Transience

The glitter of gold is questioned

Groupthink has had its say      

 

One invisible living atom quietens

The uproar of invincible economies   

 

Honesty is looked upon as a hydra-headed handicap

And values morph into gibberish fit for the sidelines

                                            

Although nothing is a surprise anymore

Nothing is a mystery

 

Hope remains 

That kindness will prevail

That gentleness will proceed to work out a way

That rules will be followed and roles will be respected

While acknowledging the transience of

Perishable life in a scarfed paradise

~Written in response to the prompt Writers' Pantry #54: New Dawn at Poets and Storytellers United

 

 

Green

Gentle rustling leaves    echo

A strewn pebble   white round smooth

The blue river     gurgles below

The tall sky sparkles    evening glow

 

I will walk this way   later    again

In the quietness    of an interlude

To touch     the scent green     see

To belong    to be      

~Written in response to the dVerse Prompt by Lisa  

Visual Verse

 A piece of short fiction that I submitted to Visual Verse is up at https://visualverse.org/submissions/the-ship/ 

Thanks for reading!

Moonshine

The captain knelt in front of the altar and raised his palms in surrender, for after two hundred fifty days of voyage, exhausting their store of canned food and no respite in sight, sea sickness consumed him and his men like conflagrating wild fire.  

‘Sire, land ahoy!,’ cried the men, banging their fists against the teak door of his room.

The captain opened his eyes to see the top of a light house glowing incandescent against the dark sky, its light as soothing as liquid moonshine.

~Written in response to Sonya's Three Line Tales Prompt at https://only100words.xyz/2021/01/21/three-line-tales-260/ - Three Line Tales 260

Resilience

Manya sat in the midst of papers, swirling in a sea of indigo files. She couldn’t hear the clock ticking but knew that each moment gave way to the next with speed of lightening. The Deadline would creep in, deadly quiet, and stand there, thin-lipped, hands on her hips, demanding her pound of flesh.

Manya stood up and stared out of the window. The red-tiled portico was unpeopled except for the aged gardener who was hunched over, picking tufts of dried grass lining the edge of the green lawn.

How she wished she could join him. Did he want a potted petunia for his garden? Or a gladiolus, may be? She would choose the best ones from her own select array and gift it to the man. Tomorrow. When it would all be over. She would gladly trade the coldness of the ivory tower, where she stood, to the greenness of the grassroots with which the gardener worked. Carefree. Shorn of inane responsibilities. Happy.

But then again, wasn’t happiness a bi-product of the mind, just as suffering was. It was all in the mind. What stood between her and happiness at that moment? It was her mind. Her imagined fear of a missed deadline.

The gardener stood up, stretched his back and made as if to wipe the sweat off his brow. He sat down in a huff, muttering under his breath for a couple of moments, and slowly proceeded to pick up where he had left.  

Manya looked at the clear sky. It was dotted with wispy white clouds. Clouds that predicted good fortune, she knew. The Deadline was inching, slowly and surely. Battling it, tackling it and nailing it, was the Hobson’s choice she would choose.

She turned around and found the indigo blue files staring at her. They were the same colour as the colour of the sky. She picked one and ran her fingers over its smooth surface. She was now holding a piece of the sky, her very own sky.

~Written in response to Rommy's Prompt - Weekly Scribblings #53 : Beautiful Words at Poets and Storytellers United. I chose the word Zuiun: clouds that predict good fortune. Word Count:341

https://poetsandstorytellersunited.blogspot.com/2021/01/weekly-scribblings-53-beautiful-words.html#comment-form

A new poem at Mothers Always Write

Mothers Always Write is a magazine that I have always admired and read regularly. Happy to share that a poem that I have written - 'One Step at a Time' has been published. Here it is: https://mothersalwayswrite.com/one-step-at-a-time/

Flash Fiction

A piece of flash fiction that I wrote is up at https://www.ekphrastic.net/ekphrastic/ekphrastic-writing-responses-maria-izquierdo. Thanks for reading! 

Two Poems and a piece of micro fiction

Hello,

Happy to share with you a couple of my recent publishing successes.

Willawaw Journal published a poem that I had written - 'The Flourescent Orange Swimsuit' in their Fall Issue. You can read it here - http://willawawjournal.com/category/journal/fall-2020-issue-10/page/3/

A piece of micro fiction that I wrote was published in one of my favourite magazine - 101Words.org. https://101words.org/divine-justice/

A poem that I had written in response to their prompt - 'Figures on a landscape' by Bertram Booker has been published in The Ekphrastic Review. It's up at https://www.ekphrastic.net/ekphrastic/ekphrastic-writing-responses-bertram-brooker.

Happy writing! Happy reading!

In this blog post, I share with you a couple of my pieces that got published recently. 

First up, another of my ten word stories found a home at Potato Soup Journal:

http://potatosoupjournal.com/how-she-fell-in-love-with-him-by-preeth-ganapathy/

A poem that I had written in response to their monthly prompt has been published in Visual Verse Magazine :

https://visualverse.org/submissions/cerulean-freedom/

A piece of prose that I had written for the Prose 500 contest organised by Wordweavers has been selected under their 'featured' category.

https://www.wordweavers.in/2020/08/prose-500-2020-winners-featured-writers.html

Happy writing, happy living!  

10 word story

My ten word story has been published in potato soup journal:

http://potatosoupjournal.com/infidelity-by-preeth-ganapathy/

The elusive silence

There is an intertwining relationship between silence and creativity in my life. I can create only when it is silent and quiet. Any noise and distraction seems to dispel the slightest whisper of new ideas from my mind. In such situations, I usually just hold onto my ideas like as if I were meditating, and wait for the hubbub to settle down before I begin writing.   

