# The Plaster of Thought-Walls: 121 When we observe the world closely, we notice that most of what we call thinking is merely the rearrangement of old furniture in the rooms of our minds. We push a chair from one corner to another and believe we have created something new. The walls remain the same. The windows open onto the same view. Yet there is a peculiar comfort in this rearrangement. It gives the illusion of agency, of movement, of progress. We convince ourselves that by shifting these mental furnishings—by reordering what we already know, by combining familiar ideas in novel ways—we are somehow advancing. Perhaps we are. But perhaps we are only rehearsing the same dance in slightly different positions. The truly original thought is rare as water in a desert. When it arrives, it arrives not through the will but through a kind of rupture—a sudden crack in the plaster of habit where light streams through from somewhere we did not know existed. These moments cannot be summoned. They come when we have exhausted the furniture, when we have pushed things into every possible corner and the room suddenly feels unbearably empty. It is in that emptiness that something new might grow. But we spend so much energy keeping the rooms full, the walls intact, the plaster smooth and unbroken. We fear the cracks. We fear what might enter through them. Perhaps this is why most thinking remains so safe, so familiar, so forgettable. Not because we lack capacity, but because we lack the courage to let the walls fall silent, to let the plaster crumble, to stand in the cold light that comes through.

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Thought: Eight Hundred and Forty-One
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One. From the moment I understood that I love you, I’ve never needed grand words or flowery ones to tell you so—neither to make you comprehend my love nor to gather applause by posting declarations for the world to see.

However I speak of loving you, whatever words or tongue I use, I know with absolute certainty that I truly love you. You know it too.

When a mother loves her child, does she search the world over for difficult or easy words to express it?

When a father weeps with joy and pride at his child’s success, does he need ornate language to convey the measure of his love?

When a brother brings things for his little sister or tends to her every need—must he spell out, word by word, exactly how deeply he loves her?

When a mother lies gravely ill in this time of plague, and her child runs wild like a madman through the corridors of hospitals to heal her—if someone were to ask that child in that very moment, “How much do you love your mother?”—could he truly explain, could he analyze and articulate the actual depth of his devotion?

There is no point in repeating “I love you” until the beloved goes mad. Yes, there is no love in this world like that between parent and child. And yet, the one who loves knows within themselves that there is little need to announce love with drums and fanfare.

Whether the beloved understands or not brings no regret. I harbor not a moment’s hesitation in admitting to myself that I love them. Often, the most beautiful words available become impossibly small, inadequate to capture the truth of love. Love cannot be explained—only felt.

And why should I need to explain at all? You know full well that I love you! Because I know it myself, I am freed from the burden of proof.

You must surely know this too: the deeper the love, the fainter its utterance. Consider—our parents love us so profoundly, yet have they ever written or spoken to make us understand it? Can even the most exquisite poetry do justice to the feeling of love?

Two. But when I see or hear that you have spoken with someone, met with them, that you regard them as your closest person, that you call them the moment your heart grows heavy—when I realize all this…yes, it hurts. There is no denying this truth. It truly does hurt.

Then I tell myself again and again: why did I ever love you? Why do you covet what belongs to another? Why have you arranged your whole life around loving and suffering?

I say all this to myself, to my own heart. The truth is, I am only human, not an angel. Sometimes anger comes, pain comes; sometimes I wish to abandon everything and flee somewhere far away.

And so, to forget you, I brought someone else into my life! But now that they’re here, I see—no, this person loves me deeply, loves me so very much. It would be wrong, wouldn’t it, to use them merely as a tool to forget another?

So now I avoid them. Even when they call, I don’t answer.

Living alone is far better. There seems nothing in this world more peaceful than solitude. Whenever I am with someone, I feel constantly that I might commit some terrible mistake at any moment.

# The Plaster of Thought-Walls

Without stealing, still I feel like a thief somehow!

Three. To love, you must learn to look at yourself deeply. The way we scrutinize things far away, with such care—just so, if we never turn our gaze inward, one day we might forget ourselves entirely, without warning! It’s a strange forgetting.

I’m busy, yes, terribly busy. But here’s the greater truth: neglecting yourself day after day, one morning you’ll suddenly realize—the very chance to be busy has slipped away! How can a person keep love alive, keep the beloved well, if they themselves are unwell?

Sit by the riverbank, speak with flowers—however you manage it, you must keep your heart calm. The more restless you are, the more sickness grows. Who will heal me if I no longer wish to heal myself?

When you’re well, everything comes. The trees arrive and ask, *How are you?* The birds come and say, *Let’s be friends!* Light comes and says, *Like you, I too long to drift on the wind!* Is this not love? How would any of it happen if you weren’t well? You needn’t search for friends. When laughter blooms in the heart, friends appear on their own.

