Days of Future Past - A Short Story

Photo by Marin Barisic on Unsplash

It was a normal day and I was bored beyond belief. I was waiting for the package of spray paint to come in since I love experimenting with different colours and medium. Finally, I heard the doorbell go off and I sprinted to the door. When I opened the door, the package was delivered by the agent. I shrug and take it inside. As I open the packed carton box, I realize it is not the right set of spray cans I was waiting for. Irked, I put it on the carpet spread across the hall and sat on the couch, pondering what to do.

I was annoyed with the spray cans muddle. They weren’t even what I ordered! In discontent, I sat across the room thinking. I thought to myself, why not go around the city, to study street art, to get some inspiration, before I get to explore my creative side, this time with jumbled up paint can spray art.

Street art has been a whining baby, crying for attention every time I set my eyes on it, not seeking for a passing change, but for a permanent shift in the heart of our culture and belief system. It was time, I dive in deeper into this notion I have about street art.

I lock the house and set myself for a long walk. I go walking down to the inner city. It grew out of the cracked sidewalk like the jagged gap-toothed grin of an old junkie. The only splash of colour amidst the grime streets was coming from the lurid graffiti, alongside the littered sidewalks. The images I see, bleed right from the canister, emotions too vivid for words, too harsh to hear and too cruel to accept. These graphics imprinted on the walls of the streets, remind me of the book — History of American Grafitti, by Caleb Neelon and Roger Gastman, which spills out a definitive story behind the most influential art form of from the last century. It traces the evolution of this medium from its early freight-train days to its city boom on the streets and the modernization.

As I continue to make my way into the grime shady streets walking, I savvy, the graffiti is talking to every level of the brain, inviting deeper thoughts and realizations, shouting in the truest language of mankind. I see the light, there is a soul in the graffiti art, the pictures depicting troubles and hope, anguish the people living in this world are enduring. It was just depressing and melancholy.

I continued with my incessant walking and observe the spray paint dim in the setting sun, it occurred to me, graffiti didn’t have to be cynical, anti, dismissive, corrosive or detrimental, it could be creative too, by giving it an artistic angle or promote ideas, on social issues and concerns. If only the people could get a real artist to use spray cans, to do something like that on the street walls then maybe the vandals and the protesters would leave the walls alone, respect it even. I think it was worth a try. Certainly, better than supplying another clean canvas for the rebels, racists and the communists to spread terror.

That aerosol filled with spray paint, invented by a paint salesman from northern Illinois could neither control nor predict the impact of his innovations. Who knew would be with a blow-back, used in a manner, which rebels and protesters use to express themselves on the street art?

©Shweta, 2020. All Rights Reserved.

Originally published in The Weekly Knob

Don't have to wait - A poem

Photo by Ben White on Unsplash

You wonder where you are
with the heaviness in your heart
and nothing to say
feeling you have lost yourself!

Wild thoughts clouding your head
caught up in the surface than deep down
when you know are strong to survive this
by not letting dark control you!

Don’t let hope fade, slip through your fingers
Life is what we make it now
Don’t have to wait for the right time
We are all blind, we can’t see the end of future
Love what you have now
Do what you love now
Be alive again
Come to life
letting your heart glow!

©Shweta, 2020. All Rights Reserved.
Originally published on The Cotton Thread.

Benefits Beyond the Mat — Power of Yoga

Yoga is a mirror to look at ourselves from within

Photo by Carl Barcelo on Unsplash

I am certain you have heard of yoga some time or other in your lifetime! Let me tell you a few interesting facts about yoga and its inception.

Yoga is over 5000 years old practice of ancient India which is a combination of holding postures, breathing, relaxing and meditating. India’s ancient religious texts, in the language of Vedas, Sanskrit, gave birth to both the literature and the technique of yoga. The idea of doing yoga is not losing weight and increasing heart rate. In the older times, it was not a part of a fitness goal, it was more to do with expanding your inner awareness, increase focus and mental stability and ultimately expand one’s spiritual energy.

Yoga is a light, which once lit will never dim. The better your practice, the brighter your flame.― B.K.S Iyengar

It was widely practised by the sages of ancient India, who believed the yoga is a kind of magnificent tapestry woven together by the inner spirit and the universe. The word yoga is derived from the word “yuj” which means bind and is often a method of discipline one follows. Yoga helps to gain balance, inner peace, coordination as well as physical and overall well being.

Yoga is gaining popularity in today's chaotic and busy lifestyle like never before. The goal and benefit revolves around the central fact of “awareness”

There are a top 5 benefits of practising yoga regularly.

1. Feel the energy flowing inside you, soothes tension and anxiety in the mind and body
2. Yoga helps to calm disturbed and stressed mind, letting you enjoy inner peace
3. Yoga detoxifies the body and improves immunity
4. Yoga and pranayama (mindful breathing) help create awareness and bring the mind back to the present and focused instead of swinging from the past to the future.
5. With the regular practice of yoga, you feel more content and relaxed and at peace with yourself and others. You will notice, you do not get agitated with small things around you and are more patient with your loved ones, improving your relationships.

Begin your journey to a better life with Peace, Love, and Happiness!

Start practising yoga and see the difference it makes in life. I have been practising yoga since 2016 and I have experienced my body becoming more flexible and developed a great sense of self-discipline and self-awareness. It has improved my well-being and given me mental clarity and peace.

