The Blind’s Blind

A passenger travelling in a train sat at the last window seat, alone. The characteristics pertained that he was blind. His stick lay beside him and the eyes were unaffected by the bright sun. Everyone who traveled in this train with him knew about him. He was blind by eyes but knew everything there was to know about the train. 

The life was ever evolving in the city through which the train was now passing and with that a new station had also been made for the train to stop. This station brought a new daily traveler with it. In hopped a girl boarding this train for her school. She entered the coach and sat on the lonesome seat beside the blind man.

The journey ahead was of a comfortable two hours and the season was of a warm and bright sun. The sunlight kept flowing through the glass directly onto the girl. This disturbed the girl and she started to moan and adjust herself against the sunlight. The moan was heard by the blind man and he swiftly put down the blind of the glass window to shield from the sunlight. The girl thanked the man, and when her station came, she left.

The next day dawned and it was time to go to school again. She boarded the same train and sat on that same seat. To her astonishment the blind man greeted her instantly with a “good morning”. On observing keenly she found that the blind had already been put down to shield her from the sun’s light.

This was surprising, if not astonishing, and she felt extremely thankful and happy to meet such a kind man.

A conversation began between the two of them and all sorts of old to new stories came and passed. The chat ended with the blind man informing her that the station for the school had arrived.

Another day of school led to a newer surprise. They were sitting quietly when a simple-minded kid came to sit at the seat ahead of them. The blind man immediately warned the kid that the seat was broken. Some moments later an angry person came into the coach and was about to sit on that seat when the blind man warned not to sit. Paying no heed to the warning the person sat on the lovely seat and down went the seat to the floor of the train.

Many days passed and many little incidents happened during the train travels. One day the little girl got down at a stop close to the forest before the school and she did not come for a whole week.

The attachment with the girl worried the blind man and he too got down at that forest stop to search for her. Lost he went in those woods as never again was he seen by the people of the train including the little school girl who came back another week later.

The blind elder man had crossed over his blind…..

© Aditya Subramanian, 2020

The Tune Up

The illuminating glow of the room was filled by the fluorescent light. A creamy door with a contrasting dark grey ribbon strip running through its center opened ajar and flurried up with people. A chair situated in the room with a person sitting and holding in the hands a pear-shaped instrument with some lines of strings. The touch of the soft hands strummed the instrument with an even softer feel.

The sound vibrated from the instrument to the ends of the room filling everyone with awe. The calmness of the vibration stopped suddenly with an out of rhythm tune. The tune was a rhythm in itself like the letters of the alphabet and to others it was nothing but a string of gibberish words.

The player felt a bit of softness for the tune. The feeling was enough to change that overpowering yet fragile mind to tune the new words up. While the others rubbished about it being non-rhythmic, the player silently wrote up a beautiful string of these words in the mind.

Out came a few of these like a soft creamy flow of chocolate and to others it was like the hardness of a frozen bar. Slowly a few more strings came out and the layer of soft and hard closed out to each other gradually. The words now had a successful rhythmic effect.

A bounce here and a slide there was the general feel.

The slow yet gradual tune up was a beautiful experience. It was like writing a story having the adventure of a child to the thrill of an elderly, from the loudness of a crowd to the silence of the air, from the softness of a clear-writing to the curiousness of a shabby-writing, and from a mysterious start of a play to a clean ending of it.

The simple new words said all there is to say in a different way. The crowd applauded at the silent and serene ending tone in a light-hearted sway. The people left the room. The light was turned off and the door was closed.

The instrument lay on the chair to rest……as the tune up was complete.

© Aditya Subramanian, 2020

The Green Ceiling

A small forest lay in front of the viewer’s eyes. The person walked into the center of the forest, which he knew perfectly, oblivious of the surroundings. Upon reaching the center he started to observe.

Tall trees with lots of branches stood like a great hallway in all directions. The many leaves sticking out of the branches covered as a ceiling with contrasting shades of green forming almost perfect semicircles. It now looked more like a forest of green hallways with thick brown cylindrical standings.

The third dimensional effect of this world made leaves feel like having troughs and crests. At first the sight simply seemed like a big wavy green hill. Sunlight was scattering at places making it feel like borders of large hilly lands. Sometimes a few leaves fell due to the breeze and more sunlight passed, and thereby, signaling new lands being formed. The leafy crests and troughs formed buildings and rivers.