You must learn to live with yourself and everything around you—what exists and what doesn’t. Once you’ve learned to live, aging becomes easier! You’re not so afraid then. Once you’ve known light, you don’t run when darkness comes.

Keep no account of what you’ve given the world, what you haven’t given. Some ledger is being written somewhere. The heaviest book belongs to those who perhaps know nothing of its entries at all! And what does it matter? Whoever keeps the account knows it, whether they understand it or not—they know it all the same.

Four. I never want to finish reading you completely. They say when you’ve read everything, your interest in the beloved wanes. The longer it takes to read someone, the deeper your care for them grows.

Too much rummaging never yields good fruit. Perhaps I love you without having read some chapters at all.

I’m in no rush—to possess you, to lose you, to touch you, to drench my heart in your voice day after day. I simply know: I love you.

By now, even a little, I must have some understanding of myself. If you’ve noticed, you’d have seen it—I have tremendous patience, and it’s only grown since loving you. Now, what is there to fear?

I’ve never believed I would lose you. I always feel: as long as I live, you will live within me.

I live on the hunger to see you once more. Yet you don’t come close. If you came close, I might lose you! You know, surely—love loves distance.

Five. Before you leap up saying, *If I were in your place, I wouldn’t have made that mistake*—know this: if I were in yours, I wouldn’t necessarily have made the mistakes you made either.

What I’ve done right in life, you may have done wrong. The reverse is equally true.

Environment, circumstance, state of mind—they change everything. Time makes simple things hard, and hard things simple.

People are strange creatures! They make a hundred mistakes themselves and never notice; one person admits to a single error and they pounce.

Some people don’t deserve the truth.

Tell them a lie with convincing sincerity, and they’ll lift you onto their shoulders and dance. Tell them an unwelcome truth, and they’ll swarm you like locusts.

Dare to speak of a mistake or two in your life, and you’ll see it instantly—droves of flawless great souls will descend upon you like bees, newly enlightened to the fact that humans, too, are capable of error!

Then there are those who will wound you with every breath, rehearsing your failures until you bleed. You’ll confess your mistakes to someone you trusted as a friend, believing him honest and open, only to discover he was the first to plunge the knife into your chest. With such people, there are only two paths to safety—to lie, and to wear a mask.

Some people don’t deserve your confessions.

Thought: Eight Hundred Twenty-Two
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One. Among the many forms of love, the truest is selfless love—desiring someone’s good without expectation of return, wishing the beloved the highest success. That love which asks for nothing in return—not even love itself—occupies love’s highest throne, a seat perhaps not given to all, but whoever finds it becomes the most fortunate person in the world. Even when a relationship ends, love never truly exhausts itself; rather, it grows stronger, for now there are no expectations left—only the hope to see the beloved flourish, only prayer for their sake.

Many believe that when one person leaves the other in a relationship, only the one abandoned suffers, and we blame and curse the one who departed. But the real truth is far more complex. In many cases, it is not only the abandoned who suffers. Sometimes, compelled by unbearable circumstance—by life, duty, obligation, convention, time, situation—a person finds themselves unable to remain in a relationship. And often, the pain of the one who must leave is far, far greater than that of the one left behind. This is a suffering that cannot be shown or explained to anyone, yet every moment of life becomes a bleeding of the heart. Yes, in time, a person may come to terms with it, because life cannot stand still—as long as life exists, one must keep moving.

If we could glimpse the inner worlds that lie beyond the outer aspects of people we see and understand, we might shed many of our misconceptions about them. To love someone while sending them away, to depart while still loving—this is not a simple thing. Just as time, circumstance, and life’s events force a person to change, so too do they alter one’s sense of life’s meaning, one’s desires for life itself. We may witness these changes, but we cannot know their true cause—the reasons only that person knows.

The one who suffers can, in time, believe themselves blameless and reconcile themselves to it. But the one who causes suffering dies a little, every single day, within themselves. They no longer have the courage to stand before themselves, to meet their own eyes and speak—terrified that they might spit upon themselves in disgust. When a person is defeated by their own conscience, no victory the world can offer will ever bring their soul any peace.

I know it will help nothing; I know that stepping into that pit means drowning; and yet people—whether in understanding or ignorance, or knowing full well but unable to control themselves—still commit such errors.

# The Plaster of Thought-Walls

Mistakes, though they seem like grotesque crimes from one angle, are precisely what refine a person and forge them into something better. The gain that accrues from a single good act by one person—it far exceeds, even doubles, the damage that might have resulted from ten sinful deeds. Perhaps this is why that person survives, or why they find their way back to themselves.

