Together

‘Sirat’, A कारवाँ

Observation

**Eroding beautifully.**
[Source – Pixabay]

Quiet and meditative energy of the whole world appears to erode everything here for it is a rocky desert region, and that golden sun and that bright moon drop shadows, following every soul as if to engulf it.

But that which is eroding is full of life and not static. It moves in all directions, in exuberance, this energy does, swallowing whatever comes in between.

Nothing is lost here and nothing is found, everything stays right in front of your eyes and you take in as much as you can.

A कारवाँ (a caravan of people travelling together) moves through such a land and is caught unawares in this directionless, seamless bigger movement. They stay in shock until they learn to tune themselves to what is unfolding.

What is unfolding is too simple to be seen in a rush, it is a drama that is acting upon itself. Its movements are beautiful, in stillness it rises and flowing it colours us all, sooner or later.

The कारवाँ sees its beauty, at times terrified by its brutal suddenness, unable to see its care in a rush. They finally become one with the quiet and meditative energy of the whole world, the whole universe that appear to be eroding everything here.

***Sirāt*** is a 2025 drama road film directed by Óliver Laxe and co-written by Santiago Fillol and Laxe. It follows a father in search of his missing daughter along with his son and a group of ravers in the deserts of southern Morocco. – Wikipedia [Image source – whentostream.com]

Check out Sirat’s trailer here –

FLOW, Let Us…

Posted on April 27, 2025 by Jagriti Rumi Animals Animation Feature Film Cat Cinema Flow Journey Miracle Post Apocalyptic The Beauty The City The Jungle Together Us All

Coverage

Check out the trailer before you go ahead.

Together it rises and together it falls, together it sees and together it takes us all.

Some lives afloat, literally, on a boat, do nothing much but are going with the flow. They rowed and roamed, the city and the jungle – thin line dividing the both not visible anymore.

The city now as quiet as the jungle, though decidedly more dead for it died stiff and in its rigidity that always glowed in its want to devour more and more and more.

But that it was made to go with the flow, it has long shed the many well-measured ideas of victory and defeat and has accepted with open eyes what it saw, what it is seeing now.

The jungle – quiet and alive – broke and fell and bowed to the Flow, peeking with wet eyes the beauty, the beauty of the Flow that the sun and the moon stopped to witness, that the winds tried to match, that the rain tried to touch – the beauty that came in the jungle’s share.

Some lives afloat, at times on a boat, at times moving in the wet jungle, did not try to stubbornly know the meaning of it all, deep breaths they took and flowed.

Not waiting and hoping for a miracle rather living it.

Source – Wikipedia
Source – Wikipedia
Source – IMDB

Flow is a 2024 dialogue-free animation film, written and produced by Latvian filmmakers Gints Zilbalodis and Matiss Kaza, directed by Gints Zilbalodis. It is the story of a cat and the animals it meets in a post-apocalyptic world where they all try to survive, facing the extreme and sudden rise and fall in the water levels around them.

Read more about this fantastic film that used a free and open-source animation software (Blender), that didn’t use any storyboards, has no deleted scenes and that used real voices of the animals.

Flow also won the Best Animated Feature award at the 97^th Academy Awards and also won the Golden Globe Award for Best Animated Feature Film.

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Let’s Take The Final Curtain Call Together

Posted on December 25, 2022 by Jagriti Rumi Animals Blushing Brightly Colour Curtain Call Dancing Darkness Death Heart Jamming Freely Joyous Life Lovely Music Rain Rainbow Sky The Moon The Sun Together Tree

Flash Fiction

**A lovely dancing tree.**
**[Source – Pixabay]**

Standing next to the giant old tree, its static presence made Saami sombre, more and more.

He cried, “Saami is now one with the rigid, rough and-and dead, yes, dead and gruesome tree bark, Saami has turned into this tree bark… O, but why?”

Resting against the tree now, now hugging the tree and mumbling, Saami stared into nothingness blankly, quietly. He opened his fist – a flint stone chip, equally dead he thought – and started ripping off the bark once again.

“Saami sees it all, Saami knows the limits, Saami’s dungeon is different from theirs, but… it’s all the same”, he announced in pain.

**Sombre Saami’s imagination.**
**[Source – Pixabay]**

The twittering yellow bird, the prancing butterflies, a distant lullaby, the pesky kung-fu crickets’ funny civil war and the red flowers’ bold stance, Saami turned a blind eye to it all.

