To the absent presence of my muse in words...

I remember my college magazine. One of the teachers had written, 'Win each argument of life and outshine all in the many more debates to come.' It was embossed with a smiley. 

It left me wondering even then. Is life all about a debate? Are all arguments to be won? Should one always win? And is it worth the wait? The debates? Should they be debates all the time? Not that I has an answer today. Still. But it gives one a kick to think about abstractions once in a while.

Those who know me personally they knew that I had stopped writing for quite some time. Some undefined definitions hazily hovered around in my Gmail drafts, blog draft folders, tit bits in my room - some on kitchen post-its, some scribbled on random places like newspapers, note book sheets, ruined sheets to be thrown away. I encountered one today. In fact, right now. And I am suddenly struck by the idea; words are permanent but do what they express are? And if they are not, one needs to answer some very difficult and uncomfortable questions.

I have often been intrigued by the world of words. Though they seldom express the intent, they pretty much accomplish the task of the intended, if wrapped strategically. I mean ultimately, if one was to give a professional edge to the whole thing, words and expressions are always considered a model of business communication, aren't they?

What is the real idea of utterance? Is it to express or is it to hide? I am forever confused on this. If it is to express, are expressions to be taken as a permanent seal? Or are they consumed by the same degree of fluidity that time is? If it is the latter, should one ever trust what is said? And if not, what is the state of literature amidst all this? Should, as Plato says, poets be banished for they spread lies?

 I pretty much fathom that am on a free spree of random musings in my blog. Writers' block they call for accomplished connoisseur of words. But i ain't no writer and hence can't tag myself with that high sophistry. But perhaps, i realized that it is not a good block to be in. One needs to shift apartments, sometime soon enough.

Literature is a perfect place for intellectual bash. I mean one can drink words like a fish, date the fanciest of characters, fantasize about all the alternate realities and build a different world for oneself out there. But then all that is a lie, isn't it? Based on some writer's mental ecology, one shapes up one's own imagination and occupies a tenancy of borrowed mindscape for quite some time, till that space is broken down and an abyss emerges craving more of such an existence - very much like Plato's idea's of poetry. 

The point is, should one value lies in life just as one hails truth? Is it some kind of a mental and psychological hangover and paralysis like the constructs of various'-isms' still that we wish to put truth above lies all the time? That is again a hierarchy generated by the scores of centuries past in time? Should we continue to be a slave to that code too? And what is truth after all? Yours or mine? 

 I have often encountered questions of morality and moral behavior. Just as much i hate this duplicitous discussion itself, the same keeps coming back to me in myriad shades of grey. I wonder if issues of morality themselves are immoral? I mean they always engage you with an agenda of a particular assertion. Is it not immoral to be falsely implicate a flawed premise of honesty to get one’s idea addressed? 

  Words do exactly that. Literature does exactly that. It plays on the psychic machinations of mind and accomplishes what it wants to accomplish. TOI will report the same news as The Hindu and Indian Express. But the imports in all the three are classically different. Who are we then? Mere stone faced consumers of what is being fed? Should we burn down all that's there? Because nothing, absolutely nothing seems genuine.

No. I advocate no hope of reconstruction. There is nothing called hope. And nothing that can be re-constructed. Hope is delusional. And either what is not, be created or what is, be destroyed. One has the choice of just working on the constructed to make it sublime and beautiful.

This brings me back to the well wished words etched on my college magazine. Debates happen all the time around us, inside us. Is it always necessary to take sides and see things as either/or? Doesn't the grey area of subliminality exist anymore? Is it always about either you are with me or against me? If it is, life indeed is a fierce debate. But for hungry souls who wish to devour each fine nuance of what is, debates become too narrow a way of life. Sometimes, it is not always the hormonal rush of victory but the sweet pain of loss which fuels further hope. And yes, to answer my own question, then it is worth the wait. The many more debates I mean.

             

Life always comes as an installment. And to pay each in and within time and move on is the best way to save oneself from heavy future debts.