There is a man I can never link to my own name, whom in society’s eyes I cannot grant any respectable identity—and yet, knowing all this, I cannot help but love him. It is such an impotence, such a helplessness that cannot be explained to anyone. To even attempt it would raise questions about one’s own character.

Across ages, everything that has become custom and convention in this world—all of it is made by man. Then why does man, being man, create customs and rules that run counter to man himself? How does a person block every path before them and still move forward?

**Two.** Being common is rather easy, but *remaining* common is not. Once you’ve descended to commonness, you’ll find no shortage of competitors. Their reign stretches in every direction! And yet some people, through fierce struggle, hold their firm ground as the common sort.

**Three.** Nibiḍ, it’s been so long since I’ve seen you. Will you come by today? I wouldn’t speak like this if I didn’t feel something deeply wrong!

How are you? Let me touch you for a moment, Nibiḍ. Will you close your eyes? Let me hold your hand once? Is that stepping too far out of bounds? After asking for all this, will you allow me even to gaze into your eyes? If you do, if your heart permits, I will look into your eyes for a long time.

Is everything all right? Is something weighing on your mind? I know many funny stories—would you like to hear them? Are you missing your mother? Go ahead, cry. Cry out loud. I’m here, sitting right in front of you. Boys cry too, and they should! If a person doesn’t cry, who will?

You empty the ocean of your chest into tears before me, and I will drink them in. The river inside my chest knows where your inner ocean is. A river must know where to find the sea!

I haven’t come to speak of those loves you don’t want to hear about. I’ve come to listen to you. If your voice breaks, I won’t look away in shock. I sit here with bowed head, ready to heal your wounds. Why do you hide so much pain? Am I not here?

Tell your beloved I am your friend. Tell her too that I am safe for everyone. I’ve earned full marks, graduated with distinction, in the art of quietly disappearing rather than in the skill of taking. I harbor a secret pride in this. Let her understand by my nature how safe I am!

What, will you stay silent, Nibiḍ? But after all, there are things you cannot even tell a lover! I’ve come precisely to shoulder the weight that bends you down. If I bend under it, there’s no harm—because I have no lover. I am a bent person, and I can wander this entire city carrying the wounds, the pain, the burden, even the joy of anything, and no one will ask me the reason. No one waits with desperate hope to hold my hand. Not a single soul in this plague lifts both hands to God, begging for one last glimpse of me.

I haven’t written any story or poem, nor kept aside an off-white Punjabi suit to gift to someone when we meet. Because I have no one!

Listen—someone who has no one is a very safe person. If someone has no one, they cannot sit with another and laugh while discussing someone else’s pain and sorrow. Someone with no one cannot see another’s happiness and lay their head on someone’s chest, saying carelessly, ‘You know, seeing their joy makes me so jealous! Tell me, when will something like that happen to us?’ They simply cannot say such things. A person like me even knows how to hide from their own reflection in the mirror!

Pour out your words today, Nibid! Assume that today is the monsoon season of your heart. Let the anguish that darkens your sky flow from both your eyes like an unrestrained storm, as you wish. I haven’t brought an umbrella. Today I will be drenched in your tears. Cry, you cry! Begin. Look, I am here beside you! I will not leave this place without easing your pain. Don’t worry about my time—I have taken leave from the office, and I’ve even left my watch unwound.

If you wish, I can embrace you. But you cannot ask to hear my heartbeat, you cannot ask for my love. Why? Because I told you—I am trustworthy, safe! Precisely because I do not commit the great crime of loving someone, I have earned this place of trust! Not everyone can become like me. I have suffered greatly to earn this honor, this seat. I do not wish for you to become worthy of this seat too!

Do not hoard your sorrow. Cry out loudly, wail, Nibid. I am here.

Thought: Eight hundred and forty-three
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One. When someone departs and travels so far away that even if we long for it desperately, we cannot catch even a glimpse of them—even then, on some solitary, star-lit midnight, we suddenly discover that we still carry this person in our mind, despite the geographical distance of thousands of miles; wherever we go, this person goes with us there too.

Do you know what is the hardest truth of this life? One can keep someone beside oneself in bed yet banish them from thought, or they remain outside thought unwittingly—and yet the one we left or who left us settles so firmly into heart and mind that we cannot forget them by any means, cannot go a single day without them, cannot keep them at a distance from our thoughts despite endless effort. To erase them, it seems, we would have to erase our entire existence! The helpless compulsion of placing one’s hand in another’s hand when it is held by someone else—it makes one weep terribly!

