Literary Vibes - Edition XLIII

Dear Readers,

I have great pleasure in offering to you the Forty third edition of LiteraryVibes.

We are happy to welcome two new contributors to the family of LiteraryVibes in this edition. Dr. T. R. Joy from Chennai is a celebrated Professor, poet and writer. His 'uneven Haikus' is a translation of the poetry of the legendary Malayalam poet Shri Kunhunni and offers a glimpse into the greatness of his creation.

Ms. Sheena Rath is dedicated to the service of Autistic and Mentally Challenged children and runs a school for them named La Casa in Mumbai. A highly gifted poet, her writings reflect deep sensitivities of the human mind.

We wish these two new members of our family great success in their literary career.

Ours is a great country with a massive population of around 1.3 billion people. The problems we face are humongous and mind-boggling. Yet in the midst of this quagmire we have great souls who try their best to help in their own unique way in nation-building. Recently I came across a few such efforts and would like to share two sparks of hope, among many.

Sriprakash Singh, a social worker came to Jalilpur, a remote village in Chandouli district of Uttar Pradesh in 2002 and was shocked to see its unhygienic condition. There was filth everywhere, open defecation was the standard practice and diseases in many forms were rampant. He single handedly took upon himself the task of cleaning up the village, motivating the villagers in sanitation campaign and became a community mobilizer. In 2005 the villagers elected him as the President of the Panhayat and thus Sriprakash got a chance to collaborate with the government for bringing in more positive changes for the people. Today the village is completely open-defecation free, latrines have been constructed in every household and villagers have learnt the value of clean, filth-free living. Jalilpur has become a model for the nearby villages. Sriprakash has shown what inspired leadership can achieve when combined with responsive local administration.

The other initiative which has impressed me a lot is the Har Hath Kalam (A Pen in Every Hand) campaign in Patiala district of Punjab. Started by a bunch of inspired youngsters in 2015-16, this exceptionally innovative effort aims at eradicating child beggary and introducing the deprived children, mostly beggars and rag packers, to schools. The transformation in the lives of these children is phenomenal. "Bananas and chocolates have replaced tobacco sachets (zarda) that some of them used to consume, hands that used to beg and forage for scrap from garbage now hold pencils and pens, and the backs that used to carry sacks full of scrap now don school bags. The cuss words in vernacular that used to be part and parcel of their lingo are now mostly forgotten giving way to 'please', 'thank you', and 'welcome'." (Indian Express, March 31, 2019).

LiteraryVibes salutes these brave soldiers of modern India and wishes them abundant success. We do hope that their initiatives will inspire thousands of such efforts and bring about revolutionary changes in our country.

Readers are invited to share such stories with me. I will be happy to publish them in PositiveVibes/LiteraryVibes.

Wish you a happy reading. Please give your feedback in the Comments Section at the bottom of the page.

With warm regards

Mrutyunjay Sarangi

 

 

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THE SNAKE
Prabhanjan K. Mishra

A snake lives in my garden.
I didn’t kill it when young.
In youth it learnt
to escape detection.
Age and experience
taught it cunning.
 
All these years I have measured
my steps lest I intrude
into its lethal ruse.
My mother worships it, and my wife
admires it from a distance.
Both claim that it visits their dreams.
 
It fascinates my daughter.
She wishes to touch
its gloss and shine,
but apprehensions hold her back.
 
I hate its overtures
in my household.
It threatens to force open
the locked room in the basement
where I hide among
shadows and whispers.
 
(a much published, much admired poem of nineties)

 

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LOVE AMONG EPITAPHS
Prabhanjan K. Mishra

 
After his Thai-massage
she whispers, “Not as strong
as before. Sigh!”
He pats her shrunken flesh.
 
An ascent or a descent (?)
he ponders, “I thought, I was 
strumming a Sitar, not trampling
on mud, you, naughty girl.”
 
She sighs, “No my half-poet,
loud metaphors. Plucking flowers,
stroking with feathers, kneading flour;
are subtler images for delicate hours.”
 