Even the crickets stopped their civil war to enjoy the rain and the rainbow that day, but not Saami.

“Fools! Saami knows the pattern, Saami knows hope and destiny are always stuck in a traffic jam, and love…”, said Saami two hours ago.

“Love… love coloured Saami’s world black… black is the absence of all colours… black reflects no light… Saami lives in darkness”, he completed the sentence just when the fireflies lit the jungle.

Some rested on his head and hands, but Saami refused to greet them.

With a dry look, sullen eyes and tired limbs, Saami spoke for the last time, “dead, static tallness, this soulless tree bark hates Saami, this is the death penalty, and the most terrible because Saami is not tied, Saami can move, Saami knows, but not anymore, for Saami has become one with this giant numb stubborn treeeeeeeeeeeeeeee…”

Saami spoke for the last time because the lovely, joyous and calm tree’s branch took hold of Saami’s tired body and pulled him up-up-up… in a gushing blast of speed, suddenly music broke Saami’s heart-heart-heart… ta-rum-pup-pup-paa came the sound and immediately replaced it with a musical hub-dub sensation of a heart.

**The lead singer-cum-dancer-cum-poser.**
**[Image by Roy N from Pixabay]**

From the top-most branch of the tall lovely tree, Saami could see melodic colours and no darkness, nothing was static for the entire jungle and the river and the wind and the sky and the stars and the moon and the sun (together) danced to the twee peppy tune – and equally soothing, thought Saami – that the animal orchestra was playing.

Every animal – jamming freely – sitting on the top of some tree just like Saami… Saami who started clapping, swaying along and tip-tap-toeing in the air.

The tall lovely tree finally spoke, “Saami, yoi-knowi-da-cosmic-i-dance-sO-‘ell”; Saami was seen blushing brightly before the curtain was drawn.

**Cosmic-i-dance!**
**[Source – Pixabay]**

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Together We Enjoy Enjaami

Posted on August 7, 2021 by Jagriti Rumi Earth Enjoy Enjaami Festivities Flowers Folk Tales And Songs Grandmas Land Life Migrants Music Nature Old Voices Sing Storyteller Tamil Language Together

Prose Poem

Kindly listen to the track before you start reading.

Unabashedly bold and free, vivacious and ebullient, adamant like the silent stone, transforming every micro-second, Nature rules… and the ones living close to it celebrate and sing, enjaaee enjaami…

Flowers shining bright, the rich yellow, orange, mahogany, red and white, the bugs, caterpillars and flies, the upside-down dancing struggling beetles, the sun-soaked green leaves, together – even when captured in a glorious painting – sing enjaaee enjaami…

**Rich yellow… shining bright.**
**[Image by AdelinaZw from Pixabay]**

Whose is this land, this divided piece, this circled boundary, that 12 acres, that mango orchid, that dry-wet soil, that cool-cool well, that fragrance casting spell… certainly it doesn’t belong to the ones who toil round-the-clock and sing, enjaaee enjaami…

Festivities when unearthed by bare hands, the swaying harvest and booming lives of the lords, shacky mud-roofed huts full of laughs and cries… all sing enjaaee enjaami…

Grandmas and old voices together have knitted the folktales, passing it with pickles and homemade sweets, carrying it closer than a life lesson, breathing it day and night, walking and singing enjaaee enjaami…

Like a tree, like a giant tree, full of flowers, then fruits and seeds, then sweat and blood, patiently bowing, accepting it all… walks an old bent figure, bare feet, singing enjaaee enjaami…

**Turn around, don’t flee…**
**[Image by Couleur from Pixabay]**

Jackals, parrots, elephants, reptiles, dogs, cats, butterflies… give their share back, turn around, don’t flee… those sitting on margins know Noah and the King, then who will ultimately sink? I sing enjaaee enjaami…

The fiery soul that burns itself, weeding the flower bed and burning the dead, it runs the life, it spins the earth, decorating the darkness, breathing lightly it sings enjaaee enjaami…

So how can you forget, threaten, betray, walk astray…? Come, not in repentance but acceptance for then your blinded eyes will see the majestic drama, lament if you must, cry and shed it before you sing enjaaee enjaamee…

So listen, listen to the storyteller, the old voice-heart beats well, this beat matches your beat and look, your mind watches you sing enjaaee enjaami…

Enjoy/ Enjaaee (my dear mother/ dear lady) Enjaami (my feudal lord, master) Vango Vango Onnagi (come together to reap the bounty of nature).

