Rantings of a freelance writer for tv. Started in a fit of unemployment-induced itchy fingers. All posts are the sole intellectual property of Purnima Rao. (c) Aquatic Static 2026. All rights reserved.
I'm being hired for cheap by film producers and screenwriters who need to make bring more depth to their women characters. Inevitably, this means writing romance.
How to write heterosexual romance between intelligent women and....men?
So I've decided to diversify into science fiction.
She of Nature and He of Art - it’s inevitable that they collide.
Nature is wild and generous beyond boundaries.
Art is selfish, yet without guile or malice.
Nature seems unbreakable, but when she breaks it's loud and unforgiving.
Art takes everything from Nature, but when he gives back, it's redemptive; elevating the physical to metaphysical on this mortal stage.
She of Nature and He of Art - it’s inevitable that they create life together.
And where there is life, there is its end.
In Hamnet, the end is so crippling, it threatens to destroy both Nature and Art. But they sustain, because the thread that connects them never severs, despite the storm.
Chloe Zhao and Maggie O’ Farrell navigate the storm with such intuitive deftness it feels as if all of the world's philosophies are moving through them. The film is soft and deep, nurturing grief as it takes root in every character - in Agnes, Will, his mother and the children. It makes you stay in moments so stretched - so real - it's as if time has come undone then rewoven itself to give breaking hearts all the room in the world to crumble, then reassemble.
The first time I watched Hamnet, I couldn’t drag myself away from Jessie Buckley’s Agnes. But the second time, I saw Will’s ache, his battle with himself and finally, the non-negotiable surrender to art; a pull for which Agnes expands space. How unfair, then, that her own primal need to return to the forest is never honoured. But Art sees all.
Will's atonement? Pressing the full might of his art into rescuing Agnes from drowning. His Hamlet laid at her feet, love’s ultimate offering, so that she can bid goodbye to her son by witnessing, through the play, that grief isn't the only thing death brings, it's also freedom.
In the end, both Art and Nature work together to restore Agnes’ knowing back to her, back home where it belongs. If that won't split you open in a cinema hall full of strangers weeping with you, nothing will.
There's this stupid certainty that returning to my creative self at age (almost) 47, having burned pretty much all my media/art bridges 5 years ago, with no light in sight, is the wisest way to use my life from here on out. I could be out on my arse financially, I could become homeless (pretty soon actually) but there's this stupid certainty that it's where I need to head.
Because there was this silly little show, maybe you've heard of it, that managed to push through the grey, rubble-laden, packed-stiff-dry-earth of 'Netflix-&-chill' teevee to become this massive moment in popular culture globally...Yeah that little show. Boy, it showed us something.
This is the return of the artist, climbing over debris left by 'content-creators', seeing but not agreeing that audiences are 'consumers' or that art is meant only to confirm the darkness we find ourselves in as the human race. Art can build whatever world it chooses to, and in doing so, give us possibilities of whichever world we want to live in.
This little show has given us a world which leads with kindness, where conflicts resolve not just with bravado and wits, but with empathy. It doesn't pretend evil doesn't exist, but neither does it treat us like defeatists, exhausted from living these dystopian lives. It takes all that and then gives us a story where compassion becomes the air we breathe in and, more importantly, breathe out.
Whether I define myself as an 'artist', or not, is irrelevant. We're all artists if we lead with authenticity and I guess the only question is: are we -am I- doing that? What is my voice in this world? Is it what a client or a channel or a boss or a 'market' or a political party tells me it is? If it's not, then what it is? If I were to make a silly little show, what would I lead with? Would I have courage if everyone around me said it wouldn't 'work'?
Jacob Tierney seems to have done whatever the fuck he wanted to do (I simplify, I'm sure it was more complicated than that). He has built an almost unbelievable premise, where the worst of humankind never really takes over and the plot twist is: love. How fucking audacious for these times. How fucking radical.
In doing so, he's given the artist in me strength to lead with whatever I want to lead with. My only job now is to go deep and excavate.