Walking back to past, he hears
peals of laughter, delicious whispers;
he smells fragrance, people call sinful;
eating toffees under Chinese lanterns.
 
Boating was an obsession,
as well taking mud baths,
spilling honey and
licking it off the floor;
 
a look at the roses and lilies
reloaded the tired guns,
they bloomed day and night;
there was no rule book.
 
The river has grown calmer,
‘Quiet flows the Don’,
oars have gone languid,
rowing rhythms with the feeble breeze.
 
Born separate, they have become
conjoined twins, creatures
that forage and wallow together
in each other’s rum and poetry.
 
From gold diggers
they have ended up digging moss,
memories, stone edicts
from times of Incas, Sumerians.
 
He wonders, what he would give her,
when she joins him in ashes
except an epitaph, “Mrs. and Mr. M…
lie here in eternal embrace.”

 

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LITTLE KANT’S JOURNEY INTO THE ANCIENT WORLD OF SCIENCE –
Prabhanjan K. Mishra

Little Kant was doing homework in their sitting room. Suddenly, there was a commotion on the road outside. He ran to the front verandah followed by his parents to check what the uproar was about. They saw a donkey running along the road and braying aloud, followed by a dozen  barking street dogs and a bunch of naughty urchins shouting for fun. Kant asked his father, “What possibly could have disturbed the donkey to such distress, Papa?” By then the donkey had gone silent and was busy grazing on the new patch of lush grass caused by the recent unseasonal showers in a roadside vacant lot, the dogs and children had fallen quiet and were walking away, and two more donkeys had come at full gallop and started grazing by the side of the first one. 
Papa replied with a smile, “Come on Kant, the braying donkey was not complaining, rather I think, the smart fellow was shouting ‘Eureka … Eureka’ like Archimedes of ancient Greece.” Kant was at a loss. He remonstrated, “Father, you are pulling my leg again. What is ‘Eureka’, who is this ‘Archimedes’, and how does a donkey fit into all these heavy-duty funda? I of course know a country called Greece, from where Alexander, the Great, came to invade India.” Father’s  smile further irked little Kant. But his father’s explanation cleared the smoke screen from his mind, “No, I am not pulling your leg my boy, not now at least. ‘Eureka’ is a Greek word meaning ‘I have found it’. Archimedes was a famous Greek scientist in ancient times, around 3rd century BC. He belonged to Syracuse, a princely state inside Greece territory. One day, the residents of Syracuse found a stark-naked bearded man, soaked to his skin, running along the streets, shouting ‘Eureka, Eureka’ meaning ‘I have got it’. A closer look revealed to the people of Syracuse that the naked man was none other than their great scentist, Archimedes. What was the great thing he had got that he was behaving so strangely ? They would come to know; he had found something stupendous, he had just invented a great theory, and had found by this theory the solution to the difficult question asked to him by the king of Syracuse. The king had engaged a goldsmith to make a crown of pure gold. He wanted to know the crown’s purity, besides the goldsmith’s honesty, but he wanted it without melting the crown, as it was a piece of unmatched beauty of fine art. No one among his wise men, his courtiers or any goldsmith had an answer to the king’s curiosity. The purity could only be determined in those days by melting the whole or a part of the crown, and treating the same with chemicals. Archimedes was finally entrusted with the question by the king. He just had found the solution in his bathtub, as he had lowered himself into its water to have a bath. He got so excited over his finding that he forgot he was fully wet, and stark-naked, and he ran along the street to announce his discovery to the whole of Syracuse. Now, dear Kant, coming back to our today’s donkey, I guess he was entrusted with the job of finding good grass by his friends, and he had finally found it by our house. So, he was simply announcing aloud ‘Eureka’ for his donkey friends to hear and come to partake of the feast. Didn’t you see two of his friends who came running and joined him at the new patch of grass?”
Father had a few sips from a steaming cup of tea that mother had just brought for him, smiled at her his ‘thank you, dear’ smile, and proceeded with his story about Archimedes, “See my boy, the moment he had dipped himself into the brimming water tub, water spilled out. He immediately knew that the amount of spilled/displaced water was equal to his own body-volume. He knew that his volume was dependent on the density of his body. The mass or weight of a body was found by multiplying the volume with its density. If another man weighing as much as him had dipped himself in the same tub, the amount of water spilled/displaced would be different, because that fellow, though of the same weight as his, would be having a different body-density than his own and therefore, a different body-volume. Comparing the amounts of water their individual body-density-ratio could be calculated. The same method could be applied to test the crown’s purity. It could be dipped in a brimming pail of water, and next a lump of pure gold equal to the crown’s weight. If the amounts of spilled waters were equal, then the density of the crown and the lump of pure gold were equal. This would prove that the crown was of unadulterated gold. If the spilled waters differed in quantity, then there was adulteration. The king of Syracuse was fully satisfied with his finding and rewarded him. In the process Archimedes had found a new landmark theory in hydraulic science - ‘The Theory of Flotation or Buoyancy’.”
Father took a few more sips from his cup, felt energized, and started revealing more exciting information to his little ward, “You would read in coming years in your school that it was not all that Archimedes invented. His big brain gave the world many more discoveries, a few stood out as unique. He invented the system of levers and pulleys. Using levers or pulleys, or their combination, a force could be multiplied hundreds and thousands times over. A man can move or lift thousands of tons using a crane or earthmover that combines levers and pulleys as force-multipliers. Once Archimedes told his king, ‘Your Majesty, if you give me a little sturdy place to make a fulcrum for my lever, and a sufficiently long and strong rod to use as lever, I can lift the earth with my meagre human strength.’ You know Kant, all our body joints are lever fulcrums and the moving parts are levers. The only sorrow, my dear Kant, is that our body uses a class lever where more force is applied to get much less output. To lift one gram, our hand might be applying 100 grams of force.”
After a few more sips from his cup, father mesmerized Kant further, this time with something in the line of Laser death-ray of Star War fame, his favourite serial on TV. He revealed, “Archimedes invented the Death Ray of his time that made his king very powerful in military engagements. His Death Ray was the sunlight focused to a point on a target using concave mirrors and getting the target to catch fire out of intense heat generated at a spot. The king used the technique to set fire to his enemies’ armada of warships attacking his land from the sea. He carried Death Ray machines in his ship, and set fire to the enemy’s coastal cities or combative vessels, staying at a safe distance from them on the sea. The Death Ray made the king invincible for the time being. Other inventions of Archimedes that easily come to mind were the Centre of Gravity, and the Archimedes Screw. The Centre of Gravity became a landmark finding for even the latter-day scientists. The Archimedes Screw or Water-screw was a device that is used even now at many places to lift water from a lower height to upper heights for irrigation or storage purposes.”
Kant appeared to have been transported far away into the wonderland of science of the ancient times. He looked like a little Archimedes himself to his parents’ doting eyes,  though of course diminutive in size and without the beard of the great inventor. Father shook him and he came back to the present routine chores – mother had gone into kitchen to fix their lunch-boxes, father was getting impatient to get ready for his office, and Kant had to run to school before the prayer-bell.
 

