Portfolio Guide

Portfolio

Hello, Hello! My stories collected below are themed around famous visionaries or poets from India. 

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"Let This Be The End..." 

Discover what happens when a dream propels an unlikely artsy creative-type to go off on a solitary journey...

Don't Kill Him!
This is the story of a pre-teen whose own father tries to kill him! In this dystopian future, does his father succeed?

Image information: 

Top: Circles In A Circle, by Wassily Kandinsky.

1st Story Image: Chilkoot's Trail from wikipedia

Second Story Image: "Sillhouette of Trees During Night" photo by Unsplash via Pexels. 

Don't Kill Him!

Sillhouette of Trees During Night
 by Unsplash via Pexels

Omar looked at the boy. His boy.

He had to shake that thought since he couldn't keep referring to him as his boy anymore. Not with the decision was forced to make. There would need to be action now, the community demanded that Kabir's life be ended.

The boy was watching television, the dim glow lighting up his face, and he was enjoying the show. Omar smiled softly at him. Life shouldn't have to be this complicated, should it? When did society come to this, that termination of a life was required simply because one thing about a person displeased a few in the community? It was like walking on egg-shells these days, careful not to offend anyone in any way: don't forget to smile while holding the door open for the neighbor lady, be sure to tip 35% or risk whispers you're dissenting from societal norms, mail out your Christmas cards the day after Thanksgiving, don't forget to include a picture of the smiling family, with the dog's lips cleverly pulled back into a smile also, careful to use fishing line to help the dog grin, a trick that everyone knew at this point, but must be conformed to regardless of the fact that everyone was in on the joke. Keeping up with the Joneses', isn't that what it was called back when Omar was a kid? Now it was a suffocating, stiff, inflexible lifestyle required by society in order to maintain your home within the city. He supposed he could become a hermit, living in the woods like those who refused to conform, but he wasn't outdoorsy enough for that. He and his boy... No Stop that Omar -- you must stop saying that... you and the boy would starve to death in the first few weeks if you could even track down water after the first few days. Sigh.

I've got to take him to the woods, I suppose, and leave him there. He'll probably die, but maybe not. At least I'm not killing him outright, thought Omar as he continued mulling over his options. The sacrificial lamb, the one that is required by the higher-ups to appease the masses. Kabir, his boy... no Omar, remember: the boy... had made a lot of people uncomfortable lately. Making people uncomfortable was no longer tolerated in today's society, and so finally the straw that had broken the camel's back had come: Kabir had sought out a guru. A guru. "We're Muslims!" thought Omar loudly, clicking his tongue without even realizing he was doing it, so that Kabir turned from the television to look at him. Omar gave an uneasy smile, then a small shrug, and Kabir turned back to watching his show.

The trouble had started because we are Muslims, in fact, continued Omar in his own thoughts. When we found Kabir inside of an abandoned home in our neighborhood, days after we had gotten back from our honeymoon, we couldn't believe it. Who would leave a helpless little child in here? Omar's wife Noha couldn't stand the thought, and so they took him home. People had accused them of hiding a premarital pregnancy, but they didn't care. Noha had been radiant on her wedding day, and anyone that said that she could have been eight months pregnant was lying to themselves! But still, people accused them of having a baby too soon after marriage. Although it certainly started everything, the real problem came when they took the child to the mosque to seek a name for him, as was custom. The local imam consulted the holy texts, and then distraught, said he would get back to the couple. That was strange. After their imam had consulted a few other imams, mild discontent began to spread throughout their community. The name the holy texts kept presenting was Kabir, a name of God. "We can't name this child such a sacred name of God, for a child to be called the Incomparably Great!" All of the imams together had told them. "Well, what are we supposed to name him? We're keeping him, so give us a name."  retorted Noha and Omar. Everyone grumbled, but obligingly, they had let them name him Kabir.

Now, however, Kabir was twelve, and seeking religious instruction. Except, he wasn't seeking instruction from the imams in the religious classes, no, he was following around a guru in the early morning hours, repeating after him, "Hari Ram, Hari Ram, Hari Ram." Ram was definitely not one of the names for the God of Islam. Worse, Kabir was writing songs, and encouraging people that the god of Hinduism and the god of Islam were all the same thing. This kid had practically torn a rift through the community the size of the Thar desert in Rajasthan.