A visible tumor in the brain can be surgically removed and cut out, but when someone’s disembodied presence takes eternal residence in that very brain, then great catastrophe strikes! Except through one death, there is no path by which to remove them from that place. The person is gone today, yet even now, without them, nothing seems to exist anywhere else!

Do you know what is the greatest deception we inflict upon ourselves while carrying life? It is this: by repeatedly telling ourselves, “This time I will forget this person, I absolutely will!”—we end up forgetting to forget them entirely. This is a profound self-deception! Some people do not truly live; they merely exist!

Not all separation means departure.

Some separations mean leaving only to remain even more deeply; some separations mean erasing the distance that was and drawing eternally closer; some separations mean circling and circling the perimeter only to stand, finally, at the very same point. Stepping away can never guarantee that one has truly gone. Ah, if only it could—how many souls might actually live a little before death claims them!

Separation born of rage ends in affection.
Separation born of misunderstanding is lived through regret.
Separation born of impatience atones in sighs.
Separation destined by family becomes the destiny of solitude.
Separation sheltered by ego finds refuge in oceans of tears.

Life hurls a question at us for every answer we’ve ever given! Then there is nothing left but to swallow those bunched-up sobs and stand mute, hollow-eyed, without reply.

Yet people live on—though sometimes even breathing grows almost unbearable.

Two. The person who, while fulfilling his duty, believes he is doing someone a favor, showing them kindness, cannot go far in life. The person who evades responsibility grows increasingly unwell in spirit.

Three. My younger brother and his wife do business in silver jewelry, online; the business is called Rauprya Rup. Let’s say the courier company through which they send products to various places is called K Courier Service. K Courier Service has branches in various places across Bangladesh. Let’s say one branch is called B. Through branch B, Rauprya Rup’s products are sent daily to different places across the country; Rauprya Rup is contracted with B. Another branch of the company, let’s call it G, is deeply resentful about this. What sort of resentment? How does branch G even know of Rauprya Rup?

Occasionally Rauprya Rup does send some products through branch G as well, for various reasons. Rauprya Rup has other transactions with branch G too. In short, Rauprya Rup is a regular customer, a regular service-user of branch G as well.

In providing this service, branch G sometimes drags its feet considerably. Why? Why did Rauprya Rup make its daily shipping contract with B rather than with G? It sees Rauprya Rup only once or twice a week—why not every day? This is the root of their resentment, and this anger adversely affects the quality of service.

Let’s say there’s another online business called Gha. It sends products to various places through Ch Courier Service. Gha is contracted with Ch Company. Naturally, no branch of K Courier Service ordinarily receives payment from Gha—that is, branch G’s earnings from Gha are zero. It’s possible branch G doesn’t even know Gha exists. Not knowing is perfectly natural!

People don’t harm those they don’t know. How could they? They don’t know them! But those people do know, those they try to harm, those they hound. And even though they benefit from those familiar people, they still try to harm them!…I made a small error in writing; the sentence should read thus: Precisely because they benefit from those familiar people do they try to harm them!

People grow angry at those from whom they don’t get help exactly as they wish. But those from whom no benefit whatsoever can be gained—people harbor no resentment toward them. Because people don’t know them, they are safe.

In the end, people always turn their fury on the benefactor. Those from whom we receive no help, no service—they remain untouched. They escape all our anger, our envy, our resentment, and every harm, wound, and calamity born from these three.

How peculiar we are! The cow that gives milk—we kick that cow. Sometimes, when chance allows, we even slaughter her! And the cow that gives no milk, or gives it to others instead—that cow remains beneath our notice, and thus stands wholly immune to our wrath and assault. The cow whose milk we do not drink, we say nothing of; we don’t even know her, so what would we say? But the cow whose milk we drink—we squeeze her teat and demand, “Brother, you’ve given white milk all this time; now bring me some pale papaya-colored milk! And it would be lovely if it carried a hint of that Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee from the slopes of those distant hills!” Should she fail, the poor creature’s throat meets our knife! We find such joy in murdering our benefactor! Even if we don’t kill with our own hands, we delight in witnessing the murder unfold. The truth is, we are not merely ungrateful and faithless—we are positively unreasonable!

In business, there exists a word called “professionalism,” deemed terribly important. Some merchants know the word well enough, yet scarcely understand its meaning! To be their customer means to receive the promised goods or service, in exchange for agreed-upon payment, in such a manner that we are made to feel they have discharged their duty and bestowed upon us some remarkable favor!

Reflection: Eight Hundred Forty-Four
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One. To know, one must first acknowledge. How so?

