The Letter to Invisible Children

Hello,

I'm Vishesh, a 23 year old trying-to-make-a-difference-to-the-world guy from India. Being very honest, I had no clue about Joseph Kony until 3 days ago, when #stopkony and #Kony2012 started trending in my country on Twitter.

Then, I saw the documentary and I'm immensely disappointed(yet again) of Humanity. But on the positive side, there are people like you who are actually trying to make this world a beautiful place to live in where the future generations, my yet-to-be-born children can happily, peacefully and fearlessly live and evolve into better persons.

I also came across many negative things flying in the air and social media circles about the 'questionable' aspect of Invisible Children. The financial aspect to be precise. Even when I already and immediately opposed their belief, I wanted to be sure. Hence, I logged onto the Invisible Children website and checked all the financial data which is there, transparent, for the whole world to see.

I want to write an article on my blog(it is very, very small right now) for people to read and know what I actually think about Invisible Children and how this movement is very important to our future generations. So, I'd like to request permission to use the data, charts and information which is available on Invisible Children website in my article and I do intend to provide links to various blogs, videos and other data on my article.

Looking forward to hearing from you soon,

Vishesh Raj Srivastava

Love

It all started with simple yet truthful words which reflect the daily story of the night of Thomas’* life.

‘I want to face my nightmares tonight. Hence, Good Night!’ 

Then, soon enough everything changed. The words poured out of him in a way he never imagined before. He doesn’t write like this, he thought to himself. Ofcourse, t’was Layla’s* presence which changed the things for him. Even if she was  1,163 kilometers or 628 nautical miles away from him. They’ve never met each other.

Following are the words which were the most beautiful his life has ever seen to come out of them. They never talked directly to each other, yet, there was a magic which binded their hearts. It was pure.

I fall in love with her the moment she starts putting her thoughts into words. So perfect.

“no longer will I fault this sharing of you. no longer will I begrudge others your company.
how odd that we were plagued by the same notions
what celestial move was this?
furball Tea and saalabonnet don’t care much, why worry when there’s tuna pellets plenty? Why, indeed.
quit being shocked at this intertwining of destinies. what paths must cross, will.”


Yes, there are two paths you can go by, but in the long run/ there’s still time to change the road you’re on
Like a ball of wool between the paws of a cat, submit to thee I shall.
Too naive. Too innocent at times. Yet full of anger, ready to ramble.
Suffocated dreams and morbid nightmares. What a lie am I living?
Illusioned by the realms of a distant future, the present behaves like a child with a cotton candy in his hands. Oh, it sounds so right.

“always the surprise, yes? at your favorite bunched up carnations on the car seat and the hug that didn’t loosen, the candy floss bubblegum he remembered you said you wanted and the kiss that set your toes on fire”


And he wrote with his eyes, they’ve seen it all. They’ve seen the fall. They crave for the ascend, the ascend which never happened.
Never was his heart strong, for it was always wrapped around the wire barb. Though magic it was which kept it beating, maybe for this day,
the day he decided to summon his fears, surrender to the evil which breeds within all his tears. Yet, he’s as soft as the morning sun.

(Talks to self)“again the surprise, at the wall he painted the colors of the sea and a hurricane sky for you, mustard smeared awkward writing of love notes, crushed under a forgotten box of whey.”


After all, Syd and George gave him life. The life they left to join hands with God, to shape his destiny. One day, he’ll disappoint them.
He had stopped playing with Sara, she adorned the corner of his room. Waiting, for the day he’ll caress her. Touch her G’s and A’s.
But like the serpent which reunited with her master in the second, she came back in his hands. And soon he became a child again. 6 years.
6 years and more, they never felt real anymore. It was a reunion, for a creation of his life’s best work ever. He’ll dress her in new soon.
She’ll be white and red. Signifying how his peace was taken away for all these years. Time which gave him these nightmares. They are real.
Yet he’s happy. A day like this he never thought’d arrive. He stands in the corner, yet in the middle of it. He feels alive again.

