track of a syzygy, hoping that would justify his love. Just then, that happened, suddenly, abruptly, and in a trice! Yeah, that epoch slid down the path from maybe a star he stalked each night and hugged him. A past, a name, a soul. In those dark memory lanes that his brain had, a street graced incandescence. That pulse got a bit stronger and with a throb reached his heart. He could no more find t...

  It never happened before. Its occurrence gave me many thoughts. Thoughts that worried me. Worry about losing what I loved the most. I had been trying to write a poem. A poem which was more of an elflock decorated in some corner of my messed up life, a corner which had him, a corner that sheltered him. Yes, the poem was for him. Annoyed and irritated on my inability to complete that poem, I made my self some tea and dragged my body to the balcony. My lips kissed the hot rim of the cup and then with that one sip which wasn't only a sip but satisfaction that hugged my soul. My eyebrows gently relaxed and uncurled. A psithurism gently brushed my tangled hairs and my eyes were still shut. This ethereal feeling just threw to a place, far off. I was so lost that I couldn't even sync my hand which had the cup with the lips that waited for yet another sip. Eyes opened, and opening them wasn't a choice but a necessity. My eyes then helped   my lips to reach the cup yet again. I t...

BY- BIBASWAN MAHARANA In this world full of sane people there was a street, well known for an insane one. That road took me to my destination every day. For a psychologist of 27, unmarried there was never any reason to reach home early. I was new to that city. And yes, even psychologists do feel lonely. But much to my delight I had got a case to study. A case which was never enrolled in any hospital. A case that roamed around in the city just like hundred others. Everyday while coming back from the hospital I would pack my food from a biriyani stall. Again, it’s just a lie that bachelors cook. On my way I would see him strolling here and there with his mental disorder just like a child does with his/her favorite doll. Then one day I decided to pack two food packets, one for me and the other one for him. My bike slowed down and seeing me get off it, he came to me. Didn’t ask for anything just looked at me, actually staring is the word for it. “What’s your name?” I asked. “umm... B...

                                                                            -BY BIBASWAN MAHARANA Disappointment was engulfing him just like dark clouds engulf a white sky. Umm .. what next .. rain? Yeah next is rain. On one side it was rain of water and on the other side it was of broken expectations. Well what do we do when it rains? We can open an umbrella and protect ourselves or we can just accept the rain as it is and get soaked. Akshit too wanted to open the umbrella, but he could not find it. Naina knew where it was but she stayed silent. For him, a long conversation was meeting an end. Everything was just ...