Gardens are opaque
Like glass houses in snow-sleet
Sheltered, spare and neat
The queen bee stood still
In the stinging air of night
The drones hum at work
Skinny blades of grass
Cut into sheer silken stream
Let the soiree begin
Red roofed house: mossy
Algae swim at a puddle’s edge
Grey reflections of Time
Skyline pastoral
I blink once twice thrice and shut
My eyes from the Sun
Deep dark wooded land
Glittering in ashen glow
Devoured by flames
Monday, December 5, 2011
Monday, October 31, 2011
The Radcliffe Line
“The tea is ready, beta. Drink it while it’s hot, achcha. Oh, I forgot to tell you, today is the day!”
“Today is the day for what?” said my bewildered son, Satyajit as he skimmed the newspaper with a wary eye.
“Today is the day for my interview! That journalist woman, what was her name….Jessica something is going to ask me questions about the partition. I already told her, “Listen baba I am ancient, and I am stupid. Some people have gone so far as to say I have Alzheimer’s. What am I to do? My memories are distorted, I might end up making up things about the partition”, that’s what I told her. But her voice over the telephone was all smiles. She said, “Don’t worry, auntie, stories are what I want. I am compiling data from a very big sample, so it doesn’t matter if you exaggerate here and there.” I was certainly pleased with this girl, impressed even, I tell you.”
“Bhalo theko, Ma. I’m sure you’ll have fun recounting your childhood to a starry-eyed stranger.”
My darling son kissed me quickly on the forehead before leaving through the front door, briefcase firmly in hand. He was a bit of a cynic, Satyajit, but who wasn’t these days?
I finished my breakfast and bath and waited in the living room in a spotless white shari. The ticking of the clock suddenly seemed louder than usual, and the only sound in my living-room. I looked at my gold watch- fifteen minutes before the interview. The ticking persisted, and made me feel very uneasy for some reason.
Then I remembered.
It was my heart that was ticking fit to burst that awfully cold day in August, 1947.
I must have been seven, at most eight years old. I was shivering in my dowdy coat, as my heart continued beating like a time-bomb in the quiet of my dada’s room. I was waiting on him and it seemed to me then that the ticking of the clock masked the sound of his breathing. Perhaps, in truth his breathing had become shallow and pale, like his body.
He had been ill two weeks now. Ever since the Radcliffe Line was announced, his health had been deteriorating like the melting of an ice-cube. Mama had left me to care for him, while she scoured the garbage dumps for vegetables that weren’t completely rotten. When she could not find sufficient left-overs she would wander the lonely streets, begging for money or food. She took what she was offered; and beat her shriveled chest in agony when she was came home empty-handed.
This was of course in those hard, poverty-ridden days of the Partition. News of bloodbaths and riots frequently floated in and out of our threadbare household, but we had immediate troubles of our own.
Bengal had sampled the first tang of doubt sometime around June, when rumors of a second split were making the rounds. Our Muslim friend Muzaffer Bhaiyya, jute-mill worker by day and intellectual by night was educating us on the future of Hindustan. I remember sitting quietly in the corner, while he enunciated with the clarity of an English babu, that British India had run its course. “These Englishmen will have to go, Sharat, they will have to,” he kept repeating to my father. But Muzaffer Bhaiyya had also warned the room at large that the storm was coming. We all thought he was a bit senile. Oh, how wrong we were!
Within a month, the government had secretly set the mood for a series of communal riots that were to be the bloodiest Hindustan stood witness to. Dada had come running into the house one day, his eyes popping. He was shouting like a madman that his factory had been shut down. You see, there was no jute to process. East Bengal’s new policies would not permit jute to be imported by our jute-mills. Dada’s eyes leaked uncontrollably and I was never more afraid of him. He clutched me by the arms, drew me to him and spat in my face that I was never to speak to Muzaffer Bhaiyya or his son again. My mother had begun to cry as well, and I remember running out of the room and hiding in our backyard with our cat, Billi.
