Skip to main content

Chiquitita

ABBA


“Chiquitita, tell me what's wrong /You're enchained by your own sorrow.”  Thus begins one of the songs that kept me bewitched for quite a while during my youth when I was passing through a tough time.  ABBA had sung it long before it crept into my veins like a soothing intoxication that ached my soul dully.  I was enchained by my own sorrow.

Like Chiquitita, I was always sure of myself until the confidence was shattered by a deep disillusionment that broke me irreparably.  “You’ll be dancing once again,” ABBA sang to Chiquitita.  “Let me hear you sing once more like you did before / Sing a new song, Chiquitita.”

I learnt to sing my new song.  That was my redemption.

We have to learn to sing a new song after each heartbreak.  The world loves to break hearts.  That is the way of the world.  That is how it is.  The storm is far too mighty for the feeble wings of the gentle birds.  The tide in the ocean can wreck the steeliest of ships.  The raucousness out there always resounds drowning the new song that you sing.  Yet you have to sing your song.  Only the song is yours. 

The sorrow is yours too.  As natural as the storm in the sky and the tide in the ocean.  But the moon that shines in the darkness is natural too.  So is the warble of the nightingale. 

Come to terms with your sorrow, Chiquitita.  Isn’t it partly your own creation?  You can’t help the raucousness out there.  But you can help yourself.  You can sing your own song.

PS. Third post in Blogchatter A2Z Challenge



Top post on IndiBlogger, the biggest community of Indian Bloggers

Comments

  1. UnknownApril 3, 2018 at 8:45 AM

    Teacher like u is a great blessing for me.
    Thanks for teaching me new
    lessons of life.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Sapna DhyaniApril 3, 2018 at 4:20 PM

    Your own song- what a wonderful thought! And songs by ABBA are amazing. If you like ABBA , do watch the movie " Mamma Mia ". A musical with ABBA songs!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalApril 3, 2018 at 7:43 PM

      I watched that movie long ago. Don't remember the story now, but the songs still echo in memory.

      Delete
  3. Tina SequeiraApril 8, 2018 at 8:08 PM

    Wow! I love how you summed up the conclusion..the last two paragraphs ..short and impactful :)

    The sorrow is yours too. As natural as the storm in the sky and the tide in the ocean. But the moon that shines in the darkness is natural too. So is the warble of the nightingale.

    Come to terms with your sorrow, Chiquitita. Isn’t it partly your own creation? You can’t help the raucousness out there. But you can help yourself. You can sing your own song..

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Tomichan MatheikalApril 9, 2018 at 9:26 AM

      Some things are so much part of your heart that feelings come naturally while writing about them. Thank you for your touching words.

      Delete
  4. SubrotoApril 9, 2018 at 8:08 PM

    Wonderful! What lovely sentiments expressed in this post.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Adventures of Toto as a comic strip

  'The Adventures of Toto' is an amusing story by Ruskin Bond. It is prescribed as a lesson in CBSE's English course for class 9. Maggie asked her students to do a project on some of the lessons and Femi George's work is what I would like to present here. Femi converted the story into a beautiful comic strip. Her work will speak for itself and let me present it below.  Femi George Student of Carmel Public School, Vazhakulam, Kerala Similar post: The Little Girl
44 comments
Read more

Remedios the Beauty and Innocence

  Remedios the Beauty is a character in Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s novel, One Hundred Years of Solitude . Like most members of her family, she too belongs to solitude. But unlike others, she is very innocent too. Physically she is the most beautiful woman ever seen in Macondo, the place where the story of her family unfolds. Is that beauty a reflection of her innocence? Well, Marquez doesn’t suggest that explicitly. But there is an implication to that effect. Innocence does make people look charming. What else is the charm of children? Remedios’s beauty is dangerous, however. She is warned by her great grandmother, who is losing her eyesight, not to appear before men. The girl’s beauty coupled with her innocence will have disastrous effects on men. But Remedios is unaware of “her irreparable fate as a disturbing woman.” She is too innocent to know such things though she is an adult physically. Every time she appears before outsiders she causes a panic of exasperation. To make...
4 comments
Read more

The Death of Truth and a lot more

Susmesh Chandroth in his kitchen “Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought,” Poet Shelley told us long ago. I was reading an interview with a prominent Malayalam writer, Susmesh Chandroth, this morning when Shelley returned to my memory. Chandroth says he left Kerala because the state had too much of affluence which is not conducive for the production of good art and literature. He chose to live in Kolkata where there is the agony of existence and hence also its ecstasies. He’s right about Kerala’s affluence. The state has eradicated poverty except in some small tribal pockets. Today almost every family in Kerala has at least one person working abroad and sending dollars home making the state’s economy far better than that of most of its counterparts. You will find palatial houses in Kerala with hardly anyone living in them. People who live in some distant foreign land get mansions constructed back home though they may never intend to come and live here. There are ...
10 comments
Read more

The Covenant of Water

Book Review Title: The Covenant of Water Author: Abraham Verghese Publisher: Grove Press UK, 2023 Pages: 724 “What defines a family isn’t blood but the secrets they share.” This massive book explores the intricacies of human relationships with a plot that spans almost a century. The story begins in 1900 with 12-year-old Mariamma being wedded to a 40-year-old widower in whose family runs a curse: death by drowning. The story ends in 1977 with another Mariamma, the granddaughter of Mariamma the First who becomes Big Ammachi [grandmother]. A lot of things happen in the 700+ pages of the novel which has everything that one may expect from a popular novel: suspense, mystery, love, passion, power, vulnerability, and also some social and religious issues. The only setback, if it can be called that at all, is that too many people die in this novel. But then, when death by drowning is a curse in the family, we have to be prepared for many a burial. The Kerala of the pre-Independ...
10 comments
Read more

Butterfly from Sambhal

“Weren’t you a worm till the other day?” The plant asks the butterfly. “That’s ancient history,” the butterfly answers. “Why don’t you look at the present reality which is much more beautiful?” “How can I forget that past?” The plant insists. “You ate almost all my leaves. Had not my constant gardener discovered your ravage in time and removed you from my frail limbs, I would have been dead long before you emerged from your contemplation with beautiful wings.” “I’m sorry, my dear Nandiarvattam ji. Did I have a choice? The only purpose of the existence of caterpillars is to eat leaves. Eat and eat. Until we get into the cocoon and wait for our wings to unfold. A new reality to unfold. It's a relentless hunger that creates butterflies.” “Your new reality is my painful old history. I still remember how I trembled foreseeing my death. Death by a worm!” “I wish I could heal you with my kisses.” “You’re doing that, thank you. But…” “I know. It hurts, the history thing. I’...
10 comments
Read more