The winds constantly shifting the leaves and making the ceiling form new different lands. Walking in any direction made new lands appear each time. Sometimes a light breeze made few leaves look like small creatures roaming. A fast one made it feel like a jet moving at supersonic speed. Once it was even followed doggedly by the eyes ending only because the jet had lost fuel. The jet’s sound remained unheard by the viewer….

Tiredness took toll and the viewer lay down on the grass. An hour later the eyes opened with renewed vigour. The lands, jets, and buildings were gone and it was all again a ceiling of green. The sunlight now dimmed and evening shades passed through leaf-gaps. Many leaves had fallen down and made lots of different borders. Abstract drawings became visible, all filled with shades of green.

A green dragon, a green hammer, or some other object filled with green with dark borders all around. The voice of the viewer trailed meaninglessly as it tried to pronounce the words “dragon” or “hammer”. To the eyes they were only shapes.

The buildings it perceived were cuboids and the rivers some wavy shapes. The eyes tried hard to perceive the world outside the forest but it seemed only like cuboids or circles, or other basic shapes.

Confusion lay around in the viewer’s clear mind.

Why did the eyes love to roam and observe this forest of leaves each day the most??

© Aditya Subramanian, 2020

The Commander’s Army

A great day for them it was. They had come out successful in their battle without a scratch on any one. The huge commander sat down and arranged his team in a straight line to have a look at them. The commander observed his victorious team from left to right.

A creature with big yellow boots and wearing bright red shorts with big round black ears was standing first with a smile. His left hand covered with a white glove was gesturing in the direction of the other team members.

Next, in the team was an animal bigger than a dog but smaller than a horse having a big mouth. Third in the row was a ninja with a sword, big round body armor, knee caps, and a scarf over his bald head.

Fourth was a skinny boy with nice brown shoes, wearing school dress, and a long pointy nose. Passing on came a big fat monster who had ears like trumpets. His laugh echoed in the whole area. The sixth was a small plump animal with a long snake like nose, strong legs, a cute pair of eyes and the large ears used for flying.

Second last on the list seemed half dragon and half donkey with dark chocolate body and small wings. Last but not the least was a tall, slim, man with a cowboy hat and big brown boots. His face was hidden by the shadow of his big hat.

The unique team of eight summed up the commander’s victory.

The kid (commander) clapped around with enjoyment at the team’s effort.

© Aditya Subramanian, 2020

The Caged Lonely Tree

It seemed like a round open cage. The cage was made up of the surrounding forest of trees. Each tree was of different hues and varieties. The clouds moved with their slow and usual pace. The center circular area was filled with glowing green grass. The greenish glow being reflected due to the sun’s observing light.

There were some small bushy areas in that circle. They formed a concentric inner circle when looked from above.

At the center of this cage was a single lonely tree. It seemed like it was autumn as the old leaves were scattered around this area. So the light, glowing, green grass around here was covered with equally dark, glowing, green old leaves. This seemed to give a monochromatic greenish view from above.

The big lonely tree which it was hid two cannons of war under its shade. It hid them from the sun’s light and the moving clouds using the fallen leaves as cover. The sun and the clouds only saw the monochromatic view from above.

This was the autumn season. The sun and the clouds were bored with the monochromatic-ness. They were also curious as to what was hidden underneath this lonely tree. They knew that trees were meant for shading and they had seen what other trees hid under them. They saw animals, birds, travelers, and other objects.

Slowly the old leaves of the big lonely tree gave way for new colours for the sun and the clouds to see.

The view was not monochromatic anymore. Now, there were two big cannons. Each cannon had two huge chocolate coloured wheels with light greyish metallic cylinders held by the wheels. The two new colours shone brilliantly with the green monochromatic leaves.

The viewers were amazed by the sight. The big old tree was not lonely after all as it had two bright friendly cannons guarding it.

Now the picture seemed clear. The cage like area was actually the home of this big single tree. It was not its cage but its castle. A cage it was to the others.

© Aditya Subramanian, 2020

The Un-forgiven Road

The man walked as he used to walk. This was the day he came over a road. It was like in his dreams. The trees and other roadside stuff crept up with the flashing red lights. The greyish of the road seemed new and wet. Then the uninvited events happened. The dust settled fast on the road. Its make was getting old month by month, year by year. The beautiful trees beside it rusted and grew old and weak like it.

It had not been trodden over for years and it was devoid of any wetness as rain ignored it and its surroundings. Its length was pretty long but even a walk on it was scarce. This made the road sad each day as it longed for someone or something to come. Even the animals and birds neglected it and the nearby trees.