There, my blessing with thee. And these few precepts in thy memory Look thou character. Give thy thoughts no tongue, Nor any unproportioned thought his act. Be thou familiar but by no means vulgar. Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried, Grapple them unto thy soul with hoops of steel, But do not dull thy palm with entertainment Of each new-hatched, unfledged comrade. Beware Of entrance to a quarrel, but being in, Bear ’t that th’ opposèd may beware of thee. Give every man thy ear but few thy voice. Take each man’s censure but reserve thy judgment. Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy, But not expressed in fancy—rich, not gaudy, For the apparel oft proclaims the man, And they in France of the best rank and station Are of a most select and generous chief in that. Neither a borrower nor a lender be, For loan oft loses both itself and friend, And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry. This above all: to thine own self be true, And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man. Farewell. My blessing season this in thee.
My parents didn't know how to care for a baby born, technically, in the European spring, and I got bluer & bluer until a nurse saw me and took measures to warm me up again.
This is an oft-repeated story in my house. My mother tells it like a funny story about fresh-off-the-boat tropical natives in a cold & grey land. As a child listening, I remember feeling special every time it was told. It was one of the few times my mother would talk about me as an individual human being, not as a thing she had to feed, clothe and keep alive.
In this story is the absence of my father. He doesn't feature in it. Nor did he ever, as far as I can recall, ever tell it.
But as a woman inching towards her 46th year on this planet, I now realise that this is a story about my almost not existing. And I think that's how I have lived my whole life.
I've tried to exist as little as possible. I've tried always to get out of the way, make the path clear by removing the obstacle that is me. I've been exhausted down to my bones trying to justify being here - by always being useful, by being of service, by anticipating & needing all needs. Most recently, in a very dark moment, I coolly & calmly considered not being here anymore. Of matching the insides with my outsides and just...exiting.
Yeah, so these are my two states of being-here: Being of service or not being here at all.
Now I think that if, as a newborn, I almost died and made it back, it must be for a reason. It's too much effort to revive a dying thing, if one sees no purpose to it, right?
So let's start with that. 2025 - the year of being here.
C'mon ChatGPT, critique this shite: What does the poem have to say about patriarchy?
The poem critiques patriarchy subtly but powerfully, exploring its impact through both destructive and transformative lenses. Here's an analysis of its commentary on patriarchy:
Patriarchy as a Source of Harm
The first stanza suggests a male figure who "hurt you," symbolizing the harm perpetuated by a patriarchal system. The emphasis on actions like "break his legs" and "destroy his reputation" reflects the violent reckoning some may fantasize about in response to systemic oppression or personal betrayal by men within that system.
The hyperbolic nature of this vengeance ("dismember him") highlights the depth of pain caused by patriarchal harm, suggesting how deeply ingrained systems of male dominance can fracture relationships, emotions, and lives.
Subverting Patriarchy Through Feminine Solidarity
The poem shifts focus in the second stanza to a collaborative and creative vision: "Find you a girl willing" implies solidarity between women, which is often a counterforce to patriarchal norms that encourage competition and isolation among them.
Together, these women "raise children not of your blood" and "grow things no man could conceive." This imagery rejects traditional patriarchal definitions of legacy (through biological offspring or material achievement) and instead embraces creation on their own terms—things born of choice, care, and mutual empowerment rather than dominance.
Reclaiming Power Outside Patriarchal Constructs
The final line, "pleasure / At no one's expense," is a direct rejection of patriarchal norms that often frame success, power, and pleasure as zero-sum games. Instead, the poem envisions a world where fulfillment is cooperative and equitable, not built on exploitation or harm.
Overall Commentary
The poem critiques patriarchy by contrasting its destructive tendencies with the potential for an alternative mode of existence based on solidarity, creativity, and non-exploitation. It suggests that while patriarchal systems inflict deep wounds, there is a possibility for healing and creation outside of its confines—offering a vision of empowerment that does not perpetuate cycles of harm.
Critique of my poem by ChatGPT (the fucking free version)
This poem is poignant and reflective, with a strong meditation on memory, impermanence, and the modern abundance of photographs that alter how we process life and loss. Below is a critique that focuses on its strengths and areas for potential enhancement:
Strengths:
Theme: The central theme of memory's role in life and how photographs disrupt the natural forgetting process is beautifully original and thought-provoking. It makes the reader consider the paradox of preserving versus living.
