Cities of Magic

The city of familiar unknowns
Drinking me in.
Each day I come to speak to you
Each night you return my words
Like droplets of ink
Reduced to insignificance
In our digital tides.

Within the caravan of moments
I see you anew, astir, abreast...
As if you are the last of the familiar unknowns
The ever-last and everlasting
I assimilate receding faces in virtual tidings
All agaze with interrupted times in broken cities.

Cities of magic in parting daylight
Cities of impossible closures
When did I last embrace you?

Chhorha

ভোটাভুটি 
দাঁতকপাটি 
উন্নয়ন 
সঙ্গোপন 
মাটির মা 
গরম চা

On Beckett's Grave (May 22, 2016)

Silence is a stalwart.
At your grave,
The third decade 
From On to No and once again.
And only one,
Raining upon my being.
To be again
And not again.
Silence is dripping
It's you now
It will be me...

Watching The Lobster

Finally watched this dystopic fantasy! A strong film with both twists and the twisted...on the necessity as well as the impossibility of love...liked the way it ended, leaving the bracket entirely open...

Watching TE3N

An emotional thriller that combines mourning with detection as the objects of mourning become clues in the process of solving the mystery of an old crime. Unlike the critics, I didn't find the film slow and if it all, its slowness I thought was an insight into the arrested time of mourning. Amitabh Bachchan was quite outstanding in underplaying his role. His impeccable body-language with those drooping shoulders, gaping mouth and sparkling eyes, conveying anguish, anger, resolve and restlessness, simply towered over the film. It is lovely to see how with films like Piku and Te3n, the great actor has staged a return to one of the first cities where he had once been a struggler, looking for work. Nawaz, Vidya and others gave him solid company. And so did the old city of Kolkata, shot beautifully in all its chromatic intensity.

Lacanian Psychoanalysis and Literature Link

This video interview of mine is a prelude to the week-long course on Lacanian Psychoanalysis and Literature, I will be teaching from 18-22 July 2016 at UNSW for The Sydney School of Continental Philosophy. Thanks to my friend Stu Guerin for his pointed questions and all the technical work. Hope you enjoy the conversation. The registration details for the course are available on the video link, just below the video in its description.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOiiwvNLbfs&feature=youtu.be

Proem

Old unstoppable ears, all you know is a complaining rigmarole of words, bereft of ageing.

You let them float in your ageless stream night and day until they dissolve into one another, like drops of rainwater, running towards one another, on a misty windowpane.

On the windowpane, union is dissolution.

Old unstoppable ears, one of these days or nights, you should finally close your inexistent lids and listen to your own inner sibilance.

When time leaves your hollow, all hearing becomes resonance.