colophon
This is Colophon.
- ചരമം – Jan 1, 0001
- കോള് – Jan 1, 0001
- who_am_i – Jan 1, 0001
- where_do_dogs_begin – Jan 1, 0001
- when_s_left – Jan 1, 0001
- what_am_i_a_legal_list_of_things – Jan 1, 0001
- watching_this_closeness – Jan 1, 0001
- wanting – Jan 1, 0001
- two_poems – Jan 1, 0001
- thrownness – Jan 1, 0001
- thoughts_on_the_small_alaap_in_poove_sempoove_anupallavi – Jan 1, 0001
- thoughts_on_actual_people – Jan 1, 0001
- the_three-legged_dog – Jan 1, 0001
- the_state_of_the_world – Jan 1, 0001
- the_door_that_irks_me – Jan 1, 0001
- the_casual – Jan 1, 0001
- the_bottle_and_other_mirages – Jan 1, 0001
- talking_about_myself – Jan 1, 0001
- sunshine_in_a_bottle – Jan 1, 0001
- stone_and_flesh – Jan 1, 0001
- splitting_headache_brutal_honesty_as_cure – Jan 1, 0001
- sinning – Jan 1, 0001
- sentences – Jan 1, 0001
- self_and_universe_yet_another_parallelism – Jan 1, 0001
- scratching_one_s_head – Jan 1, 0001
- saturday_18_january – Jan 1, 0001
- sapamoksham_redemptionsalvationliberation_poem_kalpatta_narayanan_master – Jan 1, 0001
- return – Jan 1, 0001
- reflections_ii – Jan 1, 0001
- reflections – Jan 1, 0001
- reasons_why – Jan 1, 0001
- reading_as_music_as_reading – Jan 1, 0001
- raising_the_bar – Jan 1, 0001
- pigeon_waterfall – Jan 1, 0001
- onion sellers and domesticity – Jan 1, 0001
- one_poem – Jan 1, 0001
- one_bad_turn – Jan 1, 0001
- on_poetry – Jan 1, 0001
- not_eating_sweets_on_deepavali – Jan 1, 0001
- my_last_resort – Jan 1, 0001
- mirabai – Jan 1, 0001
- literary_erotica_for_you – Jan 1, 0001
- like-this_reading_clarice_lispector – Jan 1, 0001
- lifetimes_of_gypsy_women – Jan 1, 0001
- legitimacy_from_history – Jan 1, 0001
- in_the_restaurant – Jan 1, 0001
- how_to_say_ഞാനങ്ങ്_ഇല്ലാണ്ടായിപ്പോയി – Jan 1, 0001
- how_much_i – Jan 1, 0001
- handke_and_myself_more_reflections – Jan 1, 0001
- handke – Jan 1, 0001
- guilt_shame_and_small_circles – Jan 1, 0001
- god-creation-sex_and_beauty_and_history_according_to_rilke_and_me – Jan 1, 0001
- god_and_erection – Jan 1, 0001
- gated_homes – Jan 1, 0001
- firstpost – Jan 1, 0001
- essential_tremor – Jan 1, 0001
- escalation – Jan 1, 0001
- erotic_ending – Jan 1, 0001
- eating_a_grilled_cheese_sandwich – Jan 1, 0001
- do_not_forget_anything_poem_kalpatta_narayanan_mash – Jan 1, 0001
- coming_to_terms_with_my_suicide – Jan 1, 0001
- chotta_japan – Jan 1, 0001
- birds – Jan 1, 0001
- automatic_coffee_machines – Jan 1, 0001
- anything_else_sir – Jan 1, 0001
- anxiously_waiting_for_coffee – Jan 1, 0001
- akkitham_pandathe_meshanthi – Jan 1, 0001
- agamben_reading_a_poem – Jan 1, 0001
- a_dream_unwound – Jan 1, 0001
- – Jan 1, 0001
- – Jan 1, 0001
- – Jan 1, 0001
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ചരമം *ചരമം*🌹 *പെരിങ്ങോട്മലയിൽ വാസു* നന്മണ്ട :പെരിങ്ങോട് മല വാസു (63) നിര്യാതനായി സഹോദരങ്ങൾ : പത്മനാഭൻ, ഭാസ്കരൻ, ബാബു ശവസംസ്ക്കാരം(26-03-25) നാളെ രാവിലെ 10 മണിക്ക്…
കോള് കോള് എന്ന വാക്ക് മലബാറിന് പുറത്തു സാധാരണമായി ഉപയോഗിക്കാറുണ്ടോ എന്നെനിക്കറിയില്ല. ഉണ്ടാവില്ല എന്നാണ് എന്റെ വിശ്വാസം. കോളടിച്ചല്ലോ എന്ന് മലബാറിന് പുറത്തും ഉപയോഗിക്കാറുണ്ടാവണം, കാരണം അതൊരു സാമാന്യമായ പ്രയോഗമായ് മാറിയിട്ടുണ്ട്. പക്ഷെ ആ വാക്കിന് മലബാറിൽ ഉച്ചരിക്കപ്പെടുമ്പോൾ ഉണ്ടാവുന്ന ശക്തി മറ്റെവിടെയും ഉണ്ടാവില്ല. കോളടിക്കുക മലബാറുകാർക്ക് മറ്റുള്ളവരെക്കാൾ ശക്തിയിൽ ആണെന്നതാണ് അതിനു കാരണം. ശബ്ദതാരാവലി…
Self-acceptance and the issue of knowing oneself Let us go logically, slowly. Self-acceptance can be considered a decent goal in life. To accept oneself, one must know what one is. And how do we do that? We start by examining…
Where do Dogs Begin? I am sat in the coffee shop in campus after a month of absence. The very ill, malnourished dog whom I used to feed and pet remembered me and came to say hi. I was petting…
When S Left When S left, I cried a little. But when I think about it I begin to see that it was only one of the many things I did after she left. She started leaving many months before…
