Reflections about a vexillographer and other things

1.
He
Spent so much time
Admiring the outstanding label
On the bottle inside an ice bucket
That he forgot to drink the wine

2.
The Mahatma said
Healthy dissent is a prelude to progress
Why then is progress not a prologue to dissent?

3.
We're the largest producer of licit opium
And milk
And babies

Some connection there
I'm trying to find

4.
When I opened
My copy of James Joyce's Ulysses
Molly Bloom started dancing
She started speaking like a ZooZoo

That's how I realised I'm watching too much TV

5.
A bemused commoner (that's me)
Is peering through a telescope
He is a peeping tom of sorts

He scrutinises the lives of others
Sodomy, sordidness, adultery

He starts to describe
In detail
The mating of two lovers

Members of the state police appear
To arrest him on grounds of obscenity

The bemused commoner (that's me) protests

He was describing an innocent affair
Between a blue chested kingfisher and a golden breasted kingfisher
On a neem tree

The state police say that's against the law

6.
A bemused commoner (that's me)
Sits in suffocating silence for three minutes
Plus a few seconds

Suddenly, a mob appears
The mob applauds lustily
Copies of my silent speech are distributed to the audience

I'm the new oracle
I'm the knowledge and the truth

My book which has the complete collection of all my silent speeches becomes a best-seller

7.
1.9 million miles of roads in India
How many road-side dabbas and tyre-makers does that calculate into
And obsolete road-signs

8.
I meet a young man
Name is Hamid
He tells me heart wrenching rural stories
In a bhatti in Kurla

This included one, about how he purchased a tong (instead of a toy)
For his aging grandmother

I weep when
I hear these poignant poverty stories

Years later
I realise Hamid was merely re-telling Premchand
Regurgitating stories like Idgaah

See, that's why one must read Premchand

9.
Typeface is everything
That's what RK said

Should I change everything on this site into MetaSerif?

10.
Twice a year
The vexillographer sells flags
The rest of the year it's cigarettes

Both businesses are lucrative, he says
Plus they provide for a certain sense of freedom