We are not seized by the desire to know what we do not acknowledge. To acknowledge means to hold something as significant. Whoever acknowledges another desires to know that person. Whoever acknowledges something desires to know it. Those matters we deem insignificant we scarcely think upon at all. The man who works a job thinks only of his job, because he acknowledges it. Ask him of business and he’ll say, “Brother, I know nothing of business!” He knows nothing because he does not acknowledge it.

Had the mother not acknowledged the boy as her son, would she have known him? Had I not acknowledged my father as my father, would I have known him? Suppose you hold no interest in economics. Would you then seek knowledge of economics? No, you would not—naturally. Knowledge is infinite; with matters that do concern you, you can scarcely exhaust a lifetime, so why squander time on what does not? You do not acknowledge economics, and therefore you do not know it. Perhaps you think much upon politics, and because you think upon it, you come to know it. I do not think much upon politics, and therefore I do not know it. This matter of thinking arises from acknowledgment. Thus acknowledgment is the first step toward knowing.

You take no interest in economics; I do.
I take no interest in politics; you do.
You say, “If you wish to live, you must know politics!”
I say, “If you wish to live, you must know economics!”
…This leads nowhere. Whoever does not acknowledge something does not know it. Let me remind you again: to acknowledge means to take it to heart. You cannot force a person to take something to heart.

In this world there are people of countless cultures, of innumerable nations and faiths! Is it possible to know of all of them in a single lifetime?

If we do not know, does that render the existence of an unfamiliar civilization or society meaningless? Never! What we do not hold, what we do not affirm, what we do not know — that too is beautiful, because it too keeps humanity alive. Any stubbornness about this is surely nothing but another name for ignorance. Therefore, the world beyond what we affirm and thus know is the greater world, and everything in that world is true in the lives of those who dwell there, and thus beautiful. The truth before my eyes may be the only truth for me, but it is by no means the only truth for everyone! Truth varies with the life one lives.

What we wish to obtain, or to know, we must first affirm; we must cultivate a tender regard for it within ourselves. Only then will we feel keenly the desire to seek the path toward obtaining and knowing it. What a person affirms, or whom a person affirms, pulls at them. And through this pulling, through this attraction, they come to know. This is how one must come to know. Without that pull stirring in the heart, walking the path of knowledge leads nowhere. To see, one must first become blind. Without this blindness of love settling in the mind, the search for light is not easily found.

When someone presumes they already know, where then is their desire to walk the path of knowing? What is the point of seeing what we already see? To breathe, one must first assume: I cannot breathe! To see, one must first assume: I cannot see! To know, one must first assume: I do not know! This is called blindness, this is called emptiness. To become full, one must become empty. If the heart harbors the vanity of fullness without cause, one cannot become empty, and therefore cannot become full either. As far as I have seen, if one wishes to live with head held high, one must first bow the head, must mix oneself into the dust. Look around and you will see countless hollow people walking about with the vanity of a false fullness. That false fullness is their fate, and therefore it is their destiny as well!

To know, one must affirm.
To affirm, one must be drawn.
To be drawn, one must be sharpened.

This knowing-affirming-drawing-sharpening in all of us is born from emptiness, never from fullness.

Two. Let people say what they will, do not stop. If necessary, pause only to correct yourself. They will want to stop you. Should you stop, they will have won. Do not give them the victory; simply correct your errors in time. They do not wish to reform anyone; they wish to stop them. If you would answer them as they deserve, you cannot stop; you must continue, slowly if need be, correcting yourself as you go. Some find happiness in moving forward; others find happiness in preventing others from moving forward. They cannot move themselves, nor do they seem to wish to; their whole joy lies in blocking another’s path. Let them speak, let them have their joy; at the same time, keep yourself moving, correct yourself as you reflect. That will suffice!

Three. Many drink alcohol on only two days a year. The day it rains, and the day it does not. Drinking only two days a year does nothing!

We Bengalis do so only at two times…

We use excessive adjectives in sentences,
We add unnecessary O-sounds to words,
Whenever the mind wishes, we write sentences in passive voice,
Whatever spelling we see in books and on the internet, we accept as correct.

Why should we not be smart?

Thank goodness there is no more room for O-sounds in the sentence above! If there were, surely our esteemed ad-wallahs would have inserted them!

Why (why)…Why did you come? (Why did you come?)
Why (buy)…Why do you buy so much?

(Why do you buy this much?)

‘Hob’ comes from ‘hoib’. There’s no reason to add an o-kar here. If the word ‘hob’ had other meanings too, that would be another matter—which is why we write ‘holo’ and ‘hoto’ when we use words like ‘hal’ and ‘hat’ as verbs. (I have three pieces on this; you can look them up if you like.)

Yet we go around adding o-kars thoughtlessly, here and there. Why do we do it? For the sheer whim of it, I suppose!