Omar had loaded Kabir up into their family Subaru and told him he wanted to show him a bit of nature's beauty: the moon was supposed to be really big tonight. They got to a secluded spot, parked the car, and walked a little ways into the forest. Kabir had complete trust in Omar, for Omar was his father who had raised him, and now no fear whatsoever was resonating through him. Omar told him to sit down, and wait, and then Omar began to walk away. But as he turned, essentially sacrificing his only son, his oldest, his cell phone began to ring. Bizarrre, there shouldn't be any reception out here.... Kabir cocked his head sideways, thinking the same thought as Omar. How is this possible? Omar answered the phone, out of habit, worried it was a work call. "Kabir is a child of God, and he is destined for greatness! Return with him to your home, continue to raise him as your own and all will be well for you and your family!" boomed the voice through the phone. Omar laughed at the voice, shocked at what he had just heard, but it confirmed his deep-seated belief that disrupting the current status quo of societal rigidity couldn't actually harm them too much, could it? No, he'd let Kabir rock the boat and see what would come. Omar would protect him, if he could. He told Kabir to get up, look at the moon, and then they calmly walked back to the car together.

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Author's Note: Kabir was an Indian mystic, poet and saint who lived around 1400 AD (speculations place him around 14th-15th Century). One of legends surrounding Kabir sugges that he was discovered as a child abandoned near a body of water by a couple that was returning home from their honeymoon (some say he was born of a lotus leaf). The couple risked a ruined reputation, knowing people would think they had conceived before marriage, but they didn't care: here was a perfect little child, abandoned and left to die, so they decided to raise him as their own, in the Muslim faith. The story about his name coming from the holy texts was controversial because it was one of the names of God from Islam: Immeasurably Great. The story suggests that this is an unacceptable name for a child, perhaps because he was 'born' into this middle-caste family. Kabir was renowned for seeking out a Hindu Guru (which is another legend that historians have doubts about), Swami Ramananda in Varanasi, and composing songs and poems urging his followers to follow God, which was the same God, whether you found him through Hinduism, Islam, Sikhism or any other form of religion. Some critics say that he encouraged his followers to abandon traditional religion and seek only the path of righteousness.


I was intrigued that he was found near a body of water, almost in a nest of reeds -- this seemed strikingly similar to the Christian imagery about Moses. However, Moses (Musa) is the most frequently mentioned character in the Koran, and the stories do overlap between the two religions, so it's interesting that a more 'modern day' figure like Kabir would have a similar personal history likened to that of an Old Testament figure. Moses, like Kabir, is destined by God to become great. This also reminds me that Abraham is asked to sacrifice his first born son, Isaac, to God, as a test of his faith. Kabir's father was going to sacrifice Kabir, leaving him in the forest to die, when a voice "came out of the wilderness" telling him that Kabir was a child of god, and he was destined for greatness. Kabir's father decided to keep him and continued to raise Kabir, who did become a prolific religious teacher and leader through his holy songs, poems and bhajans. I wanted to modernize the tale, and hoped that I was able to do so, while still retaining some of the more mysterious historical events of Kabir's childhood.

Kabir, memorialized on an Indian Postage Stamp, 1952
Image from Wikipedia

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More Info on Kabir 

• Kabir was famous for writing Kabir's Bijak, and Rabindranath Tagore of the 21st century translated 100 Poems of Kabir into English, which was published in 1915.
• My Reading Notes from the Amar Chitra Katha comic book about Kabir from the Visionary Series can be found here. The Volume on Kabir is vol # 623, and can be checked out from The Bizzel Library on OU's campus.
• A brief overview of Kabir's life can be found on Wikipedia.

Story: Let this be the end.....

Barefoot

Soordas' fame was growing. He was gathering moderately large crowds around him now, and he had even been given an ektara (stringed instrument) to help create music for Lord Krishna. The crowds swelled when he began his morning songs for the day, sometimes even beginning to form before he was ready to start the day's Bhajans, or holy songs, that he crafted lovingly as the words and stanzas that formed into harmonious melodies drifted out of his mouth. He had taken to this artistic lifestyle quickly and easily, as if nothing else in the world was arranged so perfectly for him.

