Final Light
The auditorium is huge. It is an ocean of space built in three levels. Diffused lighting lights the whole place. The light makes the space expand further, pushing the corners in and masking the details. The light lacks quality but makes up with its evocative display of vast space. The stage is the focus of the brightest lights. It shimmers like a mirage. The curtains hide in the corners like nervous stagehands, streaked with fine dust. And it is quiet. Quieter than even an empty house. The silence covers everything like cold dew. It drips from the dangling microphones, it fills the chairs flowing in like waves and it gives shape to the shallow shadows hiding under the seats.
Iām lying in the center of the stage, stomach ripped open. My fingers clutch the intestines crawling out of the jagged hole. I want to scream but the silence is on me too. It covers my mouth with a dry kiss and the screams struggle at the back of my throat. I do not want to fight it. I want it to engulf me. I squeeze my intestines harder.
Everything explodes.
Space expands and then contracts into a thin but intensely white line. I close my eyes and embrace Death.
(final part in a trilogy of short pieces loosely based on the themes of light and death)
This meditation on death and light mimics a lot of my dreamnightmare visions. The missing ‘how did this happen’ in the scene only adds to the excruciating terror-and-pain-before the light of death. Wow.
Now that I’ve read Pink Floyd’s song, there is something dark in this piece (in you?), waiting to explode. I’m not asking for an admission; it’s just an observation. There are shadows in all of us. Finding the light is hard, but it gives me hope that you can still see the stars through the peepholes of dark sky.
Wow… this is amazing, Anil. I love it. I haven’t visited your blog in too long. The changes are beautiful, and I have a lot of reading to catch up on…
[journey]
wow, very intense! very dramatic at the end.
“curtains hide in the corners like nervous stagehands”
“shadows hiding under the seats”
you are amazing!! i love this imagery.
to tell you honestly, i didnt enjoy the last part….it reminded me of an accident, i had seen where the guy was lying on the road, with his skull cracked open and the brains lying outside, on the road.
otherwise, its a great writing as usual.
btw, i realised today that mottled memories is only a part, there are other parts to your site too, so am going to enjoy them next. i didnt sign up for hi5 because i use a dial up and hardly connect for that long, though i use msn messenger.
the last line absolutely made me breathless! i think it was a tight conclusion. very well done!
yes the last line is excellent
finnegan: the minimal information was a concious intent on my part…lends it a slightly macabre touch I feel….and thank you so much for your wonderul insights for each one in this series….
Mermaid: well I’ll admit it freely…I’m a pretty melancholic soul..dont know where the shadows come from but they are there coloring everything with thier dim greyness….but it is something I’ve learnt to live with and even put to good use if possible…oh but there are days when I’m bathed with the warm radiance of people I like and love..that is something to live for…
[journey]: long time I know…but it is neverthless very nice to see you again in these parts…thank you….
lorena: you are a constant source of encouragement for me…..thank you so much…you picked out my fave parts too!
gulnaz: to explain a bit these short pieces were not really meant for enjoyment…they were just idle reflections on my part…they are not (especially this one) pretty I know..but that is the whole point..Death is never pretty even at its most peaceful form..
oh you noticed the other parts! I hope you like them…this site is a labor of love for me…and thank you….
I’ve have to confess that I did not understand the hi5 part…did you get an invite from me? if yes, I’m very surprised bcos I’ve never emailed you…and this site does have some protection against email harvesters installed….on another note I think hi5 should be banned…it just spams all the contacts in one’s address-book…some friends of mine were complaining about it too…orkut is way better that way….oh I use msn too…i like the handwriting feature and the emoticons in the new version…although the intrusive ads suck big time…
transience: thank you dear…..your words are like coffee…they give me a pleasant buzz! ok…ok…not very original I know…but felt like saying it!
Hi,Just dropped by from mermaid’s blog and was prompted to write a comment on this piece.
It is stark yet revelatory and reveals a combination of emotions ofcourse mostly serious.
I really liked the way you have used the imagery and words to convey space and silence and eventually death!Am glad i dropped by!
Come to think of it, this series has a very stong Absurdist element in it. Each one made me think of Ionesco & Beckett…wonder how they’d interpret it on stage….
I really liked the contrast between softness and sharpness in this last piece. You drew us in easily, shock us, and finish with a cool ending. Nice work!
Hey Anil .. you could have left a link to this place here on your rediff blog ….
I have read this before … this is one of my favorites …. you always write beautifully …
Jyotsna: a warm welcome to you….and thank you so much for your wonderful insights…this is one joy of writing…to see how people react to what I wrote…I always learn a lot from such reactions!
Geets: do you mind if I call you that? I hope not…I’m too lazy to type out your whole name today!! oh I love Ionesco (havent read Beckett though) although I havent read many of his plays…Alliance in Hyd had this beautiful bound edition of all his plays and I used to monopolize it most of the time! But I think I only managed to read ‘La Contatrice Chauve’ and maybe another one if I remember correctly…there was also some plan to stage one of his plays but I think it fell through…a’ways to cut a long story short I really liked the many-layered humor and deep satire of his plays…
coming to what you have said, that is a very interesting interpretation but I did not conciously write in that vein…now that you say it I do have to agree that the trilogy does have some elements of it…oh yeah it would be a very interesting (hypothetial) exercise to imagine how they would interpret it on stage…perhaps I myself should give it a try!
stella: *grins happily* thank you so much…you made my day!
IJ: ah you found me! a warm welcome to you too…well I wanted to start off with a (relatively) clean slate…so I didnt leave a link…and thank you…it is nice to know that you still like it…as I said before this trilogy is close to my heart too…
Oui oui tu peut m’appeler Geets. Mes amis deja fait ca – la seule peice de Ionesco que j’ai lu, c’est Amedee – c’etait vraiment excellent. Comme tu as dit, les elements d’absurd melange de satire, humeur et biensur la reflexion sur l’existence humaine.
Il faut lire “Waiting for Godot” de Beckett – moi j’ai pris les oeuvres de Beckett de la bibliotheque et j’essaye de les lire ces jours…
And hey if you do get ard to experimenting on that – you know whom to inform first! š
Beautiful imagery in this piece Anil. It is my favourite in the series of 3 purely because of the richness in the writing here. Well done!
PS – I too, have been going through the rest of your site. Very beautifully created.