"There are tracts in my life that are bare and silent. They are the open spaces where my busy days had their light and air."
- Stray Birds, Rabindranath Tagore
“Fled is that music:--- Do I wake or sleep?”
-
“Ode to a Nightingale,” John Keats
How
does one write about the nothingness and inactivity in the mind? How does one
convert base metal into literary gold? Isn’t the use of metaphors proof that the
mind is still active? Or is it the other way around? Are metaphors the
proverbial last straw the person clutches to save himself from the bottomless pit
of languorous passivity? But metaphors come and go. The mind soon slams the
door on the face of the world and gives itself to sloth.
However,
such passivity could also presuppose a laden mind, a mind assailed by waves of
sensory input. Having reached the limit of its carrying capacity, the mind
starts swaying. The sensory data that riddle the brain come in different
ways. One is the drudgery of deadline-compulsion. Deadlines are signposts that
structure our days and nights. They seem to follow each other with a metronomic
regularity until the difference between metaphor and machine blurs and
disappears. Writing too becomes a deadline.
Lethargy
steals over in a minute. But one can see it coming. There is nothing left to do
now – the mind insinuates and immediately sets into motion a spring of
listlessness. So suggestions of completion combine with the lack of immediate
goals to create a lethargic state of mind.
There
are other ways of reaching such a mental state. Lethargy is a dilatory chamber
which serves to freshen and awaken the mind. The person rushes towards a
deadline and achieves it. But he is too fatigued to start a new assignment and
so, lets his mind wander till he discovers that restraint is better than
self-indulgence. Time lapses and the early-bird advantage is wasted. Things
will be done on time, when their time comes and when I find time. No need to
hurry and spill the milk. Let me chill. But the alarm bell chimes again. The
last task this season has been delayed by err…wish I had immediately started
working on the next task. But this is the nature of lethargy. It revels in
delaying the swift-footed person. Strength abandons the hands and the head
droops before swinging backwards till the eyes widen only to stare at the grime
of the ceiling fan. The haunches upon the wooden chair hurt but I make no
effort to ease the pain. Intent deserts the mind.
Soon
the clamour begins anew. It is a bit late but I am at my efficient best and I
look forward to completing the next round of tasks well ahead of the designated
time. The mind is fresh after a slumber. Nay, this is not slumber. This is
lethargy.
