Monday, October 14th, 2024

a stopped train


Padam bhai is my old friend, he lives in Delhi. Everyone knows how hot it is in Delhi. In this scorching heat, while going to Dwarka Court, I often saw a middle-aged young man. He used to sit in the middle of the divider. No shawl, no shade. He would not even look at the passing traffic. There was a notebook lying nearby. Something was written on it. Padam bhai kept looking at him for many days. Yesterday I stopped the car. I asked, 'Brother, what do you keep writing?' He did not even raise his face. I asked, who are you? Then he was silent. Then I asked, 'Don't you want to answer?' For the first time he gave some reaction, that too negative. He was writing something strange in his notebook. Once Padam bhai thought that maybe he might be writing Ram's name. I have seen people writing Ram ji's name not only with devotion, but also with complaints.

A friend of mine from Moradabad, after the untimely death of his beloved nephew, kept complaining to him by writing Ram ji's name in his notebook for God knows how many days. I have his stuck watch. While leaving, Padam bhai asked should I take a photo? This time he said yes. Padam bhai took a photo of his copy. Then asked what are you writing? He said I am writing a poem. Showing the photo, Padam bhai challenged him to read it. Now everyone knows that I read any kind of poem! First I applied AI in that work. I will not take names, but everyone's feet opened. The machine will have to learn more to read the words engraved in an unknown sleep while sitting on the burning divider in the scorching sun. Anyway, I started reading the page of the diary carefully. The surprise was that each and every word was beautiful. As if calligraphy was done. Almost everything was visible except the waves. It was written in it – 'Neither death moves, nor the train of life. Mir, I am a crazy train.'

There was more than 90 percent repetition in the poem, but I read it completely. The poet can be mad, but even in his madness, the poem keeps saying or telling something. That is why poets, no matter how bad they are, have been liked. The train of that poet sitting on the divider is stuck at one place. He cannot die, he cannot live. That is why we are singing in the poem. There are stories stuck in such silent sadness. That man has been stuck on the divider for God knows how long, like a derailed train. Whenever it whistles to leave, the poet writes in his notebook- 'Mar-mar ji-ji maut ji rela hun'. Come on, I am also coming…'

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are the author's own.


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