What am I? A legal list of things. I read the Paris Interview I drink beer I write my thesis I type stuff from a bar I also take a lot of time to cum I think it would be…
Thoughts on This Closeness I don’t remember much about Kit Zauhar’s first film, Actual People, other than the fact I felt it was similar to the kind of movies which are common in places like MUBI, vignettes or slice-of-life movies.…
Wanting the Burgundy Roll-top A video advertising a burgundy roll-top bag appeared on my phone today morning when I was lying on the bed, too tired to get up. While it could have been an ad sponsored by the company…
two poems someone painted over a dead fly on the terrace. they would not even brush it away they just brushed over it. i wonder whether its obituary was lengthy with a list of the women in its life a…
Thrownness As I approach my late twenties, I find myself gaining new awareness about my body. Since the time I started reflecting about myself, my body had been pushed into the background, a mere mass in which my ideas resided.…
Thoughts on the small alaap in Poove Sempoove, anupallavi Feels like dropping a nice pathiri on a clean clothesline. Supple, like a leaf falling from great heights. Measured, like the lone feather which detaches from the bird. In terms of…
Thoughts on Actual People Okay, so I watched Actual People, again, because I just posted my take on The Closeness, and Kit Zauhar made Actual People before The Closeness. I think MUBI classed Actual People in the Millenial Meltdown category.…
The Three-Legged Dog These days I’ve taken to staying inside during the day; it is April in Mumbai and the sun beats down mercilessly on everything. I venture outside only after the sun sets. With the draft sent to my…
The State of the World I imagine the world as the cut side of a huge metal cylinder. The cut face open to everything, its nerve endings exposed, so that all the events and emotions are felt at this cut…
the door that irks me on our building, there is a door on the terrace that opens into the stairwell. (when you climb up the stairs, it opens into the terrace, of course. that’s what happens when you try to…
The Casual The problem with casual relationships is a language-problem. We tend to assume, even before any reflection is possible, that casual relationships are defined in opposition to serious relationships. This, as you can understand for yourself, is a misunderstanding.…
walking the tightrope i sit at my cubicle, surrounded by books, bags, and a water bottle. i spy on the other cubicle across me, a water bottle just like mine, brushed steel, the black underside of the cap sitting like…
Talking About Myself I do not know when it happened to me. I take antidepressants and the occasional anti-anxiety medicines, sure; but if they were to meddle with my mind in as serious a manner as it is happening these…
Sunshine in a Bottle She shows me an orange vial with a white cap. A familiar object. It says Fluoxetine on the label. She shows me her cheek when she leaves and I plant a kiss. On the way back…
Stone and Flesh While I know little of myself, there is one aspect of me which I assume I know quite well: that I believe in cause and effect and in the laws of physics. What this means to me…
Splitting Headache, Brutal Honesty as Cure My head aches. It moves up from my forehead, to the top of my head, and radiating towards the ears, as if the headband of my earphones are channels through which the pain travels.…
sinning the morning after i drank a carafe half-filled with gin i wake up to a cold surface against my back, my laptop. i open it and stay in bed till noon. i read poems of forough farrokhzad, balancing the…
Sentences This is a Modafinil-fuelled, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance inspired, and linguistic satiation encouraged rant. The problem with sentences (language itself) is that you cannot say one thing without not saying a lot of other things. I…
