(* During the Christmas season churchgoers donated money and gifts for the poor and needy in a box -Christmas box. The day after Christmas the boxes are opened by a priest and the gifts and money used to be distributed. 26th December is therefore called the 'Boxing day')

The Boxing Day begins like Beethoven's symphony getting flat. It wasn't supposed to be.

While memories of childhood in Christmas slips to oblivion, the fresh witnessed sights of few days old puppies shivering as they piled together for the warmth that seem to have been hidden has my thoughts seeking for the warm to shelter me. The day before the last Boxing Day, it was Christmas.

I woke up expecting too big a change that never has a chance. I was hoping everything would take their time to stop and greet the day when salvation was born in flesh and blood. But the shopkeeper takes his usual bow to begin his business. His forehead was dotted red.

The bitch crossed the street without her puppies as her eight or ten tits sways in the cold. The morning newspaper that was flooded with news of murder, hunger, rape and deaths talks about Christmas like any other news. Everything was in its usual cycle when I was expecting the unusual.

The familiar voice cracks in the radio introducing songs after songs that has nothing to do with the 'special day'. In anguish I told myself, they are going to make the day again.

Yellow and green auto rickshaws and black and yellow taxis clogged the road as usual. Blue line buses too. Even DTC (Delhi Transport Corporation) bus number 666 did not rest. The sight was almost like a bad omen.

I remember my sadness when in November 2003 John and I witnessed Copenhagen and Nuuk(Greenland) dressing up with lights,colors,Christmas trees and Santa Claus for Christmas .

The sad thing was, on our return to Delhi in December, when the date was a neighbor to Christmas, the capital of India was cold, pale and haggard, with nothing to remind me of the coming beautiful day. That was sick. Once again, everything was normal as if it wasn't expecting the day.

As if it was pretending. As if it has no meaning. As if it was like just another day. Narayan, the dhabawalla, served me strong tea from the old tea-pan. He isn't aware about the day.

Looks like to him it was another day born to set like yesterday. And when the sun finally breaks the layers of cold blankets, the small puppies sleeps in coil like formation.

Halleluiah! In the face of biting cold, man and animals are the same. The desire for the warm friend is always the prize seek. I did that trying to find the face of the unusual in the misty morning.

But when on the Boxing Day I read the newspaper, there seem to be no quest on man's part to find the friend that can warm. The son of Man.

There's more news about landmine blast. The poor boy has to live with it as long as his breathe keeps him alive.For some, hope sets at the dawn.

Its not a matter of being early or not anymore. Innocence has no place. In the face of being the brunt of a victim none seem to be in the green pasture anymore. Our peace are in pieces. And our fears we bear.While our frights never dry.

We will die like deaths bride.The Government is still flexing its muscles talking about arms-trade and nuclear weapons. In the name of defense, security, and bigger words like peace. That is when everything becomes deceptive.

Then we inherit old fears so that it becomes our new fears. Wounds turn to scars that never seem to heal. Worst is that they become a part of five and ten year plan. Or vision 2020.

What more.

Fixing dates for deaths. Never knowing the unwanted kiss awaits us all. Where is the Love?

That's my kid brother's favorite song. Mine too. A song. A favorite. Just a song that questions the unanswered. Holy cow, they still talked about holy wars too.

In the 'Concert for Democracy' there are cries of anxieties, anguish and despair. Hunger and fear too. Cries of loss that will seem like forever to those who reap. But to those that stand from afar the kiss, it was another news of yesterday.

Unaidable AIDS multiplying deaths, widows, and orphans. Meanwhile, Steve asked me to send him the music video of his favorite song. Will it make a difference to him? Seeing isn't enough.

I also read about a man shivering in the cold of murder, hunger, rape and death that occur on the day just before the last Boxing Day. Did you do that again deliberately, Judas? Did you kiss again? But another new day comes here.

Happy New Year.