The Feel of the Beach

The waves crash upon the shore in a constant rhythm, sounding like the thunder of a storm close to home. In it I feel the thrust and recourse of the waves as they push me toward and away from the shore.

Afterward, that pulse continues living within my body. I feel the rolling of the waves pushing and pulling in the air around me. With the waves coming in, there is a stillness of the mind. The undertow brings forth a stream of ideas, quickly flowing out to sea, you try to grab onto them before they flow away under the waters lost forever making way for a new wave of stillness arriving in it’s wake. In this, many thoughts and images come from my own depths, only to be lost a moment later in the flow of energy.

The night here has a different quality. Back home, in the dark, I see black splotched with bits of red and blue. Here the nighttime has a mist of white everywhere like a shroud fogging the air. That same whiteness permeates the daylight making you feel like the veils are different colored dupattas, the red, blue and black at home and here one of white. The air teasing you with floating and tugging sensations.

The Woman That I Love

Saumya you turn 40 today. I celebrated your 30^th birthday by writing something for you. I didn’t know you on your 20^th or your 10^th, but I plan to write you a piece, wholly dedicated to you for each passing decade. I write this for you.

A Krishna Kind of Love

I know a couple where it’s often said they have a Krishna and Radha relationship. They exemplify romantic love. It has the makings of a storybook fantasy. A young girl falls deeply in love with the man of her dreams; he falls in love with her. They get married – an arranged marriage actually – it’s a smart match.

Krishna was a rake.

One Thousand Nights and One Night

ॐ । अहं षिवीय ।।
I am Shiva.
I am Ogou.

Years ago at our house, we tried to start an activity. Our activities take many forms. Sometimes it’s something we do in the living room, on the porch or in times past in front of the wood-burning fireplace. Other times, it’s sleep foreplay, a.k.a. the bedtime story. This particular activity was the classic Arabic tale of romance, One Thousand Nights and One Night. We have a fragile old four volume set that’s forbidden to leave the house. Saum started reading this to me as a bedtime story. For those of you familiar with the slim slivers taken by movies, these are beautifully complex stories. There are stories within stories within stories.

Witnessing his wife’s betrayal, King Shahryār goes beyond reason with rage killing the cheating pair in a crime of passion. He loses all faith in women and takes a new virtuous young woman each night as wife, killing her after slacking his passions. He does so for three years until he has killed all in his kingdom, all except his chief advisors young daughters.