When Dreams Remain Dreams: A View from the Quagmire

Many years ago, as I stood on the precipice of what at that time looked like happy marriage, I carried a specific vision for the future. I imagined a son who would follow my footsteps to my alma mater, Birla Vidyamandir, Nainital. He would live in my old house a legacy my nephews had already refused and he would become my dream and my ambition: an officer and a gentleman.

Even world weary men like me have dreams. But some dreams are destined to remain just that.

Today, I find myself "happily divorced," having learned that love is, at best, a farce. As for the Indian legal system? It is a quagmire worse than the British Empire that sired it ......a system so convoluted it makes our neighbors look like paradise by comparison. It is a machine that remains indifferent to the despair, the broken lives, and the suicides of the men trapped within its gears.

But I digress; sometimes the pain gets the better of me.

What remains of that era is a poem I wrote for a son who never arrived. It speaks of a flight that will never take off, and a sky that remains empty.

The Only Dream Left

Spread your wings and take the lead,

To heights where only dreams can tread.

While you conquer clouds and touch the blue,

I’ll be the one looking up at you.

With every mile and peak you gain,

I’ll cheer your name across the plain.

Go on, dear kiddo, touch the sky,

I’ll clap from earth as you soar high.

You are the only dream I have left

I have often said that if there is a God, He’s a sadistic bastard. Sometimes I think the very concept of "God" was a trick created by Saturn to punish the good. But that is a thought for another post.