The day Dada was terminally ill, Mama did not come home. I was severely anxious about Dada’s health but what could I do? I applied a damp cloth over his forehead and waited. I must have dozed off but when I woke up it was pitch dark and there was a terrible scuffle in the backyard and I thought I heard Billi mewing. I ran to the back-door but opened it noiselessly, fear drumming in my throat. But I had forgotten to turn off the lights. The soft candle-light snaked out into the backyard throwing a small boy’s figure into sharp relief. It was Muzaffer Bhaiyya’s son. He stood stock-still without speaking. He held a bloody scythe in one hand and the corpse of my beloved Billi in the other. I paused for a minute, expecting some reaction. He just stood there, prepared to attack. I swiftly shut the door and bolted the lock. As I heard his footsteps sprinting among the bushes, I sighed in relief.
I shed uncountable tears for many people in the weeks to come. Mama and Billi had been the first to go, and their deaths had been the hardest to bear. But time does heal wounds, and Dada remained with me for a long long time. He got better and took up a job as a government census-taker.
The doorbell. I had to get that. Now how had these tears tricked their way into my lap?
I opened the door and said, “Hello Jessica beti. Ready to hear my story?”
“Today is the day for what?” said my bewildered son, Satyajit as he skimmed the newspaper with a wary eye.
“Today is the day for my interview! That journalist woman, what was her name….Jessica something is going to ask me questions about the partition. I already told her, “Listen baba I am ancient, and I am stupid. Some people have gone so far as to say I have Alzheimer’s. What am I to do? My memories are distorted, I might end up making up things about the partition”, that’s what I told her. But her voice over the telephone was all smiles. She said, “Don’t worry, auntie, stories are what I want. I am compiling data from a very big sample, so it doesn’t matter if you exaggerate here and there.” I was certainly pleased with this girl, impressed even, I tell you.”
“Bhalo theko, Ma. I’m sure you’ll have fun recounting your childhood to a starry-eyed stranger.”
My darling son kissed me quickly on the forehead before leaving through the front door, briefcase firmly in hand. He was a bit of a cynic, Satyajit, but who wasn’t these days?
I finished my breakfast and bath and waited in the living room in a spotless white shari. The ticking of the clock suddenly seemed louder than usual, and the only sound in my living-room. I looked at my gold watch- fifteen minutes before the interview. The ticking persisted, and made me feel very uneasy for some reason.
Then I remembered.
It was my heart that was ticking fit to burst that awfully cold day in August, 1947.
I must have been seven, at most eight years old. I was shivering in my dowdy coat, as my heart continued beating like a time-bomb in the quiet of my dada’s room. I was waiting on him and it seemed to me then that the ticking of the clock masked the sound of his breathing. Perhaps, in truth his breathing had become shallow and pale, like his body.
He had been ill two weeks now. Ever since the Radcliffe Line was announced, his health had been deteriorating like the melting of an ice-cube. Mama had left me to care for him, while she scoured the garbage dumps for vegetables that weren’t completely rotten. When she could not find sufficient left-overs she would wander the lonely streets, begging for money or food. She took what she was offered; and beat her shriveled chest in agony when she was came home empty-handed.
This was of course in those hard, poverty-ridden days of the Partition. News of bloodbaths and riots frequently floated in and out of our threadbare household, but we had immediate troubles of our own.
Bengal had sampled the first tang of doubt sometime around June, when rumors of a second split were making the rounds. Our Muslim friend Muzaffer Bhaiyya, jute-mill worker by day and intellectual by night was educating us on the future of Hindustan. I remember sitting quietly in the corner, while he enunciated with the clarity of an English babu, that British India had run its course. “These Englishmen will have to go, Sharat, they will have to,” he kept repeating to my father. But Muzaffer Bhaiyya had also warned the room at large that the storm was coming. We all thought he was a bit senile. Oh, how wrong we were!
Within a month, the government had secretly set the mood for a series of communal riots that were to be the bloodiest Hindustan stood witness to. Dada had come running into the house one day, his eyes popping. He was shouting like a madman that his factory had been shut down. You see, there was no jute to process. East Bengal’s new policies would not permit jute to be imported by our jute-mills. Dada’s eyes leaked uncontrollably and I was never more afraid of him. He clutched me by the arms, drew me to him and spat in my face that I was never to speak to Muzaffer Bhaiyya or his son again. My mother had begun to cry as well, and I remember running out of the room and hiding in our backyard with our cat, Billi.
