Friends, Romans, countryppl, lend yourself your senses

Taking an auto in Delhi right after the rains, right after the giant saffron sweep, this exhilaration on the roads, this gushing on the faces of auto and taxi drivers — this moment is tough to capture in words or images.

This day will go down in the history of histories. An image and imagery so vast and vivid. A bulbous democracy on the brink of something so big and potent you feel it thrumming on the streets of the Capital.

On any given day this power and beauty with which the Indian voter has spoken would’ve angered me. But not today. Today the sheer magnanimity of the numbers is overwhelming. The smiles and happinesses. The sheer thumping force of will.

A rhetoric, a culture, a country so vast has placed its answer in the form of this histrionic. The orange mop of all the street lights, their reflections on the roads soaked in the drizzle. The joy bouncing off the diverted traffic. Everything has spoken. The country has voted.

What does the twinkle in the peoples’ eye say? What promises do those in power hold? What secrets does the rain carry with it? No patch of land dry, no corner of heart unsaffron. Every conversation a surprise. Every turn a new revelation. What a patient democracy. What a day.

The question buzzes back into my mind. When I voted on May 12, I knew who I am not voting for. But did I know who I am voting for? What made the junta arrive at this humongous decision. Such numbers. Such majorities.

A feeling of trust and happening hangs in the air. Even the farthest and most unexpected have spoken and risen to unite the country in one colour. A number of 133 crores spoke and were heard. They are stand satisfied today.

The dinners and drinks and chais by the rainy balconies & the stark joyousness on the streets speaks for itself. There will be more charcha, gallons of chai too, but what about the other colour we are all too afraid of? The colour of life, the colour of love, the colour red.

The voters feel the opposite of trepidation. They voted to get rid of the feeling of this eternal disquietude. The simulacra has vouchsafed it's being. The numbers they speak.

The pontificate-rs, the soothsayers, the non-believers, the multitude who thought this was a battle won — were only fighting an image, by large standards they fought an imagery too, a visage. They thought it was a mirage.

But the shadows have stepped out of the not so dark room. And are standing between them and their mirrors, asking, 'How will you sleep for another five years? Did you do enough to ward us off? What did you do at all?'

This is the real and most sacred game. This, is the mastergame of all the thrones. What did we do? Did we engage and converse or did we just write people off and block? What the dystopian Handmaid's Tale won't tell you, what Leila won't show you, you will live for five years.

Nose dive, do indepth research, make a picture of your own self-exploration to perhaps understand what it feels to be in your specific skin and then maybe we shall arrive at a word or two that’ll help us make sense of this pall of doom.