Imagery: The poem uses evocative images, such as "a dog darting in front of a car" and "a necklace of last days," which are vivid and elicit strong emotional responses.
Tone and Mood: The poem captures a contemplative and almost mournful tone, which suits its theme well. The pacing and phrasing invite the reader to pause and reflect.
Structure: The lack of rigid form complements the poem's meditative nature, giving it an organic flow that mirrors the unpredictable process of remembering and forgetting.
Philosophical Depth: Lines like "It was meant to be a forgetting, this existence" and "How would we say goodbye / And live" carry a philosophical weight, prompting the reader to ponder life's ephemerality.
Areas for Improvement:
Clarification of Ideas: While the poem is richly layered, some lines might benefit from slight refinement for clarity. For example, "Or prophecy" feels abrupt and could use more contextual grounding to tie it firmly to the surrounding imagery.
Consistency in Metaphor: While the metaphor of the "necklace of last days" is striking, it contrasts sharply with the digital, modern image of "invading screens." You might consider weaving a more cohesive thread between the natural and technological elements.
Pacing: The line breaks and punctuation sometimes feel uneven. For instance, the abruptness in "Hers / Ours, not as ugly as we thought at 25" creates a slight jarring effect that might distract from the poem's reflective flow.
Title Connection: The title, while intriguing, could be slightly more evocative or better tied to the central tension of the poem. For instance, referencing memory or forgetting directly might make it more impactful.
Resolution: The closing lines ("How would we say goodbye / And live") are strong but could be expanded slightly to deepen their emotional resonance and tie the poem together more conclusively.
Suggested Revisions:
Consider replacing "Or prophecy" with something more visually or thematically aligned, such as "Or premonition."
Explore a title that directly reflects the poem's core idea, such as The Weight of Memory or Too Many Photographs.
Revisit the pacing in sections like "Hers / Ours, not as ugly as we thought at 25," to see if the break enhances or disrupts the poem's rhythm.
You could expand the idea of photographs "invading screens" by elaborating on the emotional impact of these digital interruptions.
Overall, the poem is a compelling exploration of memory and the existential tension between preservation and impermanence. With some polishing, it could be even more powerful and cohesive. Would you like help revising specific sections?
This is the year of things falling apart. This is the year of standing on the edge of things, looking back over my shoulder and wondering whether I should jump or not. This is the year of endings so quiet that only I can hear the door shutting. This is the year of rifts so loud the fissures seem to originate from my very core.
This is the year of panic.
This is the year of stretching thin and holding fort. Of not knowing where next month's rent will come from. Of feeling the imminent death of loved ones in my bones.
This is the year of being smiled at. A lot. 6 year old, 10 year old, 14 year old grins. Toothy grins, sweaty grins, book-seeking 'please help me ma'am' grins. 'Please read us one more story' grins. Life giving grins.
This is the year of fighting & holding ground.
To wake up as if everything is normal, good even, and then have it hit you like a ton of bricks. It doesn’t come with words. I wish it did. Words you can negotiate with, words you can reshape. It invades like an oil spill, rising from your feet, past your thighs, to assault your gut, restrict your throat, grip your heart and settle like thick molasses under your skull. Black sludge overwhelms you and all you can do is surrender. You want to stay in bed forever. The thought of food churns your stomach.
You don’t want to die but could life itself stop for a while?
You're not 25 anymore. Or even 40. You’re not someone who can be defeated by a man’s betrayal. But you’re not someone who can summon hope for the future quite as easily either. Everything tastes of rust in your mouth. Who knew that a heartbreak-in-progress would leave such an aftertaste?
***
I journaled everything. Every sweet lie, every contact made on skin, every misgiving and every gut feeling. I don't know if I learned anything from it. Resilience maybe? Maybe how to carry the scent of foreboding in every shared delight?
I would've walked the plank for you, K. I would've made egregious errors. I would've crossed the line for you, my love. I would've purged it all.
Your betrayal saved me. But please, no more. No more.