(talks to self)”you laugh at the impossibly clumsy adorableness of a card that bared his heart, of a karoake dedication the night ruled by baileys.
at the wildness that caught you unaware the first time and seven years later”


Blinded by fears he has always lived; Romanced the air. Witnessed the departure of the reason he existed today, the night he can’t forget.
Nothing seemed real anymore. He’s been the reason for his creator’s tears. He’s seen her die, while he slept and wandered one night.
And hence he doesn’t sleep at night, like the prisoner of the nature’s might. He looks over her, to protect her. Be strong, be brave.

“throaty teasing voices through the phone, a finger twisting around the cord, all night, let’s break our fast, just where we are, you scrawl a lipstick wish on the mirror, you love this rogue of a boy, the one that surprises you still, yes?”

Where were you when I was burned and broken? While the days slipped by from my windows watching?
Reality, he knows, won’t let him be happy. The sad reality which always took the laughter off his face every time he tried to smile.
And just like that, everything has always ended for him. Why will this be different, he’s the same person after all.
No wonder his favourite pizzas are from PizzaHut. And pasta too.

And with these lines, she sealed the perfect ending for them. Perfect.

“When you go, leave dandelion wands behind, drifting from your hands one by one. In June, a yellow brick road will bloom between you and me.”

(* – Thomas and Layla are real people. These obviously aren’t their real names though.)

Evanescenced

We dream of the days when we're with that special soul who'd make us believe in ourselves. We come across these people rarely, but we do. And sometimes, we push them away, kill them in our hearts and in our mind.
Such, is the story;- About my evil side.

Subjugating her fears she runs into the bewildering wild
No shoes, no protection for her toes
along the treacherous course. But,
it's time that they see her, her marauding chores
her saturnine life and her attempts to beat the fate
after all she was a human, but had passed through the heaven's gate.
She's the reason he lived on, for
she gave him the reason to smile;
The reason to breathe,
Until the time to move came on.
But here she is again, fighting her fears again
lingering through the shadows of the mortality
surviving each day as it comes again.


The rampant chaos was but her reality
her asylum was his heart, though she didn't know
through her veins ran the blue venom, 
and with a brutal force it flowed.
She had a task to fulfill, a job left forsaken
for the words they tremble, they lose their grip
but she lived on for him as the night grew old.
Here she was, running into the bewildering wild,
giving him the reason to smile, a laughter which'd never turn mild.
She's the woman his heart cried for, but
he didn't know one day it'd stop,
for he continued to live, continued to crawl,
cuz he'd murdered her, with a black iron maul.

#whyimsingle

So, as the title suggests, many people have their versions of 'why Vishesh had a break up', but i'm finally revealing the truth.

*All, because of this 'Beautiful' Poem*

My darling, my lover, my beautiful wife,
being with you screwed up my life.
I see your face when i'm dreaming
that's why i always wake up screaming.

Kind, intelligent, loving and hot,
this describes everything you're not.
i thought that i could love no other -
that is untill i met your mother.

roses are read, violets are blue,
sugar is sweet and so are you,
but the roses are wilting, the violets are dead
the sugar bowl's empty and so is your head!

i want to feel your sweet embrace,
but don't take that paper bag off your face.
i love your smile, your face and your eyes
damn! i'm so good at telling lies!

my love, you take my breath away,
what have you stepped in to smell this way?
my feelings for you no words can tell, except for maybe' go to hell'.. 


See? i told u. beautiful right??
Damn! then why the hell that silly girl dump me? :((

Being Private. Publicly.

The way I intend to bring this upon you is very much the way which you might want to bring upon to the rest when it comes to behaving public; Quite sadly, we Indians aren't much bothered about it.
We want to dress good, smell well and appear as pretty(the ladies) or as neat(my folks, the guys !) as possible. But one thing which we most certainly run out of gas on is the fact that there are hardly very few of us who behaves 'well-mannered' when it comes to Restroom Etiquettes.

