Lear in the river

It is that time of the year again when the rains desert Delhi and you can sense the stirring of the autumnal month, and autumn stirs like an invisible apparition, a phantom presence by the roads - you drive alone and quiet, down the dusty highway to Delhi at sundown, and suddenly you realise that the wind has changed its touch on the trees, a mere caress, a nudge is scattering bagfulls of leaves, cracked like palms, in the dust, against the windshield.

You drive on and suddenly you realise that you are looking into the future as if you were looking into the past. That you are smiling as if at someone else.

The grasses are greying in patches in the river, on the banks. In october they will look like white fire. The beard of King Lear.

"Nothing will come of nothing: speak again."

Doppleganger

It's been a recurrent dream. And while the settings vary, the central theme remains the same. The boy with curly hair in jeans and T, holding a large pile of red books. It happens in London once, once in Delhi I think and once somewhere that could be anywhere. It is followed by earthquakes and mass destruction, but he is there and I can't figure out who he is.

I am told it could be my way of recreating my old friend John.

I am not so sure because John figured in two of those dreams with us.

I suspect it is my Doppleganger.

And something, somewhere has set him free. if only, he'd step out of the dream. It's the creatures who hover in dreams that are more dangerous than the creatures who inhabit the day.