Start yoga today, even it is it for 15–20 minutes, sit down and relax your mind and body. Your mind and body will thank you for that.

Namaste!

©Shweta, 2020. All Rights Reserved.
Originally published on a Few Words. 

5 Works of Eco-Fiction You must Read

An exploration of the world of the relationship between nature and the human communities that dwell in it

Photo by Eugenio Mazzone on Unsplash

When I visited Seychelles January 2019, I was not aware the land is inhabited by humans about 300 years ago, with untouched flora and fauna, thousands of species lived on this beautiful turquoise waters and lush green land. And I didn’t know to what extent this remarkable view and experience of nature so close, would inspire my reading and writing over the coming years.

As a writer, I find myself curious to read about environmental issues captured into stories and characters and words written through an eco-focused lens, from how a story unfolds, and characters adapt and survive through the changes.

There’s no shortage of nonfiction about the environment, and the way humans are degrading it with every passing day and additionally animal extinction and protection, but fiction has the power to open eyes and hearts in completely unexpected ways. If you don’t believe the oceans are in trouble or farmlands are eroding, for example, you’re not likely to pick up a nonfiction book that outlines exactly that.

Fiction personifies the world around us, by contextualizing life into the story in the same way that it did to me, as I saw nature through a different angle when I visited a place with rich nature.

I’m inspired by the writers on this list, who have woven environmental themes into their fictional stories, raising important issues while they also show how the characters are dealing with the issues. These authors also see the untold ways in which everything is connected — humans, animals, land, dignity, power — and subtly and seamlessly allow readers to connect the dots as well.

1. The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck

This is one of the best books on eco-fictions ever written, dated back to 1939.

The book is set during the Great Depression which was followed by Dustbowl. The novel focuses on Oklahoma capturing the economic hardship, drought, and changes in the agricultural industry from 1920 through 1930. The situation puts the tenant farmers out of work since the farmlands were severely affected by wind erosion. This made thousands of farmers move from their home to different places in seeking jobs, land, dignity, and a brighter future.

How can you frighten a man whose hunger is not only in his own cramped stomach but in the wretched bellies of his children? You can’t scare him — he has known a fear beyond every other

 The book is a portrait of the conflict between the powerful and the powerless, and a man’s fierce reaction to injustice. The novel captures the terrors and panic of the Great Depression and probes into the very nature of equality and justice in the world.

2. The Drowned World by JG Ballard

This book was first published in 1962, a classic book on climactic fiction, 

which has mesmerizing descriptive narrative style making the reader envision going into a petrified future in which solar radiation and global warming have melted the polar ice caps. The book depicts the chaotic breakdown of the world, giving a perceptive of deep implications of time, space, the evolution of humans and the psychology of people going through the catastrophe. Writing during such an era most of perhaps fervently believed the world was ours to shape and module. Sadly, we see now in 2020, it wasn’t true.

3. Salvage the Bones by Jesmyn Ward

The book is muscled with poverty, helplessness, and reality. Set during hurricane Katrina, building over the Gulf of Mexico, highlights the tragic turn of events of the people living in the Mississippi during the 12-day hurricane and aftermath of the storm. The writer draws a vivid link between personal trauma and climatic disaster.

Suddenly there is a great split between now and then, and I wonder where the world where that day has happened has one, because we are not in it

The writer lived through Katrina and wrote this book after being very dissatisfied with the way Katrina had receded from the world’s attention and people’s consciousness. The book also depicts the Southern life of Afro — American people and culture and their hardships.

4. The Road by Cormac McCarthy

The Road is a profoundly moving book on an unplanned journey of a father and his young son over several months, blasted by an unknown cataclysm that has destroyed most of civilization on earth, intervening life on it for years. It depicts a future of no hope, dignity or a simple livelihood, but is sustained by love for each other. It gives a vivid imagination into the world of catastrophe we humans are capable of bringing into this world causing ultimate destruction, making the survivors witness complete devastation.

5. Flight Behaviour by Barbara Kingsolver

The book is set in rural Tennessee during a period of unseasonable rain when a young woman tempted to attempt adultery out of marriage witnesses hundreds of monarch butterflies in a field near her house. As the news reaches the experts, it comes as a warning of a disturbing event due to global warming, although they look beautiful in the farmland in Tennessee, displaced from their natural habitat in Mexico.

The book captures the reader leading us to one of the most crucial topics of our time — climate change. With a deft and versatile empathy, the writer dissects the motives of humans of this precarious world.

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So there you have it!

I realized how impactfully these books have captured my empathy and giving a glimpse of ultimate destruction, we humans are causing to the world. I hope this article motivates you to pick up at least one of these books.

I hope this list helps you add some books to your reading list. If anyone has any other books I would love to hear them.

©Shweta, 2020. All Rights Reserved.

Downhill

Photo by Tyler Mullins on Unsplash

I sat there in silence, dwelling on my thoughts, zoned out, staring into the black tunnel, willing to see the lights blinking at me, growing closer, declaring I am on my way closer. The quiet chills me, suddenly adrenaline flows through, hushing me, crashing my courage, as I go downhill. 

©Shweta, 2020. All Rights Reserved.

Originally published on The Friday Fix.