Movie Review: Do not watch 'Lipstick Under my Burkha'

Do not watch 'Lipstick under my Burkha' if you will not tolerate a sixty something widow harboring sexual fantasies. Do not watch it if you will cringe at the thought of a widow daring to love again.

Do not watch it if you think that a man owns his wife's body. Do not watch it if you think that Marital Rape is a myth, that it is okay to impregnate your wife again and again and give her an acute case of uterus infection.

Do not watch it if you think that the best way to deal with a daughter having an affair is to fix her 'rishta' with a well settled boy who won't let her step out of the house. Do not watch it if a young woman voicing her need for sex makes you mutter 'What a slut!'

Do not watch it if you think that your daughter should sit at home doing all the house chores. Do not watch it if you look at a woman wearing jeans with disgust.

We were seated behind a chauvinistic group of men who were apparently there to 'Time-pass' and 'Would not recommend this movie to anyone'. One of them loudly said to his mate "This movie is nothing but a story of women's desires. But that doesn't mean she will get so much independence that she will go and kiss a guy." This remark came right after a kiss initiated by a woman on screen. 

Whereas, they chose to remain quiet when a man brutally raped his wife; when a man pulled a girl in a dark alley; when the same boy told her that he can call several other guys to give her what she needed; when an orthodox father fixed the marriage of her daughter to punish her; when a woman's dreams and self respect were thrown off the roof.

It made me wonder if this movie was directed towards this category of men. If they believed that while a woman cannot have independence, a man can have independence to the point where he can do anything he wants to a woman.

Yes, do not watch this movie if you too will be unable to take the raw, brutal truth; if you want a masala fiction, funky dance numbers, item songs, cheesy stalker-ish behavior and people jumping from twenty story buildings.

Or maybe, watch this movie. Swallow the reality and perhaps change the way you think about women!

Nostalgia for the past

It was a time of Love and Innocence. I now remember them in sepia tones of longing. Don't we all wish for time turners? I mumble another unrealised wish, as the bus hops on the potholes towards the street bustling with life and concealed with memories. Many a nights, drenched in the vanilla of the moon, love and rain, we had spoken about life and nothingness of it all. I was a cynic, too rooted in the past and traumas. And you, you were always the anchor that kept me rooted in the present, always convincing me that there was more to life than nostalgia for the past.
Xxx
I want to know what you think now. Whether remembrance tiptoes it's way back into your life today. But then, you are a different person now and once a person changes, does anything remain of the one we knew? You smile a little too hard today. Is it because you do not remember? Is it because you no longer care? Or is it because you know that I have this thing for nostalgia. I do not remember you as someone who would cause pain to me, but then the silence of all these months suppirts the contrary. Who knows? You are a different person now.
Xxx
The slow dance of remembrance covers my eyes. Your's gleam with lightness and freedom. I remember the temple bells and the auburn evenings when the feeling of love had first sank in our hearts and we had declared it to each other with passion and innocence. Like I said, it was a time of innocence and I have preserved yours in sepia tones of love and wonder. Yes, wonder. Because I always thought you would preserve something of the person you once were.

Xxx

I have drowned myself in coffee, whiskey and verses. You have found company, happiness and all that perhaps I must have failed to provide. Tell me, why is it that the one who loves is always the one that is left behind. Why is it that the one that feels is rewarded with pain?

I remember your words. Now a box of lies that were used to show the world that you did not commit the folly of falling for an emotional trainwreck, a difficult one, an empath, a poet hung up on details, a writer who has a nostalgia for the past. Perhaps, with her words, she trapped you. Perhaps, you made her up inside her head. Perhaps, you were kind enough to not keep the broken,  waiting.

The details, the truth, shall always remain unknown to the world. Your madness, your love, your innocence shall always remain our secret, concealed in characters, verses, poems and prose. The tragedy of being a loner, you say. The glory of being the one with a heart big enough to forgive your betrayal, I believe.
The truth remains concealed behind my silence and love. Something that means nothing anymore. But had meant the world at a point. And I still taste it like regret, like a fool every day.

Xxx

You belong to those Sepia toned frames, to those evenings and nights when we had spilled our hearts out and rained kisses on each other, as if making a sacred vow. Putting things in perspective, I now feel that it really was too good to be true. I hadn't noticed until today that there are cracks on the edges and the frames are beginning to rot.

Xxx

I wonder if we catch a glimpse of each other, will you wave at me, smile at me or turn your face and pretend that there is no such thing as nostalgia for the past? I will probably put on a straight face and run to the nearest wine shop, grab a bottle of whiskey and try to blur the difference between love and lies, to make the reality a little more bearable. You will bury yourself in your phone and Twitter, and remind yourself that our history was never ours, that I do not exist but for the ghost that resurfaces only when the skies are auburn and the distant sound of temple bells echo inside your new house. Soon, I will cease to be a ghost either. You will forget the structure of my face, the creases on my cheeks, the smell of my hair, the color of my eyes. You have already replaced the taste of my lips, the warmth of my company.