The day Dada was terminally ill, Mama did not come home. I was severely anxious about Dada’s health but what could I do? I applied a damp cloth over his forehead and waited. I must have dozed off but when I woke up it was pitch dark and there was a terrible scuffle in the backyard and I thought I heard Billi mewing. I ran to the back-door but opened it noiselessly, fear drumming in my throat. But I had forgotten to turn off the lights. The soft candle-light snaked out into the backyard throwing a small boy’s figure into sharp relief. It was Muzaffer Bhaiyya’s son. He stood stock-still without speaking. He held a bloody scythe in one hand and the corpse of my beloved Billi in the other. I paused for a minute, expecting some reaction. He just stood there, prepared to attack. I swiftly shut the door and bolted the lock. As I heard his footsteps sprinting among the bushes, I sighed in relief.
I shed uncountable tears for many people in the weeks to come. Mama and Billi had been the first to go, and their deaths had been the hardest to bear. But time does heal wounds, and Dada remained with me for a long long time. He got better and took up a job as a government census-taker.
The doorbell. I had to get that. Now how had these tears tricked their way into my lap?
I opened the door and said, “Hello Jessica beti. Ready to hear my story?”
Friday, August 26, 2011
One Dog, Two Lovers
The dog barked. Incessantly. His barks grated on my overwrought nerves. He was a scruffy little dog with shaggy hair falling all over his face and into his eyes. Brown and white. I was trying to tell the girl something but his barks kept distracting me.
She leaned closer too, in the long winding cobblestone street, to make out what I was saying. I could picture us mentally as we stood together. Someone would have liked to click a picture of us- exactly like that- her loose black hair falling forward to make her tiny white ear visible, and my curly hair masking my face, both of us in rectangular black coats and regular walking shoes.
I was telling her that I wanted to own that street. In all its rain-splattered gravelly glory. I could set up a small tea-stall at the edge- very basic- with sticks gored into the ground to hold up a red cloth canopy-roof. And little tumblers made of glass to serve the sweet tea in. I’d keep a small stove and a large bucket of water. The water would boil all day long, because everyone would want to savor my tea. And she could hand the tea to my numerous customers with a ready smile- her teeth making a perfect semi circle as her eyes danced a girly dance.
When she heard this dream of mine she laughed suddenly, but softly. Her stomach heaved and her eyes danced the girly dance.
“Okay” she said, “okay, we’ll do it. But don’t you take off that overcoat; you look so sexy in it.”
She leaned closer too, in the long winding cobblestone street, to make out what I was saying. I could picture us mentally as we stood together. Someone would have liked to click a picture of us- exactly like that- her loose black hair falling forward to make her tiny white ear visible, and my curly hair masking my face, both of us in rectangular black coats and regular walking shoes.
I was telling her that I wanted to own that street. In all its rain-splattered gravelly glory. I could set up a small tea-stall at the edge- very basic- with sticks gored into the ground to hold up a red cloth canopy-roof. And little tumblers made of glass to serve the sweet tea in. I’d keep a small stove and a large bucket of water. The water would boil all day long, because everyone would want to savor my tea. And she could hand the tea to my numerous customers with a ready smile- her teeth making a perfect semi circle as her eyes danced a girly dance.
When she heard this dream of mine she laughed suddenly, but softly. Her stomach heaved and her eyes danced the girly dance.
“Okay” she said, “okay, we’ll do it. But don’t you take off that overcoat; you look so sexy in it.”
Monday, May 30, 2011
A Summer Post for the Painfully Decorative
Summer only has a couple weeks worth of life left in her, before she wilts like a fruity flower in heat. So you gotta give her a chance. Show her what you’ve got. And what is it that harbors in the recesses of your bottomless closet? The right answer is jumpsuits, mini-dresses, maxis, bell-bottoms, high waist shorts and/or skirts and generally ill-fitted flowy things. Everything else is wrong. And I’m not the one dictating terms here; the fashion frat is shouting it from the rooftops and runways of New York and Paris! To clock all things most beloved to the current Parisian heart, I’ve made a list. This is the summer “it” list; it is very jolly, it really
is.
1. 70s hippie glamour makes a colossal comeback this year. Think flared pants tied or belted-up mid-torso, think gypsy dresses, think chunky jewellery. Personally, I think one of the biggest gifts ever (accidentally) made to mankind was Woodstock. Musicians, movie-makers, playwrights, beer pubs, discos and now fashion designers all owe it their life’s savings. They visit and revisit this historic event, tweak and tussle about with it, and “revive” it in a contemporary light until they’re sore. And so it is, that 70s shimmer and shine is back with a “contemporary twist” *yawn*
2. Overheard at a fashion event: a pair of black “kitty heels” right off of Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany’s was reported stolen by a runway model. Okay maybe I’m exaggerating. Detailed perusal of said reports show that the shoes weren’t stolen, merely “borrowed”. What are kitty heels? They’re a cross between high heels and flats. With a dainty 2 inch pencil heel, it’s for those of you who believe in the saying “nothing lost, nothing gained” For the sacrificial goats in you, kitty heels are the thing.
