travel, son,

ever so often,

from the dullness of your mind

onto the heartbeat of an Enfield.

or take your curious two legs on

a trip to bustling, sweaty cities

foolishy analyzing everything.

a widening of the eyes, almost.

and invariably the horizon.

travel, son,

to question, like little children do,

the placement of signboards,

the robustness of public transport systems,

the awe-inspiring driving abilities.

and when you meet a friend - 

find a word for that city, the defining word.

I chose survive for Bombay, and inheritance for Delhi.

an inheritance of history, power and wealth.

nothing seems earnt, not even sweat.

Bombay, needs no explain.

It earns a more fulfilling bread.

travel, son,

so that you may ask life's more distant questions.

to look more closely at money and its many hues.

the business owner's idea of it,

the autowala's, that fresh-out-of-college employee's,

and all the other people you dine with, travel with and stay over at,

and how they echo with your own understanding of it.

ask about God or god, depending on what you believe.

see how a selfish faith in Him gives such immense confidence to our populace.

and yet, not strangely, His watching over leaves most of us in abject poverty.

travel, son,

to know that life is not a recipe found in self-help books,

nor lived out of a successful man's formula,

but through our own understanding of it.

out of our own ambitions, limitations, relationships and values.

and our desire to unearth more out of us and life itself.

travel, son, 

to connect and feel

the collective heart of a fallible race of men and women

that has ebbed and troughed for thousands of years.

to make peace with your scattered self,

to know that loneliness is okay,

that friends are beautiful,

love is meaningful,

wealth is important,

family is happiness,

work is worship,

and yet,

in the end,

it is all quite pointless.