Bliss.

Bliss.

Sunday, November 26, 2017

Reveries of a Harried Soul.

Sparks Fly

Like the sizzling crackle of embers in dry firewood,
Like the million electric charges piercing barren land,
They were sparks that seemed like fireworks,
An entity so magical best left untouched.

Not dampened by the swirling clouds,
Left unscathed by the scorching heat,
They shone with a glow in their eyes,
Akin to fireflies glittering against the night skies.

Yet every radiant flame that ever shone;
Would know that its light was only a borrowed loan.
The embers that braved the external assault

Were extinguished by their own emptiness.


(16th November)


Raw.

The nervous quiver as I speak
The ugly bruise over my knee
The angry pimple on my cheek
Are honest watermarks of the real me.

The curves of my smile
That curl into a sarcastic jibe
The curves of my imperfect body
I embrace as my quintessential vibe.

But it is the starry dreams of my soul
That make me whole
And the fragile hopes in my heart
That sets me apart.

I speak with feet firm on ground
But with a spirit that soars abound
A heart enslaved by its own wrath
Yet raring to embrace the unknown path.



(26th November)

I am still coughing up in the library but the good news is that our fridge finally has some goodies for snacking in my compartment! The above nonsense was penned at odd hours when I was saturated with Hernias and Hydatiform Moles and decided to spill some thought-ink.

I want this year to end. ASAP. 

Monday, November 13, 2017

Quest For Sophrosyne.

So I'm finally done with the Clinical Postings for the year and after a fairly uneventful End Posting, its now more or less study holidays. Some of the cases we saw (and presented) in the last two weeks in these postings include
  • Anemia in a young female. (Dimorphic Anaemia)
  • Anemia in a middle aged female. (Anaemia of Chronic Disease)
  • Anemia in an elderly male.
  • Anemia ... ok you get my drift.
  • A HIV+ patient who was known to Mahendrappa Sir from his McGann days.
  • A case of (cough variant?) Asthma.
  • A case of hepatic encephalopathy and ALD
  • A CNS case with Lhermitte's sign.
  • A case of malaria who was eager to get discharged and celebrate his 1st wedding anniversary.
Probably not one of my best weekends and I'm glad its over. A bit of disgust and self loathing, a fair amount of fear of falling into a redundant lifestyle and some annoyance for being voluntarily cocooned inside my comfortable shell. Being sheltered is important, you need to be protected from the big bad elements in the world. But that is different from being in factitious isolation. Unexposed to the realities of life and in persistent supression of natural emotions.

There is the concept of Hygiene Hypothesis in Immunology wherein individuals brought up in a highly sanitized environment from early life are more prone to allergic conditions on exposure to 'normal environment' which would be teeming with potential allergens that any other individual would have developed resistance to.

My point is, you cannot protect yourself forever. You cannot weave a web around yourself as a shield to the ravages of reality. The sooner you voluntarily step out of your comfort zone, less harsher would the 'burst of the bubble' feel.

There are going to be good days and some really trying days. Days when you don't know where you are headed, days when you find a stranger looking back at you in the mirror and days when you simply loathe your mediocrity, your decisions and your irrelevence in this universe. The hardest part is to get through those days, the fact that you did would be the best part.

A friend once quoted Sagan to refer to how infinitely small and insignificant our actions are in the magnitude of the universe and while most of the time, we (I?!) Choose to ignore this reality and believe we are capable of something impactful, the reality of our mundane existence is hard, almost bitter to digest.


  • Watch Thor (If you haven't).
  • Read Metamorphosis by Kafka. From what I gleaned Kafka led very troubled life and several parallels are drawn between his own struggles and those potrayed by Gregor Samsa.
  • Listen to Lights On by H.E.R (one of those singers who prefers not to 'Have Everything Revealed' but let her music do the talking.
  • Read a few short stories (including Khol Do and Thanda Ghost) by Saadat Hassan Manto last week. Manto was a prolific Pakistani writer who wrote unabashedly on themes of partition, sexuality and violence in the era with dark undertones, yet very impactful. Not for the fainthearted, his audio stories online are an attempt to recreate the art of storytelling.

So long!