The fast paced beats

Of the blaring music

Incarcerates the ears

Leaving the mind with little elbow room

To nudge around its creative muscles

I stop fighting and decide to

Drift along with the flow-

Waiting patiently for the song to end

So I can finally write something in

The quiet interlude that will follow.

Copyright © 2020 Preeth Ganapathy 

Lessons in Staying ahead

We try to tame nature, try to attach a meaning to her actions and find a solution to the puzzles she throws at us, but we are unsuccessful each time. She always has the better of us, each time.

Each generation

Thinks that it has

Unraveled

The mysteries of

Countless branches of science

In its efforts to inch closer to the truth

But no amount of

Deciphering, decoding and discovering

Can make us ready

To deal with the stock of surprises

That nature has in her quiver

She comes with a new conundrum each time.

One step ahead of us. Always.

Copyright © 2020 Preeth Ganapathy

Word Prompts :
Countless Branches - RDP
https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2020/03/26/ragtag-daily-prompt-thursday/
Amount - FOWC
https://fivedotoh.com/2020/03/26/fowc-with-fandango-amount/

Everyday instances of scrying

You don't really need to go to a clairvoyant to scry, we do it in our everyday lives too. And not just us, the animal kingdom is replete with examples of divination.

The kingfisher peers into

The orb of the blue pond

Looking for fish

The weatherman gazes at the sky

And predicts heavy

Rainfall

I stare into your eyes

And try to magically decipher

The thoughts floating in your mind

Copyright © 2020 Preeth Ganapathy

Ragtag daily word prompt : SCRY
https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2020/03/25/rdp-wednesday-scry/

Lockdown Triolet

With the 21 day lockdown period starting in India, there are cases where rules are flouted and instructions are not adhered to. People going for morning and evening walks, vehicles commuting along roads every other second are a few common examples. This short poem(triolet) is inspired by one such instance. 

Can you hear the engine revving
       Up the deserted road, puffing with all its might
I want to ask the driver,” Where do you think you are going?”
       Can you hear the engine revving
In sometime, I presume, he would be quietly withdrawing
       But still, this is supposed to be complete lockdown, right?
Can you hear the engine revving
       Up the deserted road, puffing with all its might

Copyright © 2020 Preeth Ganapathy

Delicate

New born fingers that curl around a mother’s

Dew drop fresh on a blade of green grass 

Touch of soft muslin on the skin

Unspoken equations in a relationship

Damage wreaked by angry words

Space occupied by love in the heart

The thread that connects the body to the soul

The thin veil between life and death.

This is my poem in response to the Ragtag daily word prompt: delicate
https://ragtagcommunity.wordpress.com/2020/03/24/rdp-tuesday-delicate/

Late night writing!

A long, tiring day at work today. Thinking about what to write for today’s post before I hit the sack. Well, yes, writing to me is this important. I have to write my daily quota of lines, otherwise the day, I consider, is not all that well spent!

It is like your daily share of that favourite TV show that you just can’t miss, or that comfort snack that you have got to gobble down! Writing to me is cathartic, it is something that infuses energy in me, instantly! Oh and by the way, I realised that just now, because I no longer feel as exhausted as I felt awhile ago.

A walk in the woods, a conversation with a dear one, meditation – they all do the trick – rejuvenate the mind. And now I discover that writing does that too. The joy of seeing the lines writing themselves out, like they were always there waiting, silently,patiently, waiting for you to discover them- is nothing short of a miracle, if you ask me. And one more discovery (-a pleasant one),  I am no longer wondering about what to write for today’s post. It’s already written itself out, if you know what I mean. And what's more you have now read it too. And with that I sign off!

That elusive Eureka moment!

Everytime I read anything that appeals to me - a good sentence, a new idea or even an interesting word, I make it a point to jot it down - something that my father has always advised me to do. When you look back at this collection, it will invariably spark a sense of joy in you, he always says. 

Just like time and opportunities, many an interesting thing - be it spur of inspiration, an anecdote or a-life-changing-world-changing idea - gets lost out in the milieu, and forever, if one does not take the pain to actually write it down.

The other day, as I was scrolling through WhatsApp status messages, i found that one of my contacts had put up an interesting status message. It was about not discussing your goals with anybody, but just going ahead and doing it. Throughout the day, I reminded myself to write it out, but never got around to actually doing it. Talk about procrastination! And like all status messages, it had disappeared the next day. Yes, the essence of the message has stuck in my mind. But the sentence has disappeared. Despite scouring through the results that were thrown up as I typed out various permutations of words to that effect on the Google search bar, the beautiful sentence, was lost to me.

The significance of putting down ideas, ( I mean the Eureka moments here!) on paper is even greater. For the idea is yours. It has occurred to you and you alone. From either the depths of your being or from the heights of imagination! Either way, no amount of ‘googling’ your brain can help you find it, if it is gone. Of course, in some very cases the sentence/work may deign to reappear. But, by experience I can say that such things happen only in the rarest of rare cases. I remember reading an editorial in one of the national dailies recently, where the author had a brilliant idea but couldn’t write it down because he was in the shower, and one thing led to another and the idea deserted him completely. Many famous authors are known to get their ideas at bizzare hours like three in the morning and they immediately rush to capture them. Elizabeth Gilbert, in one of her TED Talks, even speaks about catching hold of an idea ‘by the tail’ and never letting it escape ! 

So, I always make it a point to carry a pen and a small notebook(not a mobile phone, because I am an old school, paper-and-pen kind of person!) around with me. What if something 'noteworthy', lurking round the corner catches me unawares!