Self and Universe: Yet Another Parallelism This came to me as I was reading the introduction to Handke’s Homecoming. See, the guy writing the introduction says that as we read Handke, we feel that “the self has seemed at once…
Scratching one’s head Somebody scratches their head thoroughly. I could hear the hair bristling, skipping, dragging, tangling, the nails picking up dandruff. Easy to smell the sound. Of oil, soap, and dead skin. Of sweat. It was hard to believe…
Saturday, 18 January. I wish I was in the hospital, gently restrained, and being fed a consistent stream of anxiolytics. I do not wish I was home, to be honest. Because it is not a hospital and there are no…
Sāpamōksham (redemption/salvation/liberation); (Prose)Poem, Kalpatta Narayanan Master Translated with no permission and considerable leeway. Mathrubhumi, 2024 May 19-25. Perhaps because he was a man, God was despairing and depressed by the end of the process of Creation. He was dissatisfied more…
Return I am sitting by the window which opens into a view of the road, eating stir-fried lotus root and nursing a glass. There are people passing by, taking a stroll on the pavement, some of them with their company…
Reflections II A crane lowers its load in the distance. I turn down the brightness of my laptop screen. People talk and the sound pierces through my noise-cancelling headphones, deep into my being, and unsettles me continuously. Maurice Blanchot watches…
Reflections This is the only way out of death. If A is not there, then there is no way except writing. The only thing one could reassure that oneself is to say I am. In sanskrit, ‘I am’ translates to…
Reasons Why What follows are the reasons why you should be always looking for these: 1. You should listen to everybody. 2. This is because everybody is a small world unto themselves. 3. Everyone hears things their way, everyone reads…
…Reading AS Music AS Reading… Ananthu, have you noticed that when you read, you move your clenched fist in the air like someone who is properly listening to music? It feels as if you are capable of tracing the changes…
Raising the Bar Out of all the places, I have built a routine in a bar. This happens usually—oh, it doesn’t really—on days when the thought of drinking crashes into my head like a collapsing dam. There are a few…
Pigeon Waterfall From the bridge, a flock of pigeons. Like a pailful of water thrown, they descend onto the road below. Together, and one after the other. Like a mass of water, and like a smattering of droplets. They scatter…
Onion Sellers and Domesticity Two scenes from Mumbai. April 2025. Onion Sellers In the tiny but densely populated market near this working-class residential neighbourhood in Mumbai, one finds neon coloured combs, mirrors which have just a piece of cardboard backing…
one poem there are gaps in the sidewalk every few meters where each block of concrete ends like the markings on a clock, appearing after every few strides you take. there are cracks too, not like clock-face-markings but random, sometimes…
one bad turn The idea seems to be that the doctor gives you three kinds of pills, all of them in doses that are below their maximum allowed dosage, and keeps increasing the doses of each, one after the other,…
On Poetry Reading poetry is a skill that does not come to everyone. Poetry is tougher than a novel, mainly because a novel promises a sense of ending. And then there are novels which do not end, which means that…
Not Eating Sweets on Deepavali I was talking to my mother over the phone, as usual, sometime in the morning. One of my usual calls. This was the day after Deepavali. She asked me whether I had sweets, and I…
My Last Resort Me. I am my last resort.…
