The Musician

A room littered with packets of snacks and chunks of bread, tables stained with jam fingerprints and books and clothes spread all around. On the edge of a worn and feeble folding-bed sits a long haired young boy, swaying his head with his eyes closed and fingers dancing on the strings of a guitar. His feet tap a steel plate, that has remains of the last served meal. It though seems offensive but the pats match the echos of the strings and he creates an aura of melody in his den.

I close the door behind me, he remains undisturbed by the slap of the closing door and picks up a higher note. His fingers start moving furiously and his hair fly in sticky tufts as he sways his head all around. The pating becomes aggressive and food chunks fly out of the plate, landing and sticking on his shoes.

After around a minute he slowly opens his eyes, like dark rain clouds revealing the hiding sun and his gaze halts at me. He stares at me in a blank gaze and closes his eyes again. Now he picks up a different note and starts humming a sweet tone. His beak on the throat shifts as he pauses in between for a breath and his nostrils puff and contract as he takes the many pauses. He claps his tongue on his palate and whistles in tune with the guitar. He opens his eyes again, sees me standing before him, transfixed to his musical charms, and smiles faintly with an almost unnoticeable curve of the lips, and then he closes them again and continue to whistle and hum.

I wonder what kind of an unpleasant host is he, unbothered and unmannered, but the calmness on his forhead speaks of the peace of his mind. His tranquil state reflects on the many curves and frowns on his face that happen and dissolve a dozen times in a minute. Each line that he begins, seems to be pulled out from the depths of his stomach. There emerges a visible net of nerves on his throat, alike when you summon up all your strength to lift up a heavy box with your teeth crushed in heavy compressive strength.

He suddenly stands and begins to roar another song, anyone would lable that as a fit or mental disorder. He beats his feet on the floor and kicks an empty jar, his hands filled with energy, his head bouncing as if in great pain or discomfort, and his hair spread all over his face like a weeping widow. He climbs his bed with his shoes on and jumps down, landing on the ceramic plate that breaks into many pieces, the food spreads all around and triangular ceramic pieces scatter amidst the littered compound.

I watch him with more attention, his eyes shut even tighter now, and with each passing secound his energy rises to a newer height. He speaks and sings and shouts, he taps, and thumps and kicks. He jumps and kneels and dances in madness. He runs around the room and climbs the bed, leaps to the desk and beats the almirah.

Then in another second he dashes out of the door, and the room turns into mourning silence, that seems to bite. I wait for him to return as the sound fades in the distance.

I keep waiting, but he is gone.

Gone with the wind, gone with his flying music. Like the notes of his lyrics that faint after each utterance, he also faints away in the distance.