Ya should've seen the gym-bro images that popped up when I googled 'photos of walking the plank'
I had to leave the streets where men prey on us. I am ugly but I have these breasts, you see.
I don’t have breasts but I have this skin, you see.
I cover my skin from head to toe but I have this stare, you see.
I don’t stare but I have seven decades on me, you see.
I am 12 but I have this un-policed gait, you see.
I have eyes, teeth, feet, nose, mouth, hair, ears. I have nails, you see.
There is nothing you could have done, Moumita. I want you to know you lived bravely till the last second. Because when did being scared ever save us? There’s nothing we could have done for you either, Moumita.
And so I entered the forest to find you. I sang loudly so that you would hear me on the tops of trees, where they kiss and weave into each other. I looked up at the sky and then I looked at the wet moss below. You were everywhere and nowhere all at once. I think you were at peace. I think you were with me, your parents and everyone who loved, cried & raged for you, all at once.
The grace of god by which it was not-me, brings no comfort today, Moumita. Because, here in this forest as we walk together, you whisper into my heart that you actually are me. You are me in this forest. I was you in that seminar room.
"How could you not be", you whisper from the highest branches of the trees I pass, "We are together in this aloneness now, Purnima. I will never not be a part of you. Don’t you know what my name means? Moumita - sweet friend."
Very gently, before he realises what he’s agreeing to, she has sought and received permission to lay him down and swing one leg across his torso so that he's safely scaffolded between her thighs. Then she lays her palms down on his bare chest.
“Will you do something for me?”
“What?” he asks, his face grimly professorial, wondering how this moment qualifies as a valid, logical experience.
“Will you let me rest my hands on your heart? Will you close your eyes and listen - really listen - to what I’m about to say?”
“Hmm”
“Is that a yes?”
“Yes, yes,” he says, annoyance already creeping into his body. She can feel it between her legs.
“Ok, close your eyes. Listen.”
The heat from her palms warms his chest. He draws comfort from it. He feels trapped.
“What if I’m not a mad woman? What if there's a world filled with people like me, who feel deeply and live by that? Where people rage when they’re angry and love when they’re truly ready to love? What if in that world, you are the mad man? What if your words & performances fall flat, lacking the weight of sentiment and truth?
“What if I’m not actually overthinking? Or underthinking? What if I am thinking the exact amount required for the moment? What if it’s ok to be this person? Not just ok, but rational, sensible and good? What if it's a superpower which allows me to see everything you struggle to understand? What if this way of being, and my appearance in your life, was designed to help you heal?”
His lips curl up into a smirk. He is indulging her, she knows. But her palms are warmer now.
“Stay open, love. Just a little while longer.”
He stops smirking.
“You're missing out on the best of me when you discard me as a mad woman. Maybe mad women are who you need. I am proud of my madness, I cultivated it with love and fought to keep it alive. It allows me to see your heart, how hard you try, how tired you get sometimes and also how strong and steadfast you are. It allows me to see how fiercely you love your son.
“Understand this - the part of me that unsettles you the most is what'll make me your faithful ally. Trust me, this is the woman you want to be loved by”
Her thighs tighten around him. He squirms.
“Why does a woman showing you her full self, make you angry? When did me being me, become an offense to you?
“And what if it’s just me, love, showing up for you?”
He opens his eyes. He is angry. She knows she doesn’t have much time left.
“Close your eyes. Just a little bit more.”
He shuts his eyes again. His jaw is rigid. She wants to hold his face in her palms and kiss him. But not yet. She can feel his heart beat in her hands.
“So listen. This could go two ways.
You could choose to continue calling me crazy as though it were a disease. You could choose this moment to run out of patience with me. With us.
OR you could choose to listen to that one, lonely voice inside you that wonders if I’m right. That maybe, just maybe, trusting this mad woman might bring you relief. Choose this and I promise to protect your heart with every fibre of my being.
“But if you pick option ‘a’...,” she relaxes her grip around his body, “then you’re free to go. We've reached the end of our time together.”
She lifts her hands off his chest.
“You can open your eyes.”
She touches his face gently. There are storms raging in him. She is nervous now.
“So what will it be, my love?”