Oh right, let me tell you—*when* do we do it?

When we don’t understand, and when we understand too much.

Reflection: Eight Hundred and Forty-Five
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One. (To rescue those whose competence has plummeted to zero after centuries upon centuries of not translating…)

: Tell me about ‘babo’. I’ll tell you about you. Why are you making your heart heavy? That’s not right. If the heart grows heavy, the mind’s heaviness increases too. If the mind grows heavy, dumbness sets in. Dumbness brings me hope. If hope comes, I feel terribly sad. Don’t let that happen, please. You know how much I love you. I can’t even express such love in business, understand? Go home, don’t make your heart heavy, just go. How much work will I have to do?

: Not at all.

: Listen, didn’t my face light up before your heart did? What’s happened suddenly now?

: Your face doesn’t look good to me anymore, and now Kaddosh’s face looks better to me, and Motalab’s face looks a bit better too.

: Who told you that? Didn’t I tell you, only me? And now, just like that, Kaddosh and Motalab have become better? Is there something about them that I don’t have?

: Kaddosh and Mesin look better; his father looks better too.

: His father too! Who’s been telling you all this? Go on, go on, go on.

: I’m speaking of Kaddosh and Raismel’s affairs.

: Oh, I see, I see. Did you promise yourself to that shop-keeper’s son? And Motalab? Who is he to you?

: Motalab matches my temperament; he doesn’t match yours.

: What’s wrong with Motalab?

: Why would there be? He’s my type.

: What happens when Motalab and temperament don’t match?

: That’s all you. I knew it before—your heart is juvenile. You’re a child. I can’t give my love to a child like that.

: All right, what does Kaddosh need Motalab for?

: Yes. Why?

: Kaddosh’s cricket, and Motalab’s navigation?

: Yes, you know such things?

: They’ve become intimate with each other.

: You follow me, that’s the meaning. Wherever I go, whoever does it, I do all the work. Isn’t it?

: No, no, go. He goes to Kolkata with me anyway. That’s settled there.

: What again?

: That Salman Khan’s big poster there? It stayed in one place for a month.

: You people… what terrible behavior! I won’t keep relations with you anymore, go.

Two. Some people don’t have brains in their heads; their brains are in their bellies, and their heads are filled with gas. When acidity rises, they go mad, and do whatever comes to their heads.

Three. A business is like one’s own child. In the beginning, hardly anyone but a mother and father can see a child’s bright future. It’s the same with business—at the start, no one but oneself can even see its bright future, and at the first opportunity, they oppose it in every way they can.

Four. Many people lie without any profit or self-interest, habitually and for no reason at all. As if their very digestion depends on it—as if a meal won’t settle in their belly unless they’ve woven some lie into it! When they’re in this fashion, rattling off one falsehood after another, and you’re sitting there listening—what a vexation it is! But they’re not bad people, understand. This needless lying of theirs is a kind of mental ailment.

Five. Some people are so foolish, so dull-witted that a certificate is all they possess.

Of course, there are also those without certificates who are foolish nonetheless. Watching them, I think: stupidity requires no diploma. You can be a fool without any certificate at all—you need only the will and the cast of mind for it.

Six. Dear Australia, mere big talk scattered across fields and grounds won’t do the trick. You’ve got to know how to actually do something, to show results!

And here I see no real difference between your haters and mine! Both the same thing, really—all bluster and no substance. Empty in deed though grand in presumption! Where, truly, lies the problem?

(We seized fortune and claimed the swagger! Lose, and you must bear others’ swagger!
Bravo, the Tiger Team!)

Seven. Whoever loves someone should marry them—that’s the finest thing. The reason is simple: they’ve already learned to tolerate each other. Marry someone new, and there’s a tremendous risk—will this new person bear to tolerate you, or not? The uncertainty lingers.

Those in love can release each other’s hand as easily as it was taken. But after marriage, two people cannot—not even if asked a thousand times—part with such ease. Love has no social or familial chains; marriage does. And once children come, people become nearly enslaved to endure each other in numb proximity, even unto death. Is there any torment greater than this compulsion?

So when two people in love decide to marry, that is wonderful indeed. They’re making this decision after knowing and understanding each other over time—an opportunity that those without love preceding marriage simply do not have. If before marriage you already know what aspects of each other you’ll need to tolerate, that is very good!

When love exists between two people, and marriage follows, the chances of their happiness are far, far greater. But if one marries someone else, then the dread of unhappiness shadows both husband and wife alike—and at once, both their families too!

When lovers marry, they can accept and adjust to each restraint and conflict between themselves far more than two strangers or near-strangers can. A human being is a mixture of good and bad! When there is neither time nor opportunity to know and understand both dimensions, sorrow lurks at every turn.