How many times have you come across a washroom/restroom/bathroom/toilet which smells proper, the seats are clean and the floor isn't wet(obviously i'm NOT talking about water here !) ?
Yes, I'm referring to the same place which all of us here most certainly feel the need of whenever we step out of our houses. Generally. The toilets which we visit before sitting down on the table at a restaurant to eat, because some of us actually have the habit of washing our hands before touching any kind of food.

The seats are yellowed generally, the wet yellow, if you know what I mean. Most of the times the person who'd used the big L the last forgets a simple thing called 'Flush'. A female friend of mine actually suggests her female friends to carry a TP roll in their handbags because half the roll gets used to cover up the whole seat so that you don't end up requiring a bath soon after you take a leak. Quite clever, that girl I must admit.
Guys generally don't mind as they've got the liberty to 'swing in the motion' wherever they want to and feel like; And hence I've seen many walls with quite humourous literature. Some include:

'गधे के पूत यहाँ मत मूत !' 

'देखो गधा मूत रहा है !'

Except all this there are plenty of 'men' who go ahead with their act and while indulged in it, find it very amusing to read and laugh on it. Even spitting on the walls, the pan and all the 'spitphillic' things, people don't really mind. We're so used to all this that no one actually bothers. 

And that's not just about the guys who're the culprit throughout this post, ladies, you people are equally responsible too. You don't think so? Well, what about those who feel their 'pads' actually decorate the whole place? There's a thing called dustbin. Kindly throw it in their. No one wants to take it away for you, and please have some mercy on the poor toilet cleaner too. Pads have an adhesive strip on the bottom. It's pretty disgusting to see a bloodied pad stuck on the outside of the sanitary bin. Is it so hard to make sure it goes inside the bin? I suggest wrapping your pad in toilet paper before disposing of it.

How hard is it to wipe yourself sitting down so you don't dribble on the seat ? If you do make a mess can't you at least wipe it up with toilet paper? Thanks !

Anyway, this one is a classic. Schools, universities and colleges; What's common between them when it comes to washrooms except the fact that they all look and smell the same? Guesses? No?

Well, this is one up for the girls cuz' they don't do it, it's the guys who're the element of insanity.
How many of us all have seen girls' names written on the walls? Things like 'I love you Deepika', 'Please take me home with you tonight i'll show you the moonlight' ? I mean, you seriously felt that your beloved is going to read it? Damn !

Jokes apart, I mean seriously, nobody likes to clean up someone else’s mess and so it makes sense for everyone to CLEAN UP after themselves throughout the day to maintain a high standard of hygiene and cleanliness. Some people who are the first to turn up their noses in dirty, smelly toilets are themselves to blame for breaches of good toilet etiquette.

Hence, many places like restaurants, bars etc. have started to use this quite factual posters right in front of the pot:

So the next time you feel like using this 'sacred' place for the germs and filth, please bear in mind that you're not the sole user. People have visited it before you and people will visit it after you.

You want to feel and be a human? Please consider cleaning up your own mess, if you cause any while you're there.

..And I turn into a Relationship Expert !

"We're not an item. We just act like one."

Sometimes the good things in life are the ones where you don't have to call out the obvious, it just is what it is. Apparently even I don't know what it is.......

I guess at the end of it, this wraps up my understanding about relationships between people. Why people have the relationships they have. Why some people who commit to lovey dovey things everyday still break up and why some people who barely do it can stay together for a lifetime.. I finally get. It's all about trust.

There is no such thing as the perfect person nor is there a fairy tale ending, but I still believe that there are such things as a perfect relationship. Relationships where strengths compliment each other's weakness, where equals and opposites are at the right place. Perfect relationships exists…it's just that we have to bring it out and thats where things start to go wrong.

It is sad that the cynicism and unsaid insecurities are the diseases of the generations today. We live in a world where we always keep that part of us away from the world because we don't want to end up being hurt. The sad thing is…it's that very sense of distrust for the world that makes the world the miserable shell it is now.

How many times have we had opportunities lost because we were too afraid to grab the chance? How many times have we had things we have destroyed because we were so scared we were going to lose it anyway? How many times have we had the people we care for walk away because we didn't believe in them to care for us? Too many times I have seen it. Too many times I have lived it. I think it's time to change that.

