[1]
Allegedly, I was three years old when we left London for Kew Gardens, Queens in New York City. Little did I know then my brother would succeed exactly as he should, older, colder, wiser. Despite our differences... I was a sensitive, little monster... mommy cared for us equally. Yet, I felt emptiness as we crossed the ocean.
I was unbearable to my family, a flaw.
Would that I could not be born like poor George Bailey, as an utter failure, victim of circumstance, savvy people saw through my innocent disguise.
Three years old, old enough to walk, talk, act stupid. However, as a child, I appeared without fault. Remember, I was small, cute and apparently without an ounce of guile. Even then, deception deceives the deceiver. Enter '72 without a clue, so blue.
Yesterday, I woke up and went running at dawn. Exactly, fifty years later I write about a time I can never recover from the past. Remember, I am three years old when it took place. Still, my first memory... I should really forget.
Old, old, old... getting old is never any fun. Let me be twenty-two, or even thirty-two. Diminished returns, this life not worth the investment.
When I went to visit Amanda, as a child, how full of emotion, I told her, "I love you." Even as a small boy, this was appropriate. Nope! My older brother thought otherwise and laughed.
While four years of difference is not a lot in age, exceptions to the rule must be made for sadists.
Leaving London, England was tragic in a sense. Even then, as a child, I thought myself, British for our passports said so, though this is in hindsight. To say I was British would be a huge mistake.
[2]
London? No, Middlesex. Near where my father worked. Only, I was too young to know much about it. Not that we ever saw much of our dad as kids. Despite loving our mom, he worked at the airport. Only, it was Party Central and our father not just came from Kenya, he came from Nairobi.
Forget the past, they say, move on with your own life. Only, the blockages, these stuck points get sticky. Remember, memories retain for a reason.
Kiss the girls, make them cry. I said my last goodbye. Enter American airspace as immigrants. Would I be anything otherwise in their eyes.
Grant me serenity but to whom do I speak, asking for charity, for kindness, for favors. Remember, I was born in Bombay, not London. Despite being a child, I was a foreigner. Even if I could speak and write Perfect English. No one saw me as theirs, as from their own homeland. Sucker to believe in the American Dream.
Question reality, study philosophy. Understanding nothing, but experiences. Enter contemplation, contemplate suicide. Every act has merits, reward this life with death. No, with no certainty... this is all that we know. Still, to end misery... it is a temptation.
If I were without flaws as a perfect diamond... no, I am a monster, never a good person.
New York City, a flash! We were gone in two years. Even if I had met Bobby Diggs, the RZA, would that make a difference, born a week after me.
Yet, I was neither Black, nor anyone Black kids on the outskirts of life cared anything about. Remember, South Asians are simply immigrants. Kill a Hindu, a Sikh, create a Hate Crimes Act.
Crippled in my own mind, broken, a fractured life. In the city, I saw from our sixth story view that people appear small, that balsa planes fly far. Yet, I started to learn... I was just a small man.
[3]
Lessons to learn in life, turn anger into gold. If I blame anyone that energy returns to haunt my days on earth, to follow my footsteps, to appear as spectres, as phantoms, or as ghosts. Little did I know then, as a child, how it works, everyone knows karma, everyone learns dharma.
Despite our age difference, my brother got along in spite of hating me as his little brother, despite his sadism, I learned some good lessons.
I learned never to trust, never to talk or feel.
Kismet divides my lot, this is my destiny. Nothing less than to write about the blockages. Obey the directions offered by our parents. Would that they realized defense mechanisms.
That was then, this is now. Fifty-three years of age, how do I shake it off, need I ask Taylor Swift? Every musician knows how difficult it is... not to succeed, but fail until they can succeed.
Music was my first love and so I played the drums, yet fate placed poetry before my eyes, I wept.
Beyond this world, I know nothing is for certain. Religion teaches us to believe, to have faith. Only, a skeptical, questioning mind sees past theological words as the chatter of birds. Hungry to understand, I understood limits. Even in calculus, we encounter limits. Religion, I gave up for Lent, as the joke goes.
Wine, women, and song but no, I was no sailor. Only a madman thought with his brain, not his dick. Under the tyranny of my own character, (let me preface this thought with the fact I shaped it), demented as I was to others, I was sure.
Satori was a flash, gradual and then gone. Under these conditions, I expected something. Calamity to want, to desire what is gone. Catastrophe happens, still I must restructure. Engage futility with misunderstanding. Enter into debates, thinking I know better. Despite knowing nothing, Socrates kept his cool.
[4]
Enter a foreign land, nowhere are we at home. Xenophobia saves natives from foreigners. America knows well to decimate natives. Caution signs on the shore should have pointed inwards. Tragically, genocide had not been coined, as yet. Let the indigenous peoples have their lands back. Yet, we cannot undo what has been done with guns.
Attempts to understand Manifest Destiny strike a chord of disgust at our pride and hubris.
History writes itself with the blood of others. Empty the pen of ink, fill it up with more blood.
Should I concern myself with words beyond my scope? How to practice my words, to preach my word is bond? Or hypocritical, just as everyone else? Under the tyranny of language, of life lived, limit experience until experiments decide how I should live out the rest of my life.
Older now, still a child striving to be a man. Little inside my mind, the blockages persist. Defense mechanisms get in the way of growth. Even to realize this fact, helps nobody. Realize potentials, actualize the truth.
Crabby as a Cancer but why identify, order constellations using my own metric, lift the veil, envision a universe beyond dimensions created by scientists in Rome, entertain other thoughts, other minds, other worlds, residing in the mind, the self is not the stars.
Wisdom is not beauty, this visceral domain, intelligence wastes time, energy, resources, struggles to keep up with our fierce competition, engages tug-of-war, to win or lose is all, recall failure / success are aspects of this game.
[5]
Diametrically in opposition across each radiant circle speaks dialectically specious arguments, spectacular mirrors presenting truth as such, as it appears in fact, in all good faith, the oak believes in the acorn, triumphs within itself simply by existing, existence seemingly the essence of being.
Organize, rearrange the constructs of this world, unequal in measure, to place recognition reasonably higher than imagination...
Does this make sense to me, society orders indifference to pleasure or pain, a secret gift from antiquity, fools, exactly like ourselves, finding out about life, guided by assumptions, experiments to learn about anatomy, research on cognition, processes of thinking, experience with gold, ethics and politics, natural science and the physical laws of creativity placed as a schema over each point in the system, the universe measured specifically to man.
I was a hateful child, I learned what I was taught.
Would that I had been taught how to love, not to judge. As simple as turning over within the mind, such as I do in bed asleep behind the wheel.
As a child, I would ask impossible questions.
Something inside my brain needed to know, "what if..." every time my brother was proximal to me. Not that he cared for me and my questions, annoyed, sick and tired of hearing thoughts out of deep, left field. If only I could be quiet for a moment. Though, I was a shy guy, a sincere introvert. If anyone wanted to shine it was Leo, very extroverted, outgoing and social, exact opposites, boys who bothered each other.
[6]
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