Friday, October 5, 2007

THE FLOCK OF SHEEP AND MY POWER

“Power is when you have the power to kill someone and you don’t. That is what the emperors do”
- Oscar Schindler

“Now I think you are a little drunk…!”
(From the movie Schindler’s list)

I am educated. I am sitting on the chair. I have the power to consume what I want to. Thousand knocks on my door. They want water. They are starving. I will die if I share what I have. I can’t run. I will be caught. I will sit inside and not open the door. This is the only way. They know what is happening inside. But at the same time they are helpless. I have the power to exploit. I have the power to hide. They are meek. They can’t organize or revolt. They are handicapped. They need someone to initiate. A spark. Simply seems impossible to light up from anywhere. Someone needs to be insulted badly. Someone needs to be ripped. Darkness is their weakness, their darkness my power. Phone is ringing. A warning call. A call for help. They know that I will not pick up the phone. But still want to try their luck. Luck is their last resort, their luck my escape, my power. They chose me. They have to suffer now. They could stand up at that moment. Block my way if they wanted to. But they didn’t want to clutch anything. They were having nice dreams. Feared they would depart if eyes see the morning sun. Dreams were their leisure, their dreams my realism, my power. I didn’t want to drop what was coming my way, what was in my ‘luck’. They were dwarfs. Lonely dwarfs. I had friends for support, ‘TRUSTWORTHY ONES’. Now they are caught badly in a web. A web of dreams, a web of lucks, a web of helplessness. I have the power to destroy the web, to break the wall. But I will starve if I help them. I have to eat. Someone has died outside. They are crying. They are howling for help. Believe someone would come. Their belief is their legacy, their belief my treasure, my power. I am helpless to help them. We both have the key to the door. I have not changed the locks. I didn’t have time. I had to eat. They have lost it somewhere. They can search it if they want, open the door and kill me. But I don’t fear that they would find the key. You need to jostle for that. They can never ever. They want to cry and dream and try their luck. They are adamant. Ignorance is their steer, their ignorance my light, my power. Oh! I can’t listen to the music. They are screaming like beasts. But who cares for the music. I am starving. I have the power to eat.

“Bleeding and babbling we fell on his neck with a scream
Wave upon wave of demented avengers
March cheerfully out of obscurity into the dream.”

- From the song ‘sheep’ by Pink Floyd

1 comment:

Sunil Aggarwal said...

Dear Siddhartha
You seem to be bursting with thoughts. The power and sharpness of the words is commendable. For the first time, this is a kind of political fiction in a seed-like form. You need to develop it. YOu can see the paradoxes behing power. Being powerful is the most vulnerable and saddest state in the realm of a sensitive man. You find the utter hype of a phenomenon called power regime. Receiving somebody's love for even a moment is much greater a pleasure than holding a crown for centuries.