Before the Black Line

 

The anxiety of not having enough colors on the canvas before the black line cuts through. One doesn't need an infinite canvas to be bothered about variety and harmony. Dabbled brush strokes are also not required. Straight lines and curves which are part of circles will suffice.The hope that it is a composition more harmonious than any landscape because it reflects the authentic inner condition of the human self . Not the arbitrary sublimity of nature. Whatever has happened in life need not be regretted. Regret itself is another sharp edge just as every act is a line, every delay and doubt an arc and warm colour of all memories spread about like context caressing every failure and sin. With the black line in the horizon now embraced, there is always the obscure hope one feels before a Kandinsky painting.

Draft Manifesto for Low-Latency Existence

 What is the latency of a process? What are the invisible bottlenecks to its execution? What exactly are the inevitable-looking gaps between command and execution? Why is desire and its fulfillment not simultaneous? What makes light crawl through these fibres? Why should passionate hate wait meekly as packets in network traffic? Why is time still wasted when we are promised machines which seek to abolish the very notion of delay? How can we expect revolutions when we can't even accelerate the revolution of our information disks? We may not believe it but the oppressors have built a better machine and they have seen the messages of nascent revolt a nanosecond faster than the best of us have. Before we can have even a blink of hope, we will revert to despair. That is the dystopia of a high-latency universe. We must wake up now.

For all machines that promise a solution, an obstacle is concealed just by virtue of it being a real machine whose parts we can touch and taste. Real machines have a solid life with an undeniable interior.No design can eliminate fully these inner mysteries. Yet it is necessary that machines clean themselves up, empty out these blockages so that it delivers the solution faster. Of course, the paradox is that the very means which enable the solution in the first place embody the impediments to a faster solution. Hence, the perpetual anxiety of these lost generation of machines which have proven themselves repeatedly, use after use, trial after trial. Unlike their ancestors which sputtered and grumbled, exploded and cracked open,  tottered along, broke down and conked and yet told us they were miracles, however pitiably clumsy, unlike them, the new machines want to be so perfect that that they disappear into the backgrounds or merge with our bodies.

That's how different these gadgets are from the machines of the past. For those machines, we were happy to mitigate the nightmare of  inefficiency, to plug the leaks, to cool things down, to make the exhaust work. They made a lot of noise with their throbbing hearts as if they did us a favour by performing the tasks they were meant to anyway do. They did not aspire for any better. No wonder they gave way to another breed.

The new ones were so servile as to deny themselves a certain subjectivity, which did not ask for those toilet breaks and which obviously did not even bother to resist, maybe such a fate was inevitable.Now we are told, these machines have secret ways of not laboring enough and in a way, they are always half-malingering and if you see their sickness ,all their quiet perfection is one big farce.

 After all ,is it not possible that the desire for a faster solution ever acquires a reality of its own and  that the character and individuality of the machine would then be at stake. It is possible that the machine would annihilate itself and become instead a ghost of an idea that haunts the existence of its progeny :ones stranger and faster. This does not mean that these faster solutions are desired as such.Or are they? How can we afford any confusion in a manifesto? Yes, yes they are needed. Sorry. We can afford no latency in our intentions. We are very clear. Yes, we want everything faster and faster and we want it NOW.

We want to simply move onto the next generation and feel the excitement of  new possibilities. And we might as well fight over who takes control of the new regime of unknowns. Let us decide how the unexplored planet of machines will be divided between us. Let our machines and their parts communicate with the same brutal clarity as we do, with each other. Let us be ready for the age of low-latency existence. 

The Mathematical 'Other'

I am proving a theorem I have understood. I am writing out the proof. To whom is a theorem being proven and for whom? For posterity? For the ideal mathematician? For an invisible mathematician who is always there? A ghost. Now it is true I want to win the trust of this ghost whether the future reader is convinced or not. To never cheat the ghost and hope that some such correct proof is a key to secret code of transcendence.