Prabhanjan K. Mishra writes poems, stories, critiques and translates, works in two languages – English and Odia. Three of his collected poems in English have been published into books – VIGIL (1993), Lips of a Canyon (2000), and LITMUS (2005).His Odia poems have appeared in Odia literary journals. His English poems poems have been widely anthologized and published in literary journals. He has translated Bhakti poems (Odia) of Salabaga that have been anthologized into Eating God by Arundhathi Subramaniam and also translated Odia stories of the famous author Fakirmohan Senapati for the book FROM THE MASTER’s LOOM (VINTAGE STORIES OF FAKIRMOHAN SENAPATI). He has also edited the book. He has presided over the POETRY CIRCLE (Mumbai), a poets’ group, and was the editor (1986-96) of the group’s poetry magazine POIESIS. He has won Vineet Gupta Memorial Poetry Award and JIWE Poetry Award for his English poems.He welcomes readers' feedback at his email - prabhanjan.db@gmail.com  

 

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DWAPARA
Hara Prasad Das
Translation by Prabhanjan K. Mishra

 

If you were not privy
how the couple spent the night
in their lush retreat
lit only by a charmed comet,
an excuse for a light;
 
if the divine ecstasy
blinded you not to notice
the feverish passion
feasting on flesh,
 
you have no other go
 
except resorting to logic – 
nothing divine happened
between the two,
sweat and spit
flowed liberally,
 
not a single knot
was left undone,
a tidal passion rose
in the sea
snoozing in flesh.
 
