Piano Cat!

It’s feline o’ clock on a Caturday
The regular crowd shuffles in
There’s an old cat sitting next to me
Makin’ love to his catnip and milk

He says, “Cat, can you play me a miaowmory
I’m not really sure how it goes
But it’s sad and it’s sweet and I knew it complete
When I wore a younger fur coat.”

Meow me-meow, meow mi-miaow
Meow-meow me-meow, mew mi-miaow, meow meow

Chorus:
Mew us a song, you’re the Piano Cat
Mew us a song tonight
Well we’re all in the mood for a mewlody
And you’ve got us purrin’ alright

Now Chesh at the bar is a friend of mine
He steals me some milk for free
And he’s quick with his stroke while he makes a mouse croak
But there’s someplace that he’d rather be
He says, “Cat, I believe this is killing me”
As the grin ran away from his face
“Well I’m sure that I could be in Wonderland
If I could get out of this place”

Oh, meow me-meow, meow mi-miaow
Meow-meow me-meow, mew mi-miaow, meow meow

Now, Tom is a real estate strategist
Who never lost fur in alley strife
And he’s talkin’ with Tabby who's still very flabby
And probably will be for life

And the felines are practicing paw-litics
As the ArtistoCats slowly get stoned
Yes, they’re sharing a fat rat called Loneliness
But it’s better than gnawin’ alone

Chorus:
Mew us a song, you’re the Piano Cat
Mew us a song tonight
Well we’re all in the mood for a mewlody
And you’ve got us purrin’ alright

It’s a pretty good crowd for a Caturday
And the Top Cat gives me a smile
’Cause he knows that it’s me they’ve been comin’ to see
To forget about dogs for a while

And the piano, it sounds like a carnival
And the mouse-hole smells full of fear
And they sit at the bar and pour milk in my jar
And say, “Cat, what are you doin’ here?”

Oh, meow me-meow, meow mi-miaow
Meow-meow me-meow, mew mi-miaow, meow meow

Chorus:
Mew us a song, you’re the Piano Cat
Mew us a song tonight
Well we’re all in the mood for a mewlody
And you’ve got us purrin’ alright

~*~

Parody rights 2010: $hohini $engupta (me) and Rudrayudh $engupta (co-written by bro and me =D) with all due respect and the humblest of apologies to the brilliance that is Billy Joel.

Enjoy!

Grey Lady

Poets over the ages have remarked upon how the weather has mirrored their mood... how the bleakest and grayest of days have invariably and irrevocably coincided with the darkest of moments. 

It has been raining almost incessantly in the past few days. From the early grey moments of Monday to the torrential showers of today, it almost seems as though Nature is doing her best to convey what we already know (and fear) in our hearts.

I visited my grandmother yesterday. After a whirlwind (bad) romance with exams. She was tubed and sedated and well, thankfully, patients in the ICU are allowed only one visitor at a time for I don't know how long I just stood there and cried. It feels funny to think that my only fervent hope during the exams was that she not go before I get to say goodbye. And yesterday, seeing her in the state she was in brought back memories buried deep — of stories and swings, of flowers weaved into my hair and distant springs. Of afternoons gone by watching the world as it walked past an old verandah that is now no more, not knowing that two pairs of eyes, one brimming with youthfulness and another, with wisdom, were watching it in keen amusement. I remembered the books with beautiful messages inside, the letters that would come by post, those happy visits during the Pujas, all the times when I'd be told repeatedly to go "shushu" much to my annoyance...

She used to call me her "paakhi" which means 'bird'. To think that it has been over ten years that she hasn't lived the way she was meant to. And now... oh how I wish my gut felt differently!

Maybe, in a parallel universe she stayed well and got to grow old and grey with dignity. Maybe in that world she'd have been able to watch her little paakhi blossom. And maybe...

I Am A Rock

A cyclonic circulation is what is responsible for the city being held hostage by rain.

The stock market has showed an uncharacteristically uplifting upward urge for a Monday.

Claude Monet is set to be finally given a major exhibition in Paris.

Those are just headlines. This is my life. I find solace in Simon and Garfunkel at the oddest of times, in the oddest of songs. Not that I am feeling particularly petulant, but a certain train of thought set off a certain flurry of emotions and swept me right off my balance. It is rather peculiar how something that you don't normally think of at most times suddenly pops up inside your head and dictates how you feel for the rest of the day. I'd say that it's as bad as how uncomfortable you get when you suddenly remember that you've forgotten to brush and squirm wondering whether your breath stinks.

Funnily enough, I am feeling far more flaccid in terms of thoughts. Yet, there is this strange pull tugging at my consciousness and making me want to sit and brood. Do we all go through phases when we want to shut out those we love and just stay isolated, like an island? I'm not sure whether my own responses can be considered normal. I've almost always been the loner, and liked it that way. Nevertheless, recently at least, I haven't really felt the urge to shut shop and withdraw all that often.

Today, for some reason, I want to let all the sarcasm out, all the nastiness, and most importantly, all the feelings of sheer sordidness that are still trapped somewhere within. Then again, it could also be that I'm hungry... and too hungry to realize just how much.

The mundane part about it all is that I'm in the middle of exams and all that is frustrating about life is suddenly doing a bold tango before my eyes. It's only a few more days, but although the rational side of me is patiently waiting for the next Act to unfurl, the more human part of me just wants to jump out of my seat!

Perhaps it would have been better if I had indeed been a rock. "A rock feels no pain". Neither does it have to sit for sinfully squalid semester exams (or Mid-semester ones at that). I presume things are building up since I've been purposely starving myself of things I love doing (and even I don't know why I do that). 

Or maybe I just need to switch to another song.