We all know this: a winding familiar road is better than a straight unfamiliar one. Lose your way badly on an unfamiliar path, and sometimes even the desire to reach your destination withers away.

In this matter, parents must be earnest to the utmost degree. When a child makes so crucial a decision about their life, stubbornness can yield results that are utterly calamitous.

Perhaps as punishment for your stubbornness, you shall remain the object of your child’s contempt until death. The primary duty of parents is to raise their children into human beings, not to marry them off.

When a person errs in their own judgment, they accept it easily enough. But when another errs in their judgment, acceptance does not come so readily. Why spend a whole lifetime bearing another person’s sighs?

A burnt roti made in love tastes a thousand times sweeter than a perfectly cooked biryani made without it!

Reflection: Eight Hundred and Forty-Six
………………………………………………………

One. That person who thought of you every day, for reasons and for none—they truly missed you terribly.

That person who aged themselves by loving you alone, they thought not of themselves but of you, always.

That person who never once troubled you with questions—why don’t you call, why don’t you reply to messages, why don’t you visit—that person kept your peace close to their heart and soul when they loved you.

That person who loved you knowing they would never have you, they loved the truest love of all.

That person who never spoke harshly to your face—they learned to honor you.

That person who returned to you even after you wounded them a thousand times—they are not weak of spirit. Their love burned so fiercely that even the wounds you gave could not drive them back.

One day when I step away, I know a great peace will come. When you search for me among the crowd of daily messages I once sent, you will not find me then. And though you may miss me countless times, no one will torment you as I did before, and in your heart’s contentment, you will surely forget me then.

Two. A winning streak—
What is there to fear?

If it slips away, so be it!
May the guest be content!

Whether we lose or win, we care not!
Such a game we wish to watch!

Even in defeat, let the struggle remain!
Let them keep their caps off in the rain!

Tiger pack,
March on, attack!

Three. The people who hate the same person flock together much more than the people who like the same person. Haters are more united than lovers.

Four. A person cannot even become the way they wish to be, yet they sit and hope that someone else will become exactly as they desire.

Five. When your success says it all, what’s the use of your post? Success talks the loudest!
Congratulations, Tigers!! Such a well-deserved win!! Even my heart missed some beats!!

Six. Today I wish for death—I no longer wish to bloom anew. Today I wish my accumulated pain would consume me all at once, bit by bit amassed and swallowed whole. Rather than being eaten away a little each day, let it finish me entirely.

I have lost myself. Each day I wash my face and hands, rush to the mirror and stand before it—the self I see reflected is not me, cannot be me! That is someone else. My former self had such rage, such pride. I had desires and delights, uninhibited laughter that would tumble from me, and the courage to weep bitterly. But now, who is this I see in the mirror? Who is this person without desire, without pride or shame? Even when sorrow comes, they cannot fall apart and cry as they once did. I am losing the self within me, becoming someone else piece by piece—who will bear responsibility for this?

I ask again. Do you hear me? Who will bear this burden? I did not transform myself without cause.

# The Plaster of Thought-Walls

A life lived like a corpse—I refuse to call it living anymore. One can deceive others, perform deceits before their mirrors, but you cannot cheat yourself. You cannot look away from your own reflection.

I have the courage to say it plainly: my self has died. I am now nothing but a soulless body. No light can enter me anymore. Even the light that once illuminated me from within has gone out.

Listen: a person cannot live this way. I curse this dragged, hauled existence. A life where the wounds of the heart do not bleed, where the wound itself cannot feel like a wound—such a life is surely dead. And in the deadness of one like me, wounds gradually transform into salve through their own alchemy. The wound itself becomes the master of numbness. To turn a wound into salve, you must know how to nurture small injuries in your chest for years, letting them grow into scars. You must taste, see, and smell the agony of accumulating wounds, of becoming utterly wounded. I knew this once. I know it no longer. Give me back my self. Return my soul, my feeling.

Listen—I am speaking to you, yes, all of you—give me back my self. Give it back! Who among you stole my identity? Why did you steal it? I must speak. You will not escape so easily.

Very well—who stole it? Tell me plainly. Sit before me. We can have tea, talk things over. No one needs to know you are a thief. Just return my essence. I will not punish you. Believe me—I swear by Mother Kali herself—show yourself. Who stole it? Who? You? Or him? Or her? You won’t say? Or have you truly… have you truly killed my soul… No… I cannot think anymore!

