The Wanderer

The wanderer walks wearily through the dreaded desert of the unknown. The eternal nomad, he had no place to call his own... all the world is a stage, and all the roads are his to take. He is hardly steadfast, his thought processes are hardly unique. Like the constantly weathered rock that has stories to tell, his mind is an eroded remnant of all his influences.

He knows not what he is searching for, but somewhere in the deep stretches of the desert, he knows his answer awaits him. The sun beats down on the hardened stone, the rain streamlines its edges, the wind cuts through its uneven corners, and whats left is for him to claim. The journey loses focus with each step he takes, the uncertainity only adds to the glamour. 

There's no regret or loss. His heart's brethen, his head does ache, with the futility of his acts. The answers evade him, his time runs out, but still he walks, along no path. The wind keeps moulding the baseless rock, and only time will play its part.

--The Virus Of Life--

The complexities of the human mind is one thing that enthralls me. The way humans respond to their surroundings, to other brethen, to a given situation is so unpredictable that its almost like watching chaos in harmony. The other day, I was having a pointless conversation about movies with my pal, he told me that there was no dearth of stories because the very people around us have their own story to tell, the story of their lives. 

The more I thought about it, the more I came to realise that no two humans behave or respond to stuff the same way. I decided to observe the people around me to come up with some characters, not merely caricatures, and saw that every single guy is different from the rest of the pack. Compiled them into nameless independent individuals, there are six of them I observed, I post the first three here:

The Pretender:

Glass of wine in hand, his gaze is cloudy, he stares through the mist at what he percieves is life. A life slipping away, while he convinces himself that his head is indeed in the clouds, when in truth the hard Earth is giving way under his precarious tread. A life that he spends, trying to prove to himself that he can indeed do what everyone else can. He lives not for himself, but for satiating his giant ego, for patting himself on the back, and convincing himself that he is, in human terms, the master of all trades. He has no aim, his principles are long since lost. He twists his beliefs to suit him best, and smirks at how he's smarter than the rest. He only has contempt and criticism to dish out at the world, but the world, sadly, has stopped listening. He knows it, but he wants not to believe it. He blames the world for what he's become, but within he knows that the fault's his own. He is the Pretender.

 

The Follower:

The little boy edges curiously towards the shoes his peer left him to fill. The shine of the shoe fascinates him, its mere presence gives him joy. His peer is all he knows in life, the man he adores, his source of pride. It dawns on him that the cause is lost, his tiny feet shall never fill the void. His face falls, his frown deepens, the sad symphony of self-loathing plays, and he loses hope, and falls into that dreaded sea of self-pity. It doesn't occur to him that every being has a purpose, it doesn't strike him that he's unique in his own way. He sees his brethen strike their gold, he sees them find their 'thing' in life, but he fails to see the fire in himself. His very mind is his worst enemy, cuz it curbs his potential, arrests his growth. He follows the ones he perceives as great, he sings their praise and smiles in ache, this victim of fate.

The Clown:

A solitary figure, she stands before the mirror, her face obscured in a mask of white. A smile is etched upon the mask, a brilliant shade of red and buoyant delight. There is no pretence, the hard-earned mask is worthy of the bearer's hold. But deep inside she waits in hope, she wants the mask torn into two. Addicted to the thrill of winning, she made herself a mask to defy the system, to denounce all that men had for years built to choke the rise of the feminine side. Barriers fascinated her, breaking them gave her a high. She encroached more into male domains, she made them kneel and watch in vain. She failed to see the mask grow tight, she left her real self alone. Now that time has played its part, and the hunger is slowly dying out, she wants the unforgiving mask torn. The clown smiles at his reflection, but she yearns... beneath the mask.