This man carried a book and was walking on this road. A really hot wind blew and with it a lot of dust. The dust caught up with him and he lost a few pages as the book fell. These flew over and rested itself on the road.

The road did not seem to notice at first but then as a few more pages flew with their flapping noise and then it became aware of its surroundings.

It looked up to see at the papers laying all over it. It told a tale of a road all broken and tired which was where it the “new” road was made. That old road had had many mis-happenings like death, accidents, and many others like them.

The new road had been made on its place with a new feeling and vigour that people may be encouraged by the newness but all seemed hopeless as people feared this path and in years forgot about it.

The man knew about this and so had come here to cheer up this lonely road and to see its unreasonable and sad plight. He bowed down and collected his papers. The moment he touched the road he could feel its sadness.

Suddenly, tiny drops of water fell from what felt like clouds of heavy matter and slowly the rain poured with gentleness and might. The weak plants and trees nearby got strength and became rejuvenated with the freshness. The man was a famous road builder or a road rejuvenator as he was called. He gave new hope to this road and in years to come this road became one of the best passageways on Earth.

The road had been forgiven for its ancestor’s wrongs… And his bad dreams laid to rest.

© Aditya Subramanian, 2020

The Jigsaw Puzzle

A boy sat down with a box of jigsaw puzzle pieces. The picture on top of the box was of small beautiful scenery. He opened the box and scattered the puzzle pieces on the newspaper he had spread on the floor. They looked so many to him. Some were upside down and others were upside up.

Each piece was of similar size and shape except for the corners. There were only a few differences in the variance of the puzzle pieces.

The boy took out the corners out of the jumbled pieces taking his own time and one by one the frame for the puzzle picture was done. Next he tried to arrange all the similar pieces, he could see, separately by using the correlation of the colour and intensity patterns in each piece. He could figure out the glistening water of the pond given in the picture on the box.

Slowly and steadily he put all the pieces together and was amazed to find the white geese which arranged themselves same as in the picture.

He took out the separated greenish leafy pieces and arranged some of them to form the left and right tree given in the picture and yet again the pieces amazed him with some tiny flowers he was unable to perceive in the pieces separately. The zoomed in brownish dirt path came along next with its small green grasses. The boy felt happy seeing the long thin dark strokes on the path which gave it a feel of movement.

The grey walls of the right side loomed with brick patterns which the boy was unable to observe in the small pieces. These joined as if giving the boy the feeling that he himself was constructing a brick wall in reality.

The bright white clouds formed their creamy layers through the hands of the boy. Their bluish background gave a serene effect to the now almost complete puzzle. Last but not the least, came the cottage with its chimneys puffing white clouds of fumes which the boy had mistaken as extra cloud pieces.

The puzzle seemed complete the moment the boy put the last piece. It looked like a lively picture with the running pathway, the swimming geese, the flowing water, the puffy airs and the swirly clouds and the tiny but bright flowers with the looming grey walls and the open cottage door.

The picture invited the boy to come enjoy it in his dreams…which he did.

© Aditya Subramanian, 2020

The Flat Slab

The light was shining brightly. The windows of the room were open.  It was dawn and so the natural air was filled in the room. The air smelt sweet. The room glowed bright yellow. The large table was of glass, a very thick glass. A lizard lay on the glass. It seemed real and alive as if breathing. Its colour and lines all shone brightly.

Yet it was unreal when it was felt by a touch. It was a glass painting. The table was painted with a beautiful scene. The lizard, the flowers, and the bees all covered this scene. The whole glass painting looked beautiful individually. It felt warm and real and alive as a whole.

An oil painting lay in the room. It pictured the sun setting and a beach. On the beach a small crab looked on at the setting of the sun.

Zooming around the room a plain art slab lay on a smaller table. It had a clean white sheet of paper. Some vibrant colours lay beside on the table. The sheet glowed so bright it looked as if even the white had been painted.

The hue of the sheet slowly changed to a light sky blue. The brush strokes covered it smoothly. Now thin black brush strokes crept up and ran through the whole blue forming a dark contrasting web. The contrast of the web looked beautiful with the blue background.

At a quarter of a distance from the center to the left a small oval shape was made. Its long eight legs covered that area. Even its very tiny hairs were visible. These tiny hairs showed how it attached itself to the web it had made. The silkiness of the web made it glow dark.