This wonderfully powerful Tamil song is sung by Dhee and rapper Arivu (who has also written it); the song revolves around Tamil migrants (and labourers and all our ancestors) who toiled on lands but always remained landless and suffered due to poverty; the song emphasises on how the earth, the nature is for all living beings and not for the wealthy class/ caste.

This thought-provoking, globally popular number, asks us blatantly to check if we are hurrying in the right direction.

Decode Enjoy Enjaami, read these articles –

What Arivu’s Enjoy Enjaami Tells Us About the Cultural Resistance to Caste

Enjoy Enjaami a tribute to Tamil plantation labour

Enjoy Enjaami – A welcome start, say Sri Lanka’s Malaiyaha Tamils

Enjoy Enjaami: Deconstructing the Politics Behind Arivu and Dhee’s Latest

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Friend Anything For You Except The Green Umbrella

Posted on August 7, 2016 by Jagriti Rumi Fog Laughing My Friend Rain Raincoat Spooky Umbrella Walk Ahead Together

Flash Fiction

**My funky umbrella that I forgot in a bus and so I had to buy a silly raincoat.**
**[Source – Pixabay]**

It’s a foggy day and I am walking to somewhere all alone, carrying a green umbrella pendulum-like. Rain shower won’t stop me. The blinding whiteness won’t scare me. I check my watch, it assures me time is good.

Hearing footsteps following me, I try to hasten, only then I realise it is no one, but me. These gumboots I tell you. It is all very funny, but still I cannot take a chance to laugh aloud.

Never knew the fog could trick. The fresh green plants and giant trees that till now looked painting-like, now seem spooky.

Suddenly I hear fresh footsteps running from a direction towards me. Numbly I tell myself don’t move, still I turn and find someone in a funny raincoat running towards me.

Then a voice, “Smarty pants, give me back my umbrella, don’t want this silly raincoat of yours’. It is my friend Marcia. I smile and say, “But you look good in it.”

We fight and then laughing aloud walk ahead together.

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Lost And Found

Posted on September 28, 2013 by Jagriti Rumi Decision Fearless Letter Mind She Strong Together

Flash Fiction

**Together… fearless and strong!**
[Image by Céline Martin from Pixabay]

She had decided to leave and her bag was packed. Sitting on her bed she was just getting herself together to face her decision. She took a few deep breaths.

Her mind told her that she was doing the right thing and she appreciated it. But then it contradicted immediately and said loud and clear to her, ‘the road is tough and you are not.’

More thoughts flooded her mind – it isn’t what others normally do…who will take care of grandma…and a recurrent thought of failing.

In fact, her mind guaranteed it that she would ultimately, definitely fail.

She got up and moved towards the window. She saw little kids playing outside, happily and ignorantly.

Images of destruction, people crying for help, and dead bodies lying everywhere shook her once again.

The news channels always make it easy to remember the gross truth without presenting an actual practical answer, though options of ‘SMSing’ and voting are abundant.

She returned and said something to herself. Then she turned to see the mirror and said loudly, ‘I am doing the right thing…I can’t just sit and talk…I can’t…this is right…I know it.’ She took her bag and left her room.

Her grandma knew about her plan and though she had asked her to abandon it, at that moment she warmly hugged her granddaughter and said, ‘I am proud of you…God be with you.’ She kissed her grandma and left the house in a spirit to be the change.

She reached the camp with difficulty. Bad weather and landslides made it almost impossible.

All the people on the way kept telling her that she must not go. An elderly man even scolded her and asked her if she was trying to be daring or cool or trying to prove something to her friends.

He thought it was a joke for a young girl like her. She didn’t reply to him, she knew the man was hurt and maybe had lost someone in the disaster. She kept quiet and walked ahead.

After almost three weeks of no information, her grandma received a letter.

Grandma,

We are working very hard here, all as one, and I know your blessings are with me. I don’t cry, for we together. Fearless and strong. We are together in this Grandma.

When I return home, you’ll also have a younger granddaughter to welcome. Her name is Sheena. She is my baby sister.

Much love!

Sofia

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