|
 Ethereal
Friends
is a dedication to a sect of lesser mortals of the living human
world, a sect whose members have been christened schizophrenics by
psychiatrists, and wandering lunatics by the common man.
Ethereal
Friends
The
Storm rages on within
The
neural chaos makes his body creak,
And
all the while, the effigy of his mind
Burns
in silence and solitude.
Broken
only by the reverberations
Of
his ethereal friends.
The
joys of beauty, the pathos of the World,
Has
no meaning to this forlorn figure,
Only
time lies witness to a forgotten past,
Thus
lost in agonizing peace, he remains
With
his ethereal friends.
But
unlike his friends, he is real!
Then
why does this piece of breathing flesh
Not
generate any empathy?
Why
every time do we subtly deconstruct,
Homogenising
him with the surreal world
Of
his ethereal friends?
Only
palpable within is the fear he generates,
While
impalpable lie the stones and thorns
That
ages of children have gifted him with.
Thus
even today with hated love, he remains
With
his ethereal friends.
Manaan Kar Ray
Post
Scriptum: Ethereal friends refers to Auditory Hallucinations
(Non-existent voices heard by the patient only), a major symptom
of Schizophrenia during the active phase of the illness.
_________________________________________
In
an age where Countries and Governments swear by equality, at least
on pen and paper, there exists a sect of individuals, suffering
from psychiatric ailments who are not even considered worthwhile
to look down upon. This sheer disregard for ailing human life cuts
across creeds, cultures, borders, religions and the like.
Let
us be true to ourselves and recapitulate how many times we have
seen a wandering lunatic (pardon use of this derogatory term), and
he or she has failed to arouse empathy within. Regard if it comes
for them comes mostly as ridicule. And of course at times there
unpredictability engenders fear, finding expression in the two
yards distance we maintain with them.
The
Science of Medicine has taken rapid strides in the field of
Psychiatry. In fact it has explained most psychic events at the
neurochemical level. But still the stigma of psychiatric ailment
remains as strong and vivid as it used to be a few centuries ago.
From
Cancer to AIDS every disease arouses emotions. But some how
Psychiatric ailment which can and do reduce health beings to
breathing corpses rarely generate any positive feelings. Perhaps
this is befitting of an utilitarian society where ones worth is
judged by ones productivity. And no wonder the World and its
inhabitants have long maintained a cruel silence. Barring a
whisper here and a whimper there, psychiatric patients have
remained grossly faceless, friendless and voiceless. But surely
someday, somehow, somewhere this silence will end. It will. It has
to....
We
at Twilight Bridge.com hope to change age old attitudes. At this
space on the web you will get free access to articles pertaining
not only to psychiatric illness but to all happenings which
marginalise the weaker sections of our society. Through these we
hope to construct an alternative discourse, an alternative
paradigm between cause and effect.
We
at Twilight Bridge believe in the power of human relationships.
And its on these relationships that we are banking on for
incorporation of the new discourse into common parlance. If and
only if you believe in our cause we request you to personally
forward Twilight Bridge to five of your friends and each in turn
to five more. If we can do this with dedication then it will only
be a matter of time, before we have a new communion of hearts and
souls, a communion tolerant to one and all, a communion that
speaks the language of love......
Too
many of us see the world as it is and ask why so ?
Let
us see the world as it may be and ask why not? |
