The Girl and the Gun

She has one gun and a collection of knives.
She likes to call the guys for dinner at home.
She does not like loneliness so she has friends always around her.
And let me tell you, she hates all of them. She is an artist.
But she hates to be called an artist. She has got a camera.
All her works of art come through that camera.
Every other moment, when a client hangs up the phone after asking the price of a particular work, she runs to the washroom and vomit.
She comes back and writes a tag line at her chat mail id..Bleurgh…
She likes that sound, the sound that originates somewhere
Down in the pits of her stomach, finds its way up through
The Alimentary canal and meets its friend at the washroom.
And she wants her nausea to be conveyed to her friends
Who are hooked up to the chat lines. She hates them. Seriously.
She hates phone calls. But look, it is her job to attend phone calls
And answer each query politely.
She is happy that they are not asking about the price of her works.
She cherishes this secret happiness that none knows about her works
For all her works are photographs just casually saved in her laptop.
All the photographs have those blurred images of guys running.
Either they are running away from her gun
Or running away with her gun.
She wields gun in one hand and camera in another.
She at times feels that she should have one more hand, extendable
So that she could catch hold of these guys with the third hand
Make them shit into their pants in fright and click them steady.
Every morning, when she comes back to her desk
In a decent gallery located at the middle of the city
She takes a resolution that it is her last day at work.
But she longingly wait for the night to come so that
She could scare the guys with her guns.
Sometimes she wants to invite those faceless sounds
That come through the telephones during the day.
“Do come for dinner at my home, ah, by the way
Bring your mouths also, you may need to scream.”
But she has not called any one so far.
She is haunted by her regular boring friends
Who, after a few drinks try to cosy up with her.
She waits for that moment so that she can take out her gun and camera.
Now she has that many works with her
For any gallery can do a solo show of her works.
But she just does not care. She says it is better to scare people
Back at home, at night and into the moonlight, than to have a solo show.
One day, this funny guy snatched her gun away
She did click his photograph, running away with her gun.
But next day he reached office with three slashes on his face.
That was the day, she realized that she could work
Not only with the images of those running guys.
But also with their blood, right on the canvas.
I am sure, she will be ready to have her painting solo soon.


(Image courtesy; Phalguni Desai)