The oval that was made lit with two white pels. These pels were two yet they looked more than two. This was due to the spider that stood at the top of the painting. But unlike the previous one this eight-legged beauty had a smile.

One by one the areas of the painting got covered with pairs of pels till it had only eyes. The painting was now dark with eyes all over it. Slowly but steadily the eyes shut down and all was dark.

The flat slab was having a dark sheet over it. The sheet was removed and a new sheet put on which was again all white. Thus the flat slab remained on the small table to be used for one painting after another………

© Aditya Subramanian, 2020

The Unseen

The flowers of the land bloomed with different hues. The brightness of the sun reflected itself on the big crystal cube. The cube lay somewhere on this flower world. It was shining brightly with specularity. This cube had a miniature dark spot. The spot, unseen to the naked eye, showed the direction.

The dark yet bright flowers saw it. They grew with speed when it pointed at them. It moved in all the faces of the cube randomly.

It vanished, the dark flowers withered with pain. They longed for it to come back. It didn’t come. The big cube could not handle the sun’s bright light and it started to become dark. The dark flowers grew happy but the others grew wild.

The balance seemed shifted. Another cube came up. It too reflected the sun’s brightness. It had a dark spot. It was bigger than the other cube so it tried the balancing act. The spot vanished and it failed. It grew dark out of imitation.

This time a prism cropped up. It had the dark spot at its peak. It balanced. The spot grew bigger. It crumbled at its power.

The prism was dark.

There came many more cubes and prisms and other shapes of varying sizes and they all failed. They failed but not the flowers. Even before, during, and after each happening they seemed out of balance but balanced.

It looked as if all the flowers made different shapes if seen from far above but regained their shapelessness each time. Something was guiding them to balance. It was hidden among them, a flower blending with all other flowers. It was their guiding force. It looked different but remained constant.

It was the miniature spot. It lasted ever due to the flowers and it lasted the flowers forever. It was unchangeable as it revolved round……. 

© Aditya Subramanian, 2020

The Filthy Dreamer’s Inception

Everything was black. Suddenly a lamp post lighted. The road began to take shape. It was cracked. A shady small house erupted by the lamp post. There was no road behind, all was dark. The road ended at the small house. The walls were all black. The windows were airy as they were all broken. There was a piercing cool breeze blowing. It seemed as if the breeze came out of the windows and as there was no way to go, went back in through the door.

The lamp was shining brightly so the features of the house were crystal clear. The terrace of the house looked as if it was a flat shaven head. The terrace suddenly outgrew long dark creepers. The house now seemed a bit creepy but in respect to itself it must have thought that it now looked just right.

The house drew nearer as if devouring the lamp post and the road. In a moment all went dark. It had devoured everything. Another smaller lamp post lit some distance ahead. The torn carpet showed the way to the lamp post. This lamp was in an elevated position. The ground looked soft but thick and liquid flowed in every direction. The carpet made a formation of a stair leading to the lamp post. It looked like a wriggling snake. As it wriggled the lamp came closer and less elevated until the lamp post was at level.

There was a door which was looking contrastingly beautiful. It seemed to be beseeching the dreamer to come in. It grew nearer as the others had and this time there was no colour in the room. The beauty had completely vanished. It looked as if the room sought to be beautiful but had no one to help. It looked sad.

There was a small wooden box in which dust seemed to be accumulated for years. The box opened up and there was a bright display of red, green, and blue colours. Huge paint-boxes of red, green, and blue colours came out and waited as a dog would, to be commanded. A ginormous brush lay beside the paint-boxes. The dreamer looked at the dark, pale walls and in an instant the walls got coloured with some combination of red, green, and blue colours.

He got to know about yellow, purple, brown, black, white and many more. One by one the whole house got coloured with vibrant colours. He was happy and contented. The windows and doors breathed fresh air. The two lamp posts got lots of colourful walls, carpet, windows, doors, and roads around as friends. The creepers looked like beautiful strands of hair.

The dark and pale colours vanished. The road looked brighter in black and grey. It opened up in various directions. The torn carpet blended with the colours. The ground seemed hard and light. The liquid flowed with crystal clear brown colour as if some chocolate stream. The whole house looked happy.

The dreamer woke up. He wasn’t lying on a dump yard as he was when he went to sleep. He was a colourless filthy good-for-nothing man before the dream but now he had woken up as a painter. His days of living in filthiness were over. He had an inception to paint the whole world colourful. He set out for his ginormous yet cheerful task…….

© Aditya Subramanian, 2020