Relationships with people are all about that trust. Trust to watch your back. Trust to care for you. Trust to believe in their abilities. Trust to open your heart to them and let them take you higher. How deep the bonds go between people depends on how well you trust a person to be themselves with you. Without that, no relationship would go anywhere.

And it shows…in the way we do things between people. Why do couples act all lovey dovey? Because when you think of it, touch is a way you can reassure each other that you're there for them, that you can trust them to be there for you. Why do friendships fail? Because you eventually realise that you can't trust a person enough to watch your back when the chips are down. So when you boil it down to that simple equation…all you need is to know the reasons why you trust a person. It doesn't have to be that you have to feel them. it doesn't have to be that you have to tell them. It just has to be that you are there when you need to be there.

I'm not saying that trust is something you should give freely. As I said, the world is a place that can burn you. It's just that by the end of it, the choice for how you want your life to be is entirely yours. You can take a chance and give your trust to people that earned it. Or you can take the chance losing out a life where anything is possible. I trust you can make that right choice. I really do.....

Some Motivation ?

Well, I know it's very naive of me to write something like the following but then you have to understand the mentality I'm in since last few days.
This merely is an effort to keep me on track.. And remind me of what I got into when I got into this !

light is freedom in its purest form,

To dance with the clouds which follow a storm;

To roll and glide, to wheel and spin,

To feel the joy that swells within.

To leave the earth with its troubles and fly,

And know the warmth of a clear spring sky;

Then back to earth at the end of the day,

Released from the tensions which melted away.

Should my end come while I am in flight,

Whether brightest day or darkest night;

Spare me no pity and shrug off the pain,

Secure in the knowledge that I'd do it again.

For each of us is created to die,

And within me I know,

I was born to fly.

Autowallahs !!

A trip to New Delhi cannot be complete with at least a view, if not a ride, of those yellow and green three wheelers that parade the capital’s roads. Well, these cute little things that run on ‘compressed natural gas’ and provide for cross ventilation in the actual sense, are a boon when you see their mighty counterparts called ‘buses’ crammed up to the max in the worst of summer or when you’re a just a student with no personal transport and have to reach a hostel with absurd timings..!!

Seriously, I have no problems with Delhi’s auto rickshaws or autos, as we call it. Infact, as ridiculous and bizarre as this sounds, but one of my initial career options, when I barely started school, was to become an auto rickshaw driver..!! Stop raising those eyebrows and read on..! I just loved the fact that these guys could drive something like a bike in something like a car (don’t even bother to decipher this line if you couldn’t get it the first time). But what I have problems with are these very drivers, the ‘Delhi’ ones in particular (with no offense to Delhites in general).

So the countdown begins. You’ve got 30 minutes to reach a place you can reach in 15 minutes. You spend the first 5 minutes waiting for an auto to come by. When you finally flag one down, the next 5 minutes go in him telling you that there are no U-turns close to the destination or that there’ll be no passengers at the destination (yeah…these guys work part-time as tarot card readers who can predict the future). Hence, it’s a mighty huge problem for him but he’ll still be the Good Samaritan and do you a favour but at 20-30 bucks more. That big fat oaf!!! Another 5 minutes go in you lecturing him to go by the meter and arguing with him that all his excuses are just a heap of crap! He won’t go by the meter but agrees to bring down the charge by 5 bucks, like he’s doing you a world of a favour. You’re still not convinced…and why should you when it’s him who needs to be convinced!! 5 minutes go in arguing with another driver or basically telling them to shoo away for their bizarre charges and not complying with the rules. 5 more minutes go in no empty auto coming your way. You’ve got only 5 minutes to go and you’re still not in any mode of transport that goes anywhere close to your destination. BAD sign!! With 5 more minutes to go, you’d just be lucky to manage one who’s ready to go by the meter or agree to a price extremely close to yours. And you reach your destination a good number of minutes late.
And if it was a job interview you were heading towards…well then…god bless you!! 

