Inframorphosis

There was a time when I could read. Now, even though I read subtitles on films, captions on photographs, slogans on adverts, more slogans on political posters, banners and hoardings, posters that congratulate the people, no, they use an ambiguous form of address, sabhi ko, to all, who all? Does sabhi ko include people outside the area, the city, the province, the country? Such information goes beyond the symbolic in the Peircean sense. One has to have some idea of the Silversteinean indexicals to know, nay, make a case that: first, the advert is meant for anyone who comes across, perceives, sees, reads, ignores, pays attention to, gets angered by, becomes moved, and so on; second, one has to look at the string of inflated passport size photographs that deck the top and bottom of the poster – if it includes everyday though unrecognizable figures, youngsters donning black shades, midsters wrapping a gamcha around their neck, elderly figures vying for a dignified look with hands waving at an imaginary crowd or folded in courtesy. As one moves from the familiar yet unrecognizable local punters to those made recognizable by the media yet deeply unfamiliar, such as the Prime Minister, the President, the Chief Minister, with their names and designations preluded by honorifics (one can never rely on people to consider them honourable, so all doubt is removed by maananiya, mahaa-mahim, his or her excellency). The addressee can be part of a group, community, religion, or, best of all, be hailed as a member of a nation. Finally, the occasion for the poster, a festival such as Diwali, Holi, Dussehra, Janmastami or a local fair, mela, that means sound that deafens, light that blinds, crowds that rub sweat and skin into a molasses of oneness in smell and texture, a national festival, days of independence and the republic, Gandhi is not as important lately though he may appear, mere glasses or an outline imploring us to keep cities clean but the prime minister has edged him out of such postures too, and ashamed, it seems, at how much garbage, poop, plastic, dump, landfills, scenes of sewer and people floating in rivers of shit, he, too, had exited such postures and left them for the slogans, swatch bharat, swatch Pradesh, swatch nagar, and I read those slogans, see the stains that Jackson pollock them but I am unable to read anything longer, like a story, you see, I was able to read books, with two hundred, three hundred, four, five, six, occasionaly even seven hundred, a thousand pages, but now I cannot bring myself to read beyond a few phrases, a sentence or two, a paragraph at best before I move on in anticipation of excitement to other things, slide between apps, from YouTube to Safari, jump between hyperlinks, respond to a message, share a meme, heart a meme received, write Ha Ha and tap on the crying with laughter emogee 😂 , click send, no, touch and tap send, scroll back or swipe, no, touch the home button and drag and release to refresh the feed and zoom in. The New York Post is afraid of the communist Mamdani, and a Simpsons still – real or fake, who knows? – with Trump's portrait in a frame, date of birth–date of death, with a line that reads, he has not been seen in public since August 31, and scroll, Modi, Putin, and Xi Jinping huddle together for SCO in Tianjian, and Haryanvi music extols our lion for the jaata da chhora that he is in the international arena, scroll, kya kehta tha America, what did America use to say? Who the hell do you think you are… (have you shown respect, ever once said thank you?) aur ab hum kya kehta hai, what do we say now? Tu kaun hai be? Who da fuck are you? And scroll after scroll, an economist calls the coming end of the American empire, Fox praises the National Guard takeover of Washington. D,C, Corbyn forms a new party in the UK, a Scottish historian tells an Indo-British interviewer about the golden road that ran from India all the way to Rome and later on to Southeast Asia, but I step out and people sleep on tarpaulin, spread dead on naked floor, people between sludge from slippers and shoes carrying dirt and monsoon rain that turned the city into a drain, sewer enters houses and submerges first two floors, walls soak in the stink and will fume with sickness, and cows too wait for the train and sprawl, walk up and down the platform, we have achieved equality and shoved people, condemned humans to the level of cows. I remember a poster that lined Cambridge walls and electric poles – veganism is a moral urgency! We do not eat cows, so we kill those who do and let cows shit on faces that carry our shit, enter our sewers, lay our bricks, and on their concussed head carry burdens meant for beasts. Whip-less slavery in the plantations of America and the villages, construction sites, and slums of India. One is impoverished of morals despite all displays of material wealth, the other is impoverished in totality, spiritually poor, materially leaching of flesh, blood and bones and philandering the streets, feasting their gaze and scratching their crotch under bulging potbellies, honking and ramming, left and right, beggars that beggar the imagination starve on the streets, dark, sunburned to charcoal black, eyes sunken like a dry well staring back at you from dead bottomless haunts of a soul that only knew hunger, thirst, dejection, never knew fulfilment of a single wish but thoughts are too much, I cannot, I cannot don Lucky’s hat for too long, no, I cannot, my hands reach for the vial, the power button like a lighter's flame beneath the spoon, the liquid screen flashes alive, the passcode needle loads heroine in a syringe, I click on the app – Instagram crack, Tiktok meth, Facebook pot, it matters not, I inject and lay to my side, eyes settle on a six inch by three window into infinite worlds, vacation to Bali, reasons to visit the Bahamas and the beach, fly business with Etihad, use credit on cards and get all the fucking rewards, scroll, scroll, scroll, a bent in my pinky, my thumb grows sore, scroll, scroll, scroll, Mamdani is a communist, Monsanto poisons people, Immigrants are raping our daughters, muslims do not bathe, Indians are dirty, CRIMINALS, RAPISTS, jihadists, love-jihad, anti-romea squad, aaiye naa humraa bihaar mein, do come to our magnificent Bihar, fly to Tibilisi, to Berlin, journey through Taklamakan, Chinese uncles’ flaunt Beijing bikinis in the summer, the room is unreal, the bed is unreal, I am not here and now, I am everywhere and everywhen all at once, I am nowhere, I am disembodied, I am not queer, I love Big Other!

Scroooooooooooll! Though my heart is aching, Scroooooooooooll! Even though it's breaking.