Disconnected Corona Musings

Cooped up at home, isn’t it the perfect time to resume your writing? Well, I am not quite there yet but then, 19 days still to go (and hopefully no more). Meanwhile putting together my daily pots since 22^nd March.  Disjointed, certainly but so is my mind. Hope to be more meaningful soon.

27^th March

We are enduring and we are hopeful. Stay positive, friends!

But, a “To be or not to be” moment! What to do with your phone and social media exposure? What to delete and what to block? The Covidiots don’t stop with their dumb insensate bombardment and Covillains keep playing their doomsday prophecies particularly reserved for India.

Apart from the quintessential Covidiots who would stay indoors all day and come out in the evening at 17 hr to celebrate in processions, there is another strain from the Whatsapp Open University infected with the Morona virus; they would bombard you with unverified Corona forwards all day without even reading or viewing them (not that their reading would make a difference as most of them have attained asinine nirvana, anyway), drowning out the genuine signals of information with their cacophony. And the Covillains who see nothing right in what India is doing; lecturing us from countries who have thousands of cases and hundreds of deaths every day.

All Covidiots need to be silenced with a pacifier thrust in their mouths.

All Covillains should be called out and shamed and May the virus infect them in the country they are in!

26th march

Edgar in King Lear may well say that

The gods are just, and of our pleasant vices

Make instruments to plague us:

and in response let Edmund declare that

The wheel is come full circle

But how does that help? What’s going to happen to the world and therefore us and more specifically me?

Is    daur-e-taraqqi    ke   andaz     nirale   hain

Sadken to andheri par, gharon mein ujale hain

(This age of progress has unique facets, roads are dark but homes are illuminated.)

Arre sabhi burhe bhaiyon aur behanon, zehnon se bhi andhere nikalo aur socho ki,

(Hey, you all brothers and sisters, shed the darkness of your minds and thinkJ

Ye   daur-e-taraqqi   bus  aafat   ki   nishani  hai,

Bachchon pe burhapa hai, burhon pe jawani hai

(This age of progress is a precursor of disaster, the children are behaving like the old but the old are feeling young)

25^th March

All of us at home with all the time in the world. Think, just think! And unlike my friend Bertie Wooster (when he thought, practically nothing much stirred), a lot would whirl and ferment and distil. In a prison of sorts now, break free in thoughts as there is nothing so confining as the prisons of our own perceptions! Remember, as Caesar says in Antony and Cleopatra, Make not your thoughts your prison.

Remebering this sher from Jamal Owaisi sahab today,

Gurez-pa   hai   naya   rasta  kidhar   jaayein,

Chalo ki laut ke hum aapne apne ghar jaayein

(Where do I go with Indecisive legs on a new path, come, let’s head back home)

And in a lighter vein, with apologies to the shair (I forget the name),

Jazb-e-shauq-e-shahadat* ye dekhiye, ab to us ne bhi hathon mein sar le liya,

Ghar pe tikne mein hardam darta tha jo, us se ghar pe hi rehane ka dar le liya

(The feeling of willing martyrdom overwhelms me and I have my head in my hands, one who was afraid to be at home has no fear now to stay put at home)

Naaz se aaya Covid ka virus yahan, ghar dekha mera to ye kehne laga,

Chalo  itni  to  iski  marammat hui,   is awarey ne achcha sa ghar le liya

(The Corona virus came arrogantly and looking at my home said that good, this soul has been so repaired that he has taken a nice home for himself)

Happy thinking!

24^th March

Eff Corona-o-Covid. Not just tired but totally bugged, irked and incommoded by the incessant irradiation of insipid and banal posts from the WhatsApp Open University for the Mentally-Negligible, I thought of this ultimate sacrilege! Effing around with one of the greatest ghazals of my near uncle, Ghalib, in the hope that these are testing times and my impudence would go without any serious chastisement or castigation 😀

Dil-e-nadan tujhe hua kya hai
akhir is dard ki dawa kya hai

(O innocent mind, what’s up? What is the panacea for all this pain?)

Sab hain bezar par wo mushtaq

ya ilahi ye majra kya hai

(All are so apathetic but this Covid is so desirous and eager, Go, what’s this riddle?)

Sab to munh haath rakhte hain

Haan, poochho ki dhoya kya hai

(Hey, all have mouth and hands but ask them, which one have they washed?)

Jab ki tujh bin nahin koi maujood

phir ye hangama-e-corona kya hai

(When except you, nothing else exists, what is this Corona shindig?)

23^rd March

"Covidiots" is the word! And "censure" them is the next word. Read on and if my uncle, the bard, is not your cup of tea, jump to the last para.

Lorenzo: Goodly Lord, what a wit-snapper are you! then bid them prepare dinner.

Launcelot: That is done too, sir, only "cover" is the word.
(The Merchant Of Venice)

Jailer: Come sir, are you ready for death?
Posthumus: Over-roasted rather: ready long ago.
Jailer: Hanging is the word, sir. If you be ready for that, you are well cook'd.
(Cymbeline)

For the clown Launcelot, supervising a banquet, "cover" (for laying the tablecloths, cover!) is the command); for King Cymbeline's jailer, "hanging" (he waits the for the order to hang him)

Why am I quoting all this? Out of context? Not really. Censure (and shaming the morons) is the word for all the idiots who are mocking the efforts on to block the spread of Corona virus. These asinine anti-establishment mercenaries have no suggestions to make, just criticism! Call them out and show them the mirror. May Corona virus infect only these jokers and let all other countrymen be safe.

22^nd March

Sitting at home, like all countrymen, hoping this simple act would kill the Corona virus at so many places around us & put some brake on its vicious spread. More power to this massive "janata curfew" initiative! Also, thinking of the recent years, reminded of Hamlet as the mind, inevitably, what with the experience of Train 18/Vande Bharat exp imbroglio, flitted to my favourite cogitation on the indecision which plagues all governments in particular and society in general.

Now whether it be

Bestial oblivion, or some craven scruple
Of thinking too precisely on th' event—
A thought which, quarter'd, hath but one part wisdom
And ever three parts coward

On way to claim some ground in Poland, the prince castigates himself for not acting decisively. Directed by his father's ghost to avenge his murder, Hamlet is unable to do it yet. A difference here, "does only conscience make cowards of us all?" or is it a case of "what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive". "Thinking" in general, the "precise" lingering over stupid objections, cowardly protection, a bit of scheming wisdom and venal intentions or, unfortunately, is it pure and simple machinations?