Today, though, the crowds who came to watch and sometimes participate in his artistry would be a problem. It was time to move. The dream had been clear: Lord Krishna was instructing him to go away from his camp and onto the untrodden paths. He had taken refuge and commenced his daily work under this tree, far away from his family home, for long enough. He had acquired moderate fame for his devotion to Lord Krishna, that he displayed twice daily when he poetically crafted and sang his holy songs. The fame was not what Soordas sought, however. He had two aims: to sing the most beautiful song to Krishna that Krishna had ever heard, and to be granted an audience with Krishna. And last night, finally and unusually, Krishna came to him in a clear, bright, and was he remembering correctly.... damp dream? He couldn't shake that feeling of sogginess that overwhelmed him in the dream.

He readied himself to move, rising from his sleep in the third watch of the night, alongside the morning birds who began their earliest callings. He gathered his two belongings, his one copper bowl that he used for drinking, eating, and bathing with, and his ektara, his instrument that helped him sing his devotion. He rose, and slowly, slowly, began to make his way out and away from the tree. Back straight, head up, feet shuffling, he started out to find the path where no one else would be. 

After stubbing his toes quite a few times, many scrapes on his arms from low-hanging and wayward branches, and a few days' worth of accumulated sunburn, Soordas had finally made his way into a forest. He felt a path beneath his feet and the cool shade of the trees had been a welcome relief. After two days journeying into the forest, he could feel himself getting parched. The Krishna devotees had not discovered him yet, to his satisfaction, but he missed them now, as usually he could ask them for a bowl of water to quench his thirst. No help would find him here, in this lonely and deserted forest. He had been careful to sing very quietly as he walked, so that no villagers working in the fields would hear his songs and abandon their work to join him in praise of Lord Krishna. No, he had managed to solitarily escape away from humanity, with their distractions, and awkward noises, and questions, and gasps when a particular line of a song was too beautiful. Despite the hunger and the thirst, Soordas was glad, for he could focus on his adorations to Krishna without any hindrances in his way. 

He shuffled forward, contemplating the dream Krishna had granted him, confident that he would find his Lord soon enough. The dream had been vivid, bright, and full of light. Perhaps he would find the location on the other side of this dark, heavily shaded forest. Suddenly, he stubbed his toe... no, his whole foot! He had jammed his whole right foot into something very hard, vertical, and quite stone-like. Soordas lurched forward, his momentum thrown off. He had expected to find the ground soon enough, his hands outstretched before him, but instead, he kept tumbling, tumbling, tumbling down.... splash! The blind bard had managed to fall right into the depths of the well, the fool! Alone, in a deserted forest with no passersby to hear him, he would surely die in here. The blindness he had been born with would be the very thing that brought him directly to the end of his life, what a disgrace, he thought. After everything he had overcome despite this failure his physical form brought him, alas, his lack of sight would be the ultimate failure to him. It would bring him death before he could meet his Lord Krishna. The dream had been clear: Krishna would come to him in a bright place, not in the darkness. 

So he began to sing, welcoming Krishna to take him to his next life as speedily as Krishna could. If not Krishna, then Yama. Let the god of death bring him a swift end, for he did not want to contemplate how long he might be in this dreadful well. No, it was better to focus his last devotional songs on Krishna, thought Soordas. At least he might attain one of his life's aims, to sing the most beautiful song to Krishna that Krishna had ever heard. And so he sang, and he sang, and he sang. Day and night and day and night and day and night for seven long days, wondering when his body would fail him and he could pass from this life onto the next. But this was not to be Soordas' end...

~

Author's Note: Soordas was a blind bard who achieved lots of fame in India, as an almost saint-like figure, for crafting holy songs to Lord Krishna in the 15th Century. His name means "Servant of the Melody" or "Slave of Song," and he is said to have written a hundred thousand songs of devotion. Especially famous is his magnum opus, the 'Sur Sagar' or 'Ocean of Melody.'  His devotion to Krishna was renowned particularly because he was blind. A few miracles surround the story of his life, one of which was only briefly mentioned in the Amar Chitra Katha comic book Soordas: The Blind Bard where I read about him. He fell into a well, early in his career of devotional singing to Krishna, and a week later Krishna rescued him out of the well. He continued singing and creating his devotional songs, seeking to again find Krishna any way that he could. I wanted to surprise the reader with the fact that Soordas was actually blind, so I tried to keep it hidden while highlighting other sensory inputs throughout the story. I also found it interesting that Krishna implored him to move away from the safety of where he had set up camp under a tree and to go seek him in untrodden areas... Wouldn't that be difficult for a blind person all alone without any aide? I attempted to allude to that question with my story as well. 

The Reading Notes I created for this ACK (volume 613) on Soordas can be found here.