Xxx

There are some lovers, some goodbyes, some regrets, some questions that we carry with us all our lives.  Perhaps we make peace with the new way of life. And we smile a little too hard when someone asks us why we are not longer the same.

_Ayushee Ghoshal 

What if you had sailed on your paper boat?

The fact that we are too afraid to set asail in our paper boat is a proof of how the society has functioned us into believing that we are meant to be their version of "right". The misfits, the introverts, the socially awkwards, the sensitive, the naive, the gullible, the one's with no grey areas. A. K. A the ones that are "too much, " the ones  refusing to blend in.

Too many labels for someone who is so much more than flesh and bones. Who gave us the right to judge? To share a piece of our not so valuable perspective upon what is right or wrong? Our two bits of pessimism  has successfully created a society of people who are too scared to take a plunge. 

The constant pressure to get a job, earn, build a good house, marry the right person. Stop. Stop. Stop. Let us take a step backwards.

What if one doesn't want any of these?

What if I have a  key that will open this locked corner of my heart that contains all my hidden potential? The problem is, the key has a layer of rust and the lock refuses to open. Now, naturally we have to remove the corosion. How? After years of social conditioning, we refuse to even try. There are things you do for living, things that make you feel so distant from yourself. Albeit, you are fantastic at this job profile which is not meant for you. Your current partner is the definition of all that the relatives and friends consider "socially acceptable".

Yet, a part of you feels so distant from yourself, from your own soul.

There is an advertisement flashing in your mind. It keeps telling you to ride on a paper boat. Something inside you is desperate to thump, feel alive, be present in the world. The key is gathering rust. And you have no idea what a paper boat signifies. 

What do you do?  

Breath.

Take a plunge into the deep seas. Not everyone can find their calling, but you have. It has to mean something, perhaps? You can succumb to the wolves and their commercial greed, or you can die trying to live for your art and for everything that makes you feel alive. It is time for you to gather your rosebuds while you may. The longer you wait, the longer it will take to use that key that has started corroding. There is something thumping inside you. Listen to it. It won't say no.

The truth is, we will always be too afraid. Too afraid of complications. Sometimes we like the sadness. We are too afraid to do what feels right. Too busy to take a moment in the busy day for your damn self and breath. Too conditioned into believing that one cannot live for art. Too embarrassed to go out with unkempt hair and pajamas. Too unprepared d

 for that impromptu trip to another corner of the city. Too afraid of failing.

We want to sail in our paper boats, but we are too afraid of drowning. Too occupied being their version of right to even try and be your own version of excellent. Too tried to even make an effort to reach for the shore. So our heart keeps making muffled prayers, hoping that we would listen to it. Sometimes the rust of opinions, judgments, fear is too loud and we mistaken the pleas of heart to be just a tiny little voice. Therefore, sometimes we live our lives with wishful thinking. What if. What if. What if.

What if I had taken the chance?

What if I had taken the last bus to nowhere?

What if I had taken up a job that fuels my passion?

What if I had never commercialised my script?

What if I had left the person who makes me feel distant from myself?

What if I had decided to live for my heart?

What if I had learnt patience?

What if I had lived for my Passion?

What if I had lived for myself?

What if I had sailed on my paper boat? 

-Ayushee Ghoshal

Did You Build Yourself Up Inside My Head?

Too many days and nights have passed in the confines of my small room. Too many futile longings haveflickered and killed themselves in this darkness.
It is all flesh to flesh. Hearts are made in toy shops these days. Good ol romance is a legend. Every notion of love invites complications. We are too scarred. Too scared. We have learnt to love from afar, in silence. Perhaps, we are stuck in a vicious circle of constant hurt.

My eyes chose to convince me that you are not you anymore. I look at you like nothing matters, like you have not tore this heart into a billion pieces. My breath is racing against time as i watch you hold her hands and walk on the road that we had once walked upon. Is it so easy to forget someone who gave you all their heart? I can do nothing but watch as you stir her coffee,  your eyes smouldering with lust. Once innocence had simmered in the brown of your eyes. Your lies unravel in front of me. All the 'I cant live without you. Cant think of you with someone else' have been tossed and discarded like previous night's breath.

You are a lie, conjured up in form of a person. I stand here, looking at you. I ask myself. Did I make you up inside my head or did you make yourself up inside mine? Tell me the version of you that I must believe? Perhaps, help me erase you, since it is only fair, since you have already erased me. Perhaps, you are afraid of the best that you can be.

My heart is a whore.. Always looking for love where it doesn't exist.

Xxxxx

You are holding her hands in yours. I am standing in the corner, feeling pinned inside a belljar. I am asking myself. Did I make you up inside my head or did you make yourself up in mine? -Ayushee Ghoshal
#4AmConversations

"Honey, You are my bad habit."