Mirabai I feel the pain of separation now more than ever. Mirabai speaks for me O friend, I sit alone while the world sleeps. In the palace that held love’s pleasure the abandoned one sits. She who once threaded a…
Literary Erotica for You She shuts the door behind them, gingerly, careful not to awake the little kid and the woman sleeping in the other room. The lamp on the night stand throws up a yellow glow into the space,…
Like-this; Reading Clarice Lispector In a post-clarice-lispector haze, i walk past a traffic cop drinking tea, a homeless girl with a child and a plastic tub with a few coins in front of her, a shop which exhales smoke, and…
lifetimes of gypsy women From Yama Gilgamesh’s book pen-jypsikalude jeevithakalam (The lifetimes of Women-Gypsies, 2023). Translated without permission and with considerable leeway for picking the words. Yama is a writer, theater artist, and an actress. Contrary to popular usage, yama…
Legitimacy from History In the last few years, I have been trying to trace out things from my past—that is to say, the past of Kerala and my community—to understand how things were before changes happened. Changes such as the…
in the restaurant the restaurant is full of people who are right always right about all things always right, never wrong, always their head kept upright never one step out of the line following it like the line a hen…
How to do ഞാനങ്ങ് ഇല്ലാണ്ടായിപ്പോയി (I ceased to be) This is a common phrase employed to convey the fact that the speaker felt so embarrassed that they wished they cease to be. (I ceased to be. ഞാനങ്ങ് ഇല്ലാണ്ടായിപ്പോയി) Now, consider…
how much i mother, do you know how i crumble into dust and waft into the wind everyday? do you know how the long lines of red at the signal outside this place makes me want to kill myself? do…
Handke and Myself; More Reflections I am reading Handke at the moment. Excruciatingly slow, but intensely rewarding. Really Heideggarian in his thinking. Almost as if he was living the philosophy of Heidegger. Doesn’t mean that he was applying it in…
Handke Handke’s prose is boring. It is boring in the way Sally Rooney is not boring. Handke does not have a storyline, there is no action, no drama, no tragedy, no climax. There is no plot, only a suggestion of…
guilt, shame, and small circles the housekeeper asks me whether i want packets. what packets, i ask. condoms, he says, in a low voice. The next morning i wake up with a bad hangover and after the memories come back…
God-Creation-Sex and Beauty and History according to Rilke and Me Rilke is talking about sex and art as parallels, the first great sex as God (because God is the creator no? First sex is also the creation), and procreation (sexually)…
God, Erection, and Illumination From Bataille’s Story of the Eye And it struck me that death was the sole outcome of my erection, and if Simone and I were killed, then the universe of our unbearable personal vision was certain…
Gated Homes It was during the relaxed lock-down period that we all caught COVID. Everyone in the family, except for my sister-in-law. She was somehow immune to COVID. I think the day after we discovered that most of us were…
Writing good, thinking slow. I’ve realized, quite recently, that good writing *is* thinking slowly. Good writing captures the jumps one’s extended cognitive faculties make when thinking about *anything*. This must be partly the reason why good writing makes us think…
Essential Tremor If I can sum up my sedentary life through a part of my body, it is the hands. The muffintops and fatty thighs are better places to spot my inactivity, but it is in my shaky hands poised…
escalation I was reading The Brothers Karamazov when the rain resumed. Under the streetlight, I could see the rain cross-hatching as it dripped from the trees and swayed in the wind. The rain sprayed across the narrow courtyard of the…