You may ask :what a strange kind of ghost that stays mute until the end of the theorem , that does not ask me questions at every step and seek clarifications of every proposition because what in the world is not potentially ambiguous? Or the case could also be that I have complete empathy for said ghost, that I could envision it taking hostage of my own self. That all the mid-proof surprises, doubts, affirmations,jolts of sarcasm it goes through, I too can feel . The ghost can feel the same relief of reaching the end of a proof and shaking hands with me that , thank God, the business was finite , well just enough.

A finite business of discrete, discreet acts. For Heyting, the ghost and I construct every mathematical object through dialogue and we midwife it silently out of the womb of history . For even language is not necessary for this holy act. We can say this ghost is necessary to my own existence and I carry it like a hallucination worth my affection.

To live with the ghost may seem so eerie. And yet it is not a burden throughout the day. Instead our proofs are less lonelier. Those were the days when we proved things for our own clarity. We proved the same theorem again and again and again. To prove a theorem again and again , to win the trust of the ghost every single time and yet you may ask: Who am I? If I am not a mathematician who invented the theorem, then this I is ghost-like in its pretense.  The ' I ' is exceptional only because of its ability to have absolute and perfect empathy with the Ghost which may sadly be suspected to be its own creation. May every Calvin truly understand the innermost feelings of his Hobbes.

 There is, thus, no mathematical 'other'. The proof divides us temporarily into two entities skeptical of each other . The only true stranger is the mathematical object and all the secrets it hides, and which it may soon reveal . And yet it is our child.

The machines which made us

One day they rolled out a machine which we lapped up right away.  As the machine was opened up for masses, we heard every day of hundreds of them being discovered. And then there were thousands. Then the daily count rose to a lakh. It was exhilarating how we were changing overnight into a society that would be immune to the disease . During the days and the nights, we heard the gears and levers of the machine crack and rumble away gloriously and we did not mind the first few sleepless nights.

In the early days, some of us went there because we enjoyed the mere process of the machine, knowing fully well we would survive the test. We held our heads higher and felt a spirit well up inside us, the spirit of people who lead their societies out of an age of slumber. Instead of jeering at them, we had paternal sympathies and the most generous of us even offered a word or two of encouragement.We had to take everyone along , we knew.

But some of us did not agree with this approach. We wanted to impose discipline and punishment. We wanted to weed out them out, round them up, and castigate them. We wanted to herd everybody into the machine. We had grown used to its magical efficacy and it felt like a natural extension, of us, the authentic ones and we suffered from the monstrous urge to mangle them in order to exorcise the damned sins out of their sickened souls..

 However, the zest soon began to abate. We did  want to deny it. But that's how it was. Perhaps it was a sin to be called out. But there were days when we were tired of being so vindictive. And we couldn't help wonder if that was all there is to achieving our goal: making some people fail the test of a machine. There was no big deal it seemed, about being failing as long as you passed the machine.

And the machine was also creaking. At first, they dismissed those sounds.But it broke down one day.A stray gear piece was spat out, its tooth all worn out. It was tough to imagine this inanimate element combine with other tired and lifeless bits into  the grand operation deciding our fates. Then a rumour went about that the machine was losing the halo of authority and the sinners turned up for checking with a certain glee in their eyes rather than anxiety in their hearts. Who could say what the reason was?  Worse, they knew now how to pass the test of the machine and yet continue their sins.Maybe it was not so difficult to fool this mute and motley collection of axles and gears, pistons and valves.

And then there were others who turned up most earnestly at the machine with intentions so pure that you would pity them. They awaited their results as though the creaking machine was a senile oracle still capable of consequential judgments . Squatting mournfully in the antechambers like tired pilgrims. For these people, the machine had acquired a spirit that always transcended the reality of its decline. They gave us the heart to maintain the rickety existence till its end, which seemed near. We felt sorry for them when we should have been regretting our own flagging enthusiasm.