The flag that flutters
atop the temple
is probably a fig leaf
for believers to make
much ado about nothing.
 
The divinity of their union
rather thrashes in pain
like an arrow that broke its tip
after missing
the time’s soft target.

 

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CHARYAAPADA*
Hara Prasad Das
Translation by Prabhanjan K. Mishra

A star feels guilty
over losing
its brilliance;
the ember is wary
of dying
choked in its own smoke.
 
The vase looks bereft,
its wilted flowers removed;
rain clouds rue
over giving a go-by
to a parched land
going fallow.
 
Oarsmen struggle at the oars
across the flooded Vaitarani,
the boat loaded with provisions;
the anxious evening birds
clamour back to the safety
of their nests.
 
(Charyapada was a genre of mystic poetry practiced between 8th and 12th century AD in many Indian languages, especially Odia, Bengali, Assamese, and Maithili. It spoke of life’s drama in metaphors.)
 

Mr. Hara Prasad Das is one of the greatest poets in Odiya literature. He is also an essayist and columnist. Mr. Das, has twelve works of poetry, four of prose, three translations and one piece of fiction to his credit. He is a retired civil servant and has served various UN bodies as an expert.

He is a recipient of numerous awards and recognitions including Kalinga Literary Award (2017), Moortidevi Award(2013), Gangadhar Meher Award (2008), Kendra Sahitya Akademi Award (1999) and Sarala Award (2008)”

 

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MR. MYSTERIOUS (PARICHAYA)
ARUPANANDA PAIGRAHI
Translation by Prabhanjan K. Mishra

 
Shouldn’t you be more friendly
with a crocodile in the river
if you live by its water’s edge?
 
Wouldn’t it be rude to ask
some one’s name and address
as soon as he comes along?
 
Of course, caution is your hallmark
as a householder, you can’t allow
a stranger into your hearth and home.
 
So, you may soften your inquiries –
“Are you passing through this area, bro,
from your place to some other place?”
 
A neighbour may whisper
in your ear, “Take care man,
the stranger could be a thief.”
 
“He may walk away with
the garments of your women
drying out on cloth-lines.”
 
“Imagine women without their clothes!
Wouldn’t they be vulnerable
as the Gopis of Dwapara?”
 
A well-wisher may caution,
“The fellow could be an imposter,
may steal cattle from your shed.”
 
But by the next morning,
you may find him gone; leaving
only harmless footmarks on wet sand;
 
the marks blurring into smears
of a slithering crocodile as it
recedes away into the river.
 
The strange guest would be gone
leaving you disconsolate,
your doubts looking at you accusingly.
 
 

Arupananda Panigrahi is a senior Odia poet, his poems mostly rooted in Odisha’s native soil; has four collections to his credit; he writes his poems in a spoken tradition in an idiom unique to his poetry. Sprinkled with mild irony, his poems subtly closet at their cores the message of hope even at the moment of proverbial last straw of despair. (email add – arupanadi.panigrahi@gmail.com)

 

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KING OF MANGOES

Geetha Nair G

 

 In August, I had moved into a little house close to the sea. It suited me perfectly. For one, it faced west; a symbolic reminder of my setting days. For another, it held no memories; one carries around enough of them already and they need no augmenting. This place was a tabula rasa; well nearly. Is a well- erased slate ever possible for the human kind?

  Some evenings, I went up to the terrace. The house behind mine riveted my attention; I spent much time looking at it. It was a house fit for a king. An imposing mansion, built with the good taste of a lost era, set in the midst of well-kept lawns and gardens… . There were numerous outhouses where several people seemed to be staying. I had counted at least five. I asