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
47 comments
Read more

Shooting an Elephant

George Orwell [1903-1950] We had an anthology of classical essays as part of our undergrad English course. Shooting an Elephant by George Orwell was one of the essays. The horror of political hegemony is the core theme of the essay. Orwell was a subdivisional police officer of the British Empire in Burma (today Myanmar) when he was forced to shoot an elephant. The elephant had gone musth (an Urdu term for the temporary insanity of male elephants when they are in need of a female) and Orwell was asked to control the commotion created by the giant creature. By the time Orwell reached with his gun, the elephant had become normal. Yet Orwell shot it. The first bullet stunned the animal, the second made him waver, and Orwell had to empty the entire magazine into the elephant’s body in order to put an end to its mammoth suffering. “He was dying,” writes Orwell, “very slowly and in great agony, but in some world remote from me where not even a bullet could damage him further…. It seeme...
11 comments
Read more

Urban Naxal

Fiction “We have to guard against the urban Naxals who are the biggest threat to the nation’s unity today,” the Prime Minister was saying on the TV. He was addressing an audience that stood a hundred metres away for security reasons. It was the birth anniversary of Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel which the Prime Minister had sanctified as National Unity Day. “In order to usurp the Sardar from the Congress,” Mathew said. The clarification was meant for Alice, his niece who had landed from London a couple of days back.    Mathew had retired a few months back as a lecturer in sociology from the University of Kerala. He was known for his radical leftist views. He would be what the PM calls an urban Naxal. Alice knew that. Her mother, Mathew’s sister, had told her all about her learned uncle’s “leftist perversions.” “Your uncle thinks that he is a Messiah of the masses,” Alice’s mother had warned her before she left for India on a short holiday. “Don’t let him infiltrate your brai...
14 comments
Read more

The Little Girl

The Little Girl is a short story by Katherine Mansfield given in the class 9 English course of NCERT. Maggie gave an assignment to her students based on the story and one of her students, Athena Baby Sabu, presented a brilliant job. She converted the story into a delightful comic strip. Mansfield tells the story of Kezia who is the eponymous little girl. Kezia is scared of her father who wields a lot of control on the entire family. She is punished severely for an unwitting mistake which makes her even more scared of her father. Her grandmother is fond of her and is her emotional succour. The grandmother is away from home one day with Kezia's mother who is hospitalised. Kezia gets her usual nightmare and is terrified. There is no one at home to console her except her father from whom she does not expect any consolation. But the father rises to the occasion and lets the little girl sleep beside him that night. She rests her head on her father's chest and can feel his heart...
19 comments
Read more

Egregious

·       Donald Trump terminated all trade negotiations with Canada “based on their egregious behaviour.” ·       Pakistan has an egregious record of assassinations among its leaders. ·       Benjamin Netanyahu’s egregious disregard for civilian suffering has drawn widespread international condemnation. Now, look at the following sentences. ·       Archias is an egregious and most excellent man. [Cicero’s speech in 62 BCE] ·       “An egregious captain and most valiant soldier.” [Roger Ascham in 1545] U p to about 16 th century, the word egregious had a positive meaning: excellent or outstanding . Cicero was defending Greek poet Aulus Licinius Archias’s request for Roman citizenship. Archias had left his country out of disgust for the corruption of its Seleucid rulers. Ascham was speaking about the qualities of valiant soldiers when he used the ...
6 comments
Read more