3. But the real dead weight holding us all prisoners to summer’s ire are the clogs. Yes you heard right. Not the clogs of dirt in your sink or the clogs of hair in your sewage pipes. The clogs we’re talking about are a type of shoe. When Platforms took a tour of Holland, it made it with a couple of undisclosed shoes and came back with children named Clogs. Clogs aren’t comfortable. They aren’t exactly what you’d call divaesque. Obviously we all know that the only things truly divaesque are stilettos and disco-balls. But clogs have the one thing- they are deconstructionist, or atleast appear to be. The perfect inversion of fashionable footwear, the clogs give even skinny sky-scraper girls a complex. I mean walking tall is one thing, but looking like a giant is still a no-no in these parts. They add atleast 6 inches to your height, while leaving you looking like a tottering dummy. Wooden, flat, unimaginative and grand-motherly (although a single grandmother wouldn’t be spotted dead wearing them; they probably prefer Crocs) these are strictly for the blind-lovers of “haute-couture”.
4. To make up for the heaviness of Clogs, feather-light see-through numbers are making the rounds. Sheer blouses in honeysuckle, lavender and oceanic pastels are very much in. I suppose they make one feel…….delicate. Everybody’s wearing it, even the paunchy bunch.
Everything else this season rings mellow and inconspicuous. Or maybe just repetitive. If you’re looking for something marginally new and safe, I’d suggest the jumpsuits. Mix it up with some good old earth (read dirt) and have a ball with this semi-sporty outfit. No seriously, I’d really like a jumpsuit. Commes des Garcons, make me one? Oh never mind, they’re probably too busy making their models look like starved schoolboys (specifically hailing from idyllic English country schools).
Thursday, May 26, 2011
EARTH OCEAN SKY
I sat in the hollow
Of a grassy cup of earth
Grass so thick, and longish
Blowing like a brunette’s hair
Against the prairie breeze.
I saw one gull
White against an off-white sky
Keeling like a feathery ship
Against a heavy sea-tide
Dancing feathers haloed
In sunlight’s prism.
I shut my eyes tight
And heard an eerie quiet
The quietness of sound
And red and black alternating
I opened my eyes
To this beautiful dream
Again.
So never let me go.
Of a grassy cup of earth
Grass so thick, and longish
Blowing like a brunette’s hair
Against the prairie breeze.
I saw one gull
White against an off-white sky
Keeling like a feathery ship
Against a heavy sea-tide
Dancing feathers haloed
In sunlight’s prism.
I shut my eyes tight
And heard an eerie quiet
The quietness of sound
And red and black alternating
I opened my eyes
To this beautiful dream
Again.
So never let me go.
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
Anchor
Sparse like rust
Crumbling like dust
From your fingertips
Dripping from your hair
Vacuumed like particles
Running a race
Drained like oil
Filtered through mesh
Picked like husk
Picked like louse
Crushed or burnt away.
Now you can stay
Gagged and tied
Blinders on
Like you always were
Like you want to stay.
Crumbling like dust
From your fingertips
Dripping from your hair
Vacuumed like particles
Running a race
Drained like oil
Filtered through mesh
Picked like husk
Picked like louse
Crushed or burnt away.
Now you can stay
Gagged and tied
Blinders on
Like you always were
Like you want to stay.
Friday, March 18, 2011
HOODIE
Make me warm in the dark
I look up stars glittering high up
In a blackish night sky face of day
That looms close and alien and warm
Large surrounding rounded all around
Round
Hold my breath as I nuzzle against your t-shirt
Black forms just like ants small
Huddle in your safe black warmth
The world is a bubble
I look up stars glittering high up
In a blackish night sky face of day
That looms close and alien and warm
Large surrounding rounded all around
Round
Hold my breath as I nuzzle against your t-shirt
Black forms just like ants small
Huddle in your safe black warmth
The world is a bubble
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