Ha ha ha ha ha ha! Oof! Laughing so hard my belly aches. But tell me—what does it matter to your soul that you have murdered mine? Why are you silent? Speak! Your essence too has died, hasn’t it? Ha ha ha ha! I know everything, I know it all. Your souls too have rotted away. You have a mirror at home, don’t you? Hmm? Who do you see in it? Do you see anyone at all?

—

**Thought: Eight Hundred and Forty-Seven**

—

**One.** Sometimes, intentionally make mistakes. Then you will know who cannot bear your faults. Those who cannot accept your errors, who rush forward with public criticism, yet cannot give you a single clap of recognition when you do nothing wrong—they are no well-wishers of yours. The more flawless you remain, the more their bodies burn. To save themselves from this burning, they often fall into a kind of hibernation. But the moment you make an error, every fiber of their consciousness springs upright, and they rush headlong to perform your final rites at lightning speed!

Wait—in what I just wrote, the words “no well-wishers” do not quite fit. It should be “haters.” Sometimes cast bait to identify haters. They are small in mind—you will see, they will swallow the bait the moment it appears. Whether you do something right or wrong, they will follow you. In the first case they suffer in bitter discomfort; in the second, they practically achieve heaven in their ease and comfort!

# The Plaster of Thought-Walls

Such mental eunuchs lag behind all their lives—they stay behind, they remain behind. Yes, ‘they remain behind forever.’ Write this down somewhere, and check it against your own life from time to time. I’ve been matching it for the past ten years, and it keeps proving true!

Wait, wait! Don’t misunderstand me—they’re not critics, mind you! In plain Bengali, they’re what you’d call detractors. Their entire lives amount to nothing but stalking people’s heels, and there’s precious little worth mentioning in their achievements, never will be either. Critics discourse on the work; detractors discourse on the worker. Critics need brains to speak of deeds; detractors need only the power of malice to speak of people. That’s the whole difference.

—

Two. Why this restlessness in my chest, I don’t know. I only feel that if I could see you, my mind would find peace. You know, sometimes I think: if I were to lose you by some mistake, I’d have nothing left to live for.

I’m truly afraid. Truly. When I close my eyes, I feel you drawing a kiss on my lips. I feel it often. I like it.

Sometimes I imagine you lying very close to me, and I’m touching you. I can hear your breathing, and I want to wrap myself around you, want to cover your whole body with kisses. I really want to have you then. Thinking such thoughts, I eventually fall asleep, starved of affection.

Looking steadfastly at your photograph, I speak aloud to it: Scold this boy on my behalf. He hasn’t shown me tenderness in ages. Tell him I’m angry, very angry. But also tell him this—when we meet, I’ll shower him with so much affection.

I’ve kissed your photograph more than a hundred times; I’ve kissed it so much I had to wipe the phone screen with a tissue! Now I have this fierce urge to punch you. Don’t ask why. If you ask why, you’ll have to come to me.

One day I’ll come and get you, bind your hands and feet, and beat you. I’ll keep beating you until you feel the pull toward me.

It’s easy to hurt me! I’m someone with an overly sensitive heart. I don’t write you everything, don’t share all my sorrows. I often avoid so much, because I know my limits. This girl inside me—she’ll never do anything to hurt you, only things born of love.

Whenever you say you’ve been hurt, the pain of hurting you without understanding cuts into my sleep. Then I’m restless for you. Meanwhile, you tell me these things and move on. And here I am, wondering: where have you gone? Where? Why aren’t you here today? Are you busy? Have you fallen asleep? Why did sleep come to you so early today? Why?

There are so many days when half my diary entry is spent scolding you.

Almost everything around us depends on how we treat each other. I’m afraid of losing you. This purposeless drift toward you—it will bar the path to losing you. I’m here. I’ll remain. Let me grow in my own way, let you grow in yours. Seeing you grow brings me peace, brings me joy.

When you talk to me, don’t speak like a robot. If you do, I want to punch you. Always speak to me with tenderness, always speak to me with love.

Of late, there is only this: that holding you close to my chest might bring my mind to rest. When I go long stretches without seeing you, the ache grows unbearable—it does, more and more. You are so terribly cruel! I do nothing but think of you. I turn over in my mind how to still this desire to clutch you within my breast, how to forget you, and when—if ever—my work will return to me as it once was.

Will I do nothing but see you, read you? Nothing else at all? It’s strange, is it not? Your poems are blameless; the fault lies entirely with you. But tell me—is my feeling for you nothing but grievance? Do I complain so very much? The truth is, no one else truly understands me with their whole heart the way you might. No one will remain by my side to the end, or so these thoughts keep circling through my mind.

This tenderness I harbor for you, this abundance of longing that I keep locked within my chest—if only you knew how many see me as a person wholly without tenderness, wholly unmoved by affection!