He takes a long breath. She feels him rise and fall under her. He opens his mouth to answer.
Somewhere there is someone for this ugly girl. Someone who speaks completes sentences containing feeling words and honest truths. Somewhere there is someone who remembers to stop, breathe and listen. To her. Somewhere there is someone who remembers how she said she was sad, she was sick, she needed time. Somewhere there is someone who wants to be unbroken before they reach for her. Somewhere there is someone who sees her ugly and because of it, calls her beautiful.
1. Inference One: Undiagnosed Problem with Alcohol & Gymming
Men posing with boot-shaped beer mugs
Men posing with 2 boot-shaped beer mugs
Men posing with boot-shaped beer mugs against a backdrop of a boot-shaped-beer-mug neon sign.
Men posing with muscles (their own & others')
Men posing with sweat
1. Inference Two: Aspirational Poachers
Men posing with tiger on leash
Men posing with white tiger on leash
Men posing with dead tiger on wall
Men posing with one leg on dead-tiger carpet
2. Inference Three: Good Morning Afficionados
Posters of red roses and 'Good Morning'
Posters of yellow roses and 'Good Morning'
Posters of 'Good Morning Life Is Too Short For *fill in the blanks*'
3. Inference Four: Lovers of Simplicity
Men who desire 'simplicity'
Men who want 'non-judgemental' partners
Men who want 'transparency'
Men who use Hritik Roshan's face as profile pictures
4. Inference Five: Seekers of Domestic Bliss
Men who pose with unidentified children
Men who pose with their own children
Men who pose with their wife and children
5. Inference Six: Highest Education
Men from IIMs want clean nails
Men from MIT want to fight misandry
Men from IIT
So 12 and something years ago, I decided this would be how I would live: https://aquaticstatic.blogspot.com/2009/12/ritual.html and then I forgot about it. Or, I went about living my life with this tucked away in the back of my mind, not really invoking it as life began to nudge me, tongue-in-cheek, into uncomfortable spaces rife with fun shit like crossroads and existential dilemmas.
On my 43rd birthday this year, as wishes poured in, a dear friend called me courageous. In the last couple of years, I’ve been hearing versions of this characterisation and it’s left me confused. Because for much of my early life the word most used for me was ‘nice’. A safe and bland word said when people didn’t know how else to describe me. General decency and a compliant nature was what people associated me most with. Woohoo. What a legacy. She was….nice.
Bravery of any kind is not what I’ve ever felt on the inside. I am, if anything, an encyclopaedia of fears seen & unseen. Every worst case scenario is my reality. Everyday I make decisions to not pick them as I get ready to go out into the world. If that makes one brave, then ok, the Decade of No Fear did its job.
I’m 3 years late to the next decade - or at least blogging about it - but hey, the last one turned out alright so do I dare paint a dream for the next one? I’m 43 and the downhill express is picking up momentum. They make you fill up with hope for 40 and to be honest, if you’ve lived a relatively healthy life, it feels like anything is possible. At 43 shit gets real. The body slows, you’re working with people 20 years younger and no you cannot keep up with them. Or dream like them. Dreams change when you’re 43.
Dare I make this a Decade of Love? Of loving and being loved? The core work remains the same as it did when I turned 30. To trust. I feel like I've let more and more people and ideas into my circles of trust recently and now just the last fence remains - the one around the most intimate parts of my heart, where I am my most woman, my most child, my most sacred and pristine. If I don’t do the work or delay things, this part will wither and rust. Nothing I do then, will be able to protect it. New awareness is beginning to flood me - I can’t protect this place by hiding it away. It just doesn’t work anymore. I have to dismantle the fence. Or else, whatever it protects will die.
Just like when I started the Decade of No Fear, I honestly don’t know how to make the Decade of Love work. I have no roadmap. I’m riddled with uncertainty and the wounds of the last many years loving people who didn’t love me back. Maybe I start with honouring all the love that comes at me. Maybe I start with not measuring love but allowing it to exist. I meet children & people everyday who make my heart burst with unbearable joy just by the mere fact of their existence. Maybe I start with believing that I can do that for someone too.