Erotic Ending Ending is a word which has an -ing towards the end of it. Ending is a process. A process of becoming an end. Of ceasing to be—a continuous process of becoming an end. When I look at the…
Eating A Grilled Cheese Sandwich The restaurant has two levels: one higher than the other, opening into a wide patio with long wooden tables and a floor that has strips of grey pebbles embedded in concrete that you can feel…
Do Not Forget Anything; poem, Kalpatta Narayanan Mash Unauthorised translation, as always. From Mathrubhumi. April, 2024. Is it a big deal to forget a cake of washing soap a matchbox or a bit of cumin? Can’t I get them tomorrow?…
Coming to Terms With My Suicide Intense nausea is weariness with body-being; one truly does not recognize one’s self and its affectednesses. In such moments there is only the tiring, sickening sensation; there is no way of making meaning out…
Chotta Japan Somewhere in the institute.…
Birds A flick of ash Turns into a Flock of birds In the evening Mumbai Sky…
Automatic Coffee Machines The automatic coffee machine dispenses a predetermined shot of water each time you push the button. You think about it when the coffee shows its true colors dark brown and pale white splitting three-quarters into the cup.…
Anything else, sir? The last few days have been interesting. My therapist tells me I exhibit autistic traits—especially my cycling between highs and lows—and encourages me to read about it. I click-click-cick through links and ends up in a page…
Waiting Anxiously for Coffee If I were to write a novel, it would probably resemble a little bit of Nicholson Baker’s work, just as it would resemble other influences. I single out Baker’s work because of the situation I am…
Akkitham; Pandathe Meshanthi വാഴത്തടയുമായ് വെമ്പി വെമ്പാതെയും വാതിൽക്കൽ വന്നുനിന്നമ്മ ചൊന്നാളുടൻ: കർക്കടമാസം കഴിയും വരേയ്ക്കിനി- ക്കഞ്ഞിയാണുണ്ണീ, നിനക്കിഷ്ടമാവുമോ? ഇത്തിരിപോന്നൊരു വെൺകുളിർക്കല്ലേറ്റു ഭിത്തി തകർന്നു പൊടിയുന്ന മാത്രയിൽ കണ്ണാടിവീട്ടിലുറങ്ങിക്കിടക്കുന്നൊ- രുണ്ണിപോൽ ഞാനൊന്നു ഞെട്ടിത്തെറിച്ചുപോയ്! ഇഷ്ടമാണെന്നേ പറഞ്ഞു ഞാൻ, കഞ്ഞിയോ- ടിഷ്ടവുമുണ്ടെനിക്കത്രമേ,ലെങ്കിലും അമ്മതൻ ഗദ്ഗദം വിങ്ങി ചെവിക്കുള്ളി- ലാഴിത്തിരകൾതന്നാരവംപോലവേ. ., Akkitham. Malayalathinte Priya Kavithakal -…
Agamben Reading a Poem I was reading a book chapter on postcolonial resistances when I came across a poem by Mehmet Al-Assad, titled *Asylum*: ``` Through the wire one last time please observe I am sewing my lips together that…
A Dream Unwound I am at a place for training the military. It is a township, a community, with bungalows for officers and rolling hills with single lane roads cutting across the grasslands. An old man tries, despite all odds,…
നഗ്നത pro max കുളിമുറിയില്‍ ആരും നഗ്‌നരല്ല ഓവര്‍ക്കോട്ടിട്ട് കുളിച്ച ആശാനൊഴികെ. നഗ്നത ലജ്ജിപ്പിക്കുന്നു. ലജ്ജിപ്പിക്കുന്നതെല്ലാം നഗ്നത. പരാജിതന്‍ നഗ്‌നനാണ്. നാക്കുപിഴ നഗ്‌നതയാണ് കിതപ്പ് നഗ്‌നതയാണ് കമ്പിയൊടിഞ്ഞ കുട നഗ്‌നതയാണ് കണ്ടുപിടിക്കപ്പെട്ടാല്‍ നുണ നഗ്‌നതയാണ് കുറ്റവാളി മുഖം മറയ്ക്കുന്നത് മുഖം രക്ഷിക്കുവാനാണ്. കുറ്റവാളിയുടെ രഹസ്യഭാഗം മുഖമാണ്. നഗ്‌നനായ നെഹ്‌റുവോളം നഗ്‌നനല്ല നഗ്‌നനായ ഗാന്ധി. നഗ്‌നനായ ശ്രീശുകനോട്…
ചാട്ടം ജനലിൽ കൂടിയൊരു ചാട്ടം ഒരു ഭാഗത്തുനിന്നും മറുഭാഗത്തേക്ക്. ചാട്ടമല്ല നമ്മെ കൊല്ലുന്നത്— ജനലിന്റെ പൊട്ടലാണ്, പൊട്ടിയ കാഴ്ച്ചയാണ്, കാഴ്ച്ചയുടെ സത്യമാണ്. The Jump A jump through the window from one side to other. It is not the jump that kills— but the crack in the…
untitled but better What would I not give to get the boredom out of me? The pressure is too much and I’m afraid it will draw a cracking line down my skull, ripping the scalp away through its fault-lines and…
Difficult and confused writing Alan D. Sokal quotes Noam Chomsky in his sequel to the infamous *Transgressing the Boundaries: Toward a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity,* titled *Transgressing the Boundaries: An Afterword.* Available [here](https://physics.nyu.edu/faculty/sokal/afterword_v1a/afterword_v1a_singlefile.html#73//) “George Orwell once remarked that political…