A sequel to Voices.
A temple stood on bamboo feet in the middle of an abysmally
and particularly Sicilian-mafia-fashion brutally murdered place – a place
devoid of death and full of life
‘Ah Life’, snorted
the yak in disgust.
‘Aren’t you alive’,
asked the woman.
‘I am a statue,
can’t you see’, the yak replied.
‘With piercings on
your knees’, the woman added.
‘I am punk, you
idiot’, shouted the yak.
‘Oh, I see’, wondered
the woman.
The variegated stained glasses ornamenting the window-ey eyes
of the mud-clad temple with bamboo stilettos provided the woman with
invigorating images of the world that lay rotting outside. The woman and the
yak stood face to face in a metaphysical encounter.
‘Souls are real’,
asserted the woman.
‘Commercial yak-shit’,
laughed the yak.
Yes, they worshipped the yak in that devil-forsaken place.
The zombies had a perfectly lit world with a 7 inch long Bunsen burner. Their
ideas were cradled over the blue flame of flowery filth and littered hopes for
the deceased. They called their world Earth and portrayed it as a utopian
condolence for screwing up big time. And yes, they worshipped the yak.
‘Then, why do
people come to you’, the woman thought to herself.
‘Because they are
irreparable fools’, whispered the yak to her.
‘You can read
minds’, exclaimed the woman.
Don’t you know Bunsen burners do not emanate a lot of light,
do you? They are non-luminous blue flames. Blue films and laboratories are lit
with such flames. Then how could it qualify as the sun of the world the zombies
lived in? The coloured glasses had a certain mystical quality to them; they showed
exactly what the person in conversation with the yak wanted to see.
‘They say, you are
pimp’, blurted out the woman.
‘Yes, I am into souls...’,
hurried the yak.
‘You hypocritical
piece of excrement’, intercepted the woman.
‘...the business of
bodies hit a rock-bottom a million years ago’, continued the yak.
The blue-ey, gooey mess the zombies lived in was swept aside
with an acidic broom of tantrum thrown sky high by the yak. The yak swore by
his foibles and abhorred vicissitudes although his decision making abilities
rested solely on the visceral(stooping over the bent down carnal) traits of
audio-visual juxtapositions, in a flickering no light effect strewn once in a
while with a hard mix of psychedelic lights upon haystacks that carried the
stench of cattle saliva. The yak was the root of this world. He had sustained
the world with his sheer magic, his wand being the Bunsen burner. The zombies
worshipped the yak.
‘So, what brings
you here’, the yak inquired.
‘I came here because...’,
the woman stopped.
‘Do you see what I
see’, the woman resumed.
‘No, it’s only
meant for you’, the yak added quickly.
‘But, I want you to
see...’, the woman gasped frantically.
‘...what I see. I
want to share them with you’, the woman murmured slowly.
‘Okay! I will have your soul’, the yak declared.
‘You are free now’,
the voice of the yak echoed through and beyond the mud walls.
The glasses were funny, you see – they showed visibly
transmogrified dark skins into fair ones and expensive lenses that entitle you
to call yourself richly gifted with convoluted perceptions of a swamp, over
which moths hovered and the zombies called those harmless creatures
butterflies. As the caterpillars grew old, they invited the humans to wake up
from their deaths and live, to become zombies. Then the caterpillars deluded
the humans and fancy-dressed into butterflies. The zombies had a floating joke about
the humans – they named their moths butterflies.
‘The temples are
beautiful’, the woman said, looking through the stained glasses.
‘They are all
fakes’, the yak quipped.
‘What do you mean’,
the woman asked in disbelief.
‘Don’t worry, you
would forget that they are fakes when you walk out of that door’, the yak
sympathised.
You can only reach the temple of the yak by an invitation.
The woman christened zombie walked in distorted strides out
of the temple and as she did her tinkling anklets rusted and wrapped around her
feet like hand painted tribal tattoos.
The bamboo shoots twinkled with the blue light. The glasses
had turned gray. The bowl of Earth had been heated enough for the day. The mud
walls became soft and clayey. It was time for the yak to rest. Yes, they
worshipped the yak.
Sean removed his
shoes, then his socks. He put on his shoes again sans the socks and wore the
socks on his hands like gloves. He stepped into the temple of the yak.
