I think we all need a little more love. The half-hearted sun that shines today, hardly dispelling the anxieties of a cold, unforgiving winter in India needs some love. The twittering pigeons outside, scaring the parrots and crows away from the grain, they need love. The media persons and anchors sitting in their television studios ranting need some love. Even the ones who sit in judgement and authority in the halls of parliament, they need love - because they do not know it.
My country needs love. My city needs love. I think, you and I do to.
Cole Porter’s song reminds me of the passion of young love, when nothing but even the sight of the beloved is enough to turn a person into an advertisement for toothpaste. This song is pure passion; a love that endures without the need for reciprocation.
I remember seeing a child smiling at me in a protest in Shaheen Bagh, a couple of days ago. She must have been a few months old, and, suddenly out of nowhere her teeth glistened, and her eyes lit up. It lit a fire in my cold, cold heart, that wintry day, when the people were out in huge numbers fighting for their survival, fighting for ther voices to be heard.
I wonder if the seed of this love is the same, this passion that makes one go on without expectaction. Cole Porter’s song is light and beautiful, almost naive, but it is the time that makes me think of love even as we resist. Whethere it is couples who come together to celebrate freedom, families who stick together and brave the cold and the tyrannous state, resistace a site of coming together of hearts.