Very early into COVID-19 ’s second wave and before the images of funeral pyres began to make international headlines, like so many of us, I too tried to arrange oxygen for someone I’d never met. The patient was alone at home with a nurse, in the middle of a lockdown, with an SPO2 level of 30 (later, we would learn all about SPO2 values as we performed our own triages). No assistance was reaching them. I was 15 km away, yet confident I could help. Having been cushioned by a lifetime of privilege, it never occurred to me that this was unfixable, until many enquiries later, I had to inform them that there was no oxygen to be had. Could she wait till the morning? The daughter, who was on the other side of the globe, sent a message to stop searching. I put the phone away and wept for a stranger who was about to lose her mother.
Weeks on, anyone deemed non-essential to our city is locked in at home. Everyone except those who are running from pillar to post looking for beds, for air. Then the funereal photographs start coming in. A city engulfed in smoke and dust from mass cremations and burials. Pyres burn non-stop for weeks. We’ve never seen anything like it. People living near cremation grounds report that everything is covered in a grey film, an unholy scattering of ashes across a city stuck in an unending nightmare. The state refuses to count the dead but the smoke is everywhere. It’s getting harder and harder to breathe.
Or maybe, it is history wrapping her hands around our throats. You’ve been here before, she screams as her grip tightens. This isn’t the first time you’ve witnessed institutional murder.
But those of us who won big in the sweepstakes of caste and class have mastered the art of denial. We have anointed intellectuals and ‘thought leaders’ to construct dangerous mythologies. Headlines, full page advertisements, op-eds in The Washington Post and TIME magazine, the Dutts, Dhumes and Mehtas. We have enabled not just one or two, but an army of sociopaths. We have made a business out of dismissing history’s smoke signals. The marketing of fake messiahs, the vice-like grip over police, media and the courts, the buying of bureaucrats, candidates and votes and the willful abdication of Constitutional duty as minorities are brutally culled. Go further back, history urges us, follow the trail of your pathological apathy. We watch vacantly as our farmlands get looted and workers betrayed. We look away as the brightest minds of our generation are locked away behind bars. We cheer as private profiteers hollow out public education and healthcare. But we always preserve our fragility. God forbid someone stored beef in their fridge.
The thing with a million pyres is, when the smoke rises, no one can tell where exactly it came from. Was it the pregnant 25-year-old who breathed her last at the threshold of a hospital that had nothing left to give? Or a young Dalit girl, full of promise, burnt like trash in the middle of the night by thugs in uniform? Was it our father, mother, son or daughter? Or was it the young man ‘disappeared’ into the Kashmir night?.
This is our moment of reckoning. We must ask why we turned away from self-evident truths. And why we rendered a million voices, unheard. In our deafness, we lost the ability to discern between right and wrong, the cruel and humane. Like religion and culture, we allowed the virus to be weaponised.
Now the pyres burn as history engulfs us in unforgiving fury. She rages like a forest fire that consumes everything in its path. Let us hope it annihilates the hate that courses through our veins, rendering us criminally useless when we need each other the most. May the hatred in our belly, as poet Joopaka Subhadra called it, be extinguished so that we may breathe. What will it take to start afresh?
The defeat of one political party won’t be enough, nor will the toppling of the current regime. We will have to remove the rot from the system, from ourselves. These recent years of darkness have also put a spotlight on our greatest resource, the Indian Constitution. It offers hope in spirit and word and a roadmap out of this hell we have built on communal and caste hatred. It is remarkably compassionate in its essence and committed to equity at its core. And although it has been singed badly in the last few years, it hasn’t burned out yet.
No, history isn’t the fumes that clog our lungs. It is the fire that burns in our hearts, urging us not to betray this moment in time. Those who merely wring their hands and despair will be pushed out of the way, making space for the children of Ambedkar to create new history. The Umars and Azads, the Nodeeps and Devanganas, the Sudhas and Sharjeels, the farmers, workers and nurses will claim this country. It is theirs to inherit. But make no mistake, the debris to clean up is ours.
When the smoke clears, let us hope to hear history’s whisper again, those words we long to hear: Don’t be afraid. There is still time.