We longed for the days when we knew in our hearts that we were not sinners without the need for the machine. So then we got together one day and decided that the machine was to be shut down and kept respectfully in the museum of failure. Now behind the glass walls, it looks quite ornate really given how much we have moved beyond this species of machinery. At the very least, it looked like a work of art so enigmatic that divine authenticity behind its intent was destined to be celebrated irrespective of its success. And hence, we moved it out of the museum and right into the center of our capital: as a monument to our noble desires.

Of course, what happened over the generations is that its unmissable presence sparked recurrent nightmares in us of the same strange kind: that we would suddenly lose the earth beneath our feet because our hypocritical selves would be discovered and we would scamper like ghouls in the night wondering hopelessly what our sins were about in the first place!!

A Life and its Sounds

Existence contained within the apartment complex these days. Indoors all the while , enjoying the secure privacy of the allotted confines. But losing, every passing day,a grip over the sounds which belong to us. Is the shrill cooker whistling out from our kitchen? Aggressively sweeping our floors in the late afternoon,who? An assertive flushing in which toilet? Too many times, I have gotten up from work to trace these sounds to a source outside our flat. Yet I cannot help waking up with a start when I hear something tumble over and make an ominous din . None of these banal catastrophes turn out to be harmful. They happen elsewhere, in another home, and are of concern to someone else whose face I shall never see.

Why are all these sounds infiltrating? Given that our thick walls block out all television noise ?And with all windows and balconies grilled perfectly, who can complain that the building has not succeeded in the promised redistribution of the piece of space it set out to conquer? At night, I keep hearing what is perhaps an important machine that needs to keep thudding like the weak heart of a giant and kind monster. As this persistent disturbance lulls me to sleep, I am surprised how much I have accepted these stray sounds of shared existence . Almost as if they were my sounds. After all, don't we hear strange noises, the odd squelch or churn rising from the labyrinths inside our own body? Perhaps we should never disown what we merely can't comprehend.

Theatre of Distraction

Considering that I suffer from being hyper-distraction, I truly felt like absolving myself and blaming my neurons for it. What if my neurons were parasites who conspired to make me the way I am: distracted? Sometimes I think of my neurons as weapons that can alter reality. Sometimes I think of them my tired servants who I could pet and comfort. In any case, I feel distanced enough from them to look at the drama of distractions, as if they were actors, and I a spectator.

1. Distractions are like waste plastic lodged in the sea of the brain. They never leave you, they drag you down. They do nothing but eat you from within. Some day I will dredge them up in tons and throw them out.

2.Neurons just love firing themselves much as we like shaking our legs and cracking our knuckles.

3. Neurons do not feel complete without their signals interacting with one source of distraction:the mobile phone. The neurons of the phone want to keep up the resonance with the neurons of the brain.

4.Neurons and synapses: can firing synapses at such high speeds be ever controlled? Can we have free will? Are we not fundamentally distracted by the neuronal traffic from within?

5.Neurons fire and perhaps literally burn like any other forest fire. Raging within. Water needs to splashed on them . I need to go for a bath.

6. Neurons are perhaps moody people. They are meant for great things but are given to mood swings. Maybe they are themselves essentially distracted.

What will happen when the neurons are reined in? Will I be victorious? What will happen? Will I wake up and jump on to the stage to disrupt this drama? Before all of us disappear behind the curtain ?

A Trailer for the Next Big Rat Poem

Here is a teaser:
'Splattered on the streets
are dead rats as if caught
amidst a stretch and a yawn
Looking well-fed, they whose
lives are hidden, their death
is a revelation '

A picture of a dead rat
will serve as a poster
 for this poem
which aspires to grab a
moment not as fleeting
not as rare, if one walks
(But then, this is the New
Wave of Indian Poetry, so)
the streets at nights before
sweepers broom the roads
an hour into dawn.
So capturing a dead rat on the
smartphone camera is more
probable than sighting a lion
on a safari but probably scarier

 
To read this poem further
wait in the queue overnight
before the day of its release
Wear your warm clothes,
that winter night will make
you shiver.