Thursday, March 25, 2010

Of Prose and Lethal Doses

Voila!...This is the first ever time that I am writing prose for this blog. Not that there is anything wrong in writing prose. But there was this weird worm of beats and free rhythm that used to wiggle just below my cranium every time I started writing. So whatever little I wrote was more poetry (I hope) than prose. I have realised I have a quintessential flaw which can mean death for any writer. I have the habit of writing the whole piece at one go. If I leave it midway, I can seldom come back to it. I have decided there are two reasons for this attitude. One, my years of newspaper and tv writing, where less is more. Two, grueling responsibilies, mostly wasteful in nature, have made time a coveted but elusive asset.

Why then have I decided to leave all that aside and start doodling with my laptop keys again? I won't answer the question right away. I want things to be different this time. I intend to comback with the reply.

And here I am. Back again. Scraping from the spillovers around my feelings and flashbacks and making attempts at putting them into words. Milton thought words became tainted as we fell from grace. Words before that were free, pristine and innocent. I don't know about grace. But even as I lumber through the loads of vain articulation, I feel we have lost those words. Every thought is overshadowed with numerous ifs and buts. Every phrase is encumbered with oodles of seamless tedium. And as the dust keeps settling and cobwebs form like soft blankets over them, we end up realising that writing has become a compulsion.