You are the evening cup of tea, a relief from the mundane affair called life. I run to you for a refill and you empty me of my sanity. Without you, I am a person who needs a fix. Perhaps, the joint of weed that a writer craves for when art refuses to happen to him? The stick of cigarette that  I crave for after my bowl of salad. A glass of wine that I cannot do without. The blood red lipstick that boosts my confidence, the little black dress and the raunchy pair of denims that make me feel good. The sleeping pills that I am addicted to.
You are everything on my shelf that I need, but will never want. We run in circles, always too cautious to step out of the comfort zone for the fear of getting burnt.  I know what we have will never be love, because Honey, you are my bad habit.
-Ayushee Ghoshal
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Day 3 #4AmConversationsPrompts:
Tell me about that bad habit? It can be a person, a place, a memory. Anything.
A big Thank you to everyone who is posting their #4amconversationsprompts
Love to read your 4 AM Conversations. Just makes me feel like all of us together in this big beautiful chaotic thing called life.
If you love writing, you can join in and spread the love for words. All you have to do is write a piece on the prompt given here and use the hashtag #4AmConversationsPrompts
Tag me in the pictures after you have posted a piece. At the end of this writing prompt,  I will be doing a give away.
Today's writing prompts is: "Honey, you are a bad habit." Use this prompt to write a 4 AM Conversation.
Spread the word. Tag your writer friends. Keep writing.
Cheers!

"We play dumb. But we know exactly what we are doing"

Denial, through the course of history of love, has been under rated. A safe evasive measure to fool ourselves and the world.
I am too stubborn to end this facade.
"I don't care much for what you do." Yet,  your breath causes a tornado in my heart.
You, you have too much of ego to accept that perhaps what we can't define is  nothing but love. Perhaps, both of us will realise our undoing years from now. But right now, we chose to live in denial and cloak our actions and inactions.
Perhaps, we are nothing but two different genres juxtaposed in the same shelf. Yet, nothing soothes me more than the warmth of your embrace. Perhaps, we are the favorite song on repeat that we will get tired of listening. But right now, only you can calm the storm in my heart.
There is no turning back, we know. Only stopping. Perhaps, all at once; without any said goodbye.  Nothing to say, only to watch, as we leave each other with a baggage and a lifetime of commitment issues.
But there has always been something about the flicker in your ambers eyes. It probes me, urges me to take a plunge into this thing called 'love'. We know, this flicker will leave us with nothing but ashes.
"I want to be free. To float in the lightness of being." You take my hand in yours. We stare at the endless rise and fall of the ocean.
"I know. So do I." I squeeze your palms. You squeeze them back.
In the stillness of the night, we play dumb. But we know exactly what we are doing."
-Ayushee Ghoshal
#4AmConversationsPrompts
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A big Thank you to everyone who became a part of the first #4amconversationsprompts.
If ou love writing, you can join in and spread the love for words. All you have to do is write a piece on the title of this article and use the hashtag #4AmConversationsPrompts
Cheers.
#GiveAway


Cheers!  #Giveaway
#4AmConversations
 http://ayusheeghoshal.blogspot.in/2016/12/we-play-dumb-but-we-know-exactly-what.html

Dear One Night Stand: It's Okay. You don't have to love me

Dear One Night Stand, 

Before we begin, let me tell you, let us treat this the way it is. I forbid you to use your tricks. You don't have to use your cliched sentences to make me believe that I am any different from all the girls you have slept with. I am well aware of your nefarious intentions and I hope you are aware of mine.  I am to you what you are to me. A piece of meat.

I won't come back to you at the end of the day or text you during my work hours. There will be no sappy messages or 2 AM calls. I won't hold your hands while walking in a desserted park or in public. I won't  kiss you underneath the street lamp. You dont have to strew petals on the floor to lure me to your bedroom. You don't have to know my favorite band, poet or book. You don't get to know what makes my eyes twinkle. Hell, you don't get to know me at all and I hope you will be kind enough to reciprocate in this game of not falling in love. I would hate to have an unrequited not-love. 

I am sitting next to you as you crush the last seed of iriki gold. While rings of smoke rise in the air from the cigarette pressed between my teeth, my eyes meet yours. We know what will follow. As the night ascends, your fingers trace every corner of my body.

The temperature in your room is too cold for someone with a migraine. Your bed is far too comfortable for me. Wrapped in your well built arms, I miss the hard mattress of his iron bed. 

Before you ask me out for another date, before you tell me you are not available 'that way', let us just clarify this small thing. Let us treat this the way it is. 

It is okay. You don't have to love me. -Ayushee Ghoshal

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4 AM Conversations is my Poetry Debut and it will be releasing all over India in 2017. If you want to stay connected, do subscribe to my posts. 

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