76. Israelistine's Problem
That kid slaughtered twenty-six times Through flesh supple as dew-water (A torturous decline) Must put a lid on his trip to Azrael, Rise from his shrouds instead And bluster curses at the News Cycle For distilling him into a sound-byte— A trifle, a mere mite—adjoined to the Greater Megapixel of war.
For what has become of The Gaza Strip, Jordan, West Bank, Fifty-plus years of rank genocide— (A blip in real-world time) Sponsored by the Brits, Divided States And the country that preaches, irate How ‘The World Is One Family’ (While throwing sly and shady slurs Towards its boor-like, chink-eyed neighbour)— Spare a few megapixels on the Web?
Is this War far from reels on screens? Venues for outraged plebs To choose an already entrenched side And sling piles of encrusted grime Across the fence? To slag off Piers Morgan For getting cooked on his own show all the time Or to guilt-trip ideological foes By bringing up the ‘Nazi’ history So lazily, that Westminster’s puppies Fattened with royal poultry Would be revolted into push-ups?
Crane the contours of your brain And think back to Russia and Ukraine. How fared their games on the Internet? Did they sway your mind, your libido? Did they provoke you to carry pitchforks to NATO Or to the monarch of oligarchs? Do you even know who’s winning? Do you care?
This is a fair question, Along with the following assertion: My words won’t move you, Don’t kid yourself. You shan’t muster more than A WhatsApp Story in its stead. And please, do not be more narcissistic Than you already are: This is not your roast. It is a toast: to Social Media. Social Media! Where Jean’s Theory of fakeness blooms true. Where Entertainment is the only Virtue.
Now, now. Do not misconstrue: between Israel And Palestine, there is nuance— Much more than even in a Bharatnatyam dance. But if you fight a war on social media You invite the social strata to laugh. Not to feel, not to think, Not to investigate what might be askance, But to laugh.
Think of this, and think it true. In a commode brimmed with swimming shit (Loose motions or tight) If you find a copy pristine of John Locke’s thoughts on Human Rights Or Gandhi’s vision of World Peace, Would you read it? Would you wear gloves and plunge Your fists in the toilet, Extract the contents, piece by piece? Delicately skewer it with a sharp thing, Remove the mush, clean, read, then laminate it? Or would you just flush it down the sewers?
Surely the latter. And that is the crux of my matter. I couldn’t care how polemic or centrist This line seems: You cannot, should not, fight a war with memes. Carry on like this, and When Hamas bites the dust, dead, Its legacy will be antisocial fools. “Hamas?” they shall ask, “Do we eat that with pita bread?”
77. Our Prime Minister
The vomit coloured garland
Once handed to snotted hair
And eyes like dark commodes
That we call our Prime Minister
Grinned with bubbling white teeth,
His palms clasped in prayer
Much to the heavens’ despair
Concurring with shrieks of delight
From the rich, privileged
And jingoists alike
Piercing through the starchy sky
Like daggers in spines
Or knives through a pie.
78. Temple of Lies
Was a time when the temple of lies –
When wiggled sages and devotees sans-eyes –
Were pebbles sunk like rubble in the sand
Like forgotten folds of an old man’s hand.
Lost and lovelorn, parasite without host
Till he (or she) who donned inhuman ghosts
For garbs took pains to pluck the fated grains
And built wonders of woe and disdain
That took its leprous walk around the park
Firms, cells, coffee shops without a name—
Until the park was Paradise no more
But a sea of boars chasing their own tails
Far the apple fell,
Like worms fleeing the lark.
79. One True Sentence
When molten turns mellow, scuttles through palms Fingernails tidy like spotless pards And dances on wrinkled forearms as dusk Settles on dialectics and forced wars— Then shall I have found one true sentence.
80. Land Lord
Oh, what else is there to be said Of that dead-eyed deceiver Who sublets an apartment (or five) And derives pleasure from a month of Bored leisure, by throttling tenants Of their sweat-earned silver And chucking them at his idol god— Begging for forgiveness While wearing Versace, no less?
P.S. I hid behind the moniker of TINTA since the account was opened on Instagram. Truth be told, this has always been my natural impulse. If I had my way, none of my works would be attributed to me. I write a lot of miserable stuff, which I don’t want attributed to my character. I am proud of my writing, but it is also comfortably the worst of me—where my most cynical, nihilist and antisocial tendencies come to fruit.
For a while, I hoped I could hide behind TINTA forever. Perhaps anonymity is cowardice, but it has always been my impulse. But people tell me there’s nothing sustainable about the moniker strategy—that I must put my name, centralize my content, ensure I take credit for everything in a brutal industry, blah blah blah.
So, briefly, let me introduce myself: I am Neil Nagwekar from Mumbai, India.
I don’t plan on abandoning the moniker TINTA though. Because there is a story behind TINTA, and I think it will take quite some time for it to be completed.
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