Ok…I just might have exaggerated this whole episode a teeny-weeny bit but there’s no denying that it definitely includes at least a good 90% of the above. Oh, and if you’re looking for an auto, say anytime after 7pm, trouble hounds you once again. The auto drivers are definitely gonna hike their prices!!

Then there are the frequent ‘Oh, do we have to go beyond the gate??’… ‘Oh, you didn’t say that the house is beyond the blah blah point’ and the constant pitter-patter of their words continues!!

Let’s just say that you could consider yourself lucky if the driver does not know the route. He’d be ready to go by the meter and to you showing him the way. That way, you can ensure no arguments but a hopefully peaceful ride back to the place of your bliss where you can lay yourself down !!

The man who walked alone.

No, it's not the lyrical similarity to Kurt Cobain (RIP !) hit 'the man who sold the world', but in case you do find it, I can't help it. Though it's certainly not.
I don't remember when I wrote this, but I'm sure it was after one of the stupid-dumb-bad-mood when I didn't want to think anything and just write each line as it kept on popping in my head.
*Please don't compare the writing style with that of an 8th grader(as someone has already commented on this part on my Facebook's notes' section), as I write not to show my skills over the language, but in describing the complex emotions in the simplest and easily understood grammar/sentence construction*
(Damn, what am I writing ! :S)
Anyways, here you go.

He wakes up without a concern about the world,

goes to bed with the same,

never feels it'll take a toll on him sometime

all he knows is how to play the game

  

They called him a liar,

traitor was his name

but they never realised,

he didn't care at all, come what may

for he was the one who talked to the air,

he was the one who romanticised with the same

Leaps and bounds, he played on

whenever the time called he went on

though never in his mind he understood;

the realms of life, the moments of truth

he ran from the responsibilities, but

he knew he'd face them one day..

The gates of nifelheim, 

were right in front of his face

The portals of a world he'd never seen before,

where the time came to rest, 

where the demon gods sang their lore

  

But he didn't care, didn't care at all

for he knew that this time too shall pass,

not for a brand new day but 

for the night to fall 

Today he strives to live on,

still turning to darkness, to turn the heat on

but he'll manage some how like he's done before,

on the paths of glory, he walked alone.

He'll rise again, but the world won't care,

for once, their mouths will shut, shut again.

It's always a Mirage.

This came off when I was stuck between two worlds. Reality and Dreams infect me with their illusions and delusions; General belief being far more complex and different than they do to the others.

And since merely existing in the Dream is much more intriguing to me than to actually live in the Reality:

"I'm a Dreamer, and when I'll wake; you can't break my spirit, its my dreams you take"

Confused? Anyhow. Go ahead with this.

It'll sway you, take you places

It'll make you feel good, for the while it is alive

It'll make you ponder on why how things can be so good.

It'll amaze and shock

deprive and devastate

yet make you love with love.

It'll hold on,

see if you can make it work

test and maybe succumb

to all that lies within it.

I write not because my heart swells with it's thought.

I write not because I want to hear those words

I write because it's it's always a mirage.

And it always fools me.

From a 17 year old heart.

I am just starting this Blog with these few lines I wrote when i was 17 and this was my first poem.
Quite surprisingly, there ain't a change from then and now except the very different transition period, but except that this somehow remains a piece which I still adore.
(Oh and btw., in case someone wants to follow, remember that I usually write when i'm in a bad/sad mood. Hence, the whole thing will somehow end up being darker than I am imagining now.)


Behind these sad and teary eyes,
there's a truth n' not a lie.
In the day and in darkness alike,
you're the dream in my lonely nights.

When the fear rises, and the moments die,
Be there and make my time sufficed.
I sought to seek your presence tonight
Take my arm and hold me tight.

Behind these sad and teary eyes,
I want your soul together with mine,
It's been long n' now it's time to rise,
else this boy'll again cry tonight.

In your hands my destiny lies
but when I think of you the time just flies
you're the only one who can make me smile
take my arm and lets fly to the sky.

Yet I neither know your name, nor your face
Where do you stay, what's that place?
I need you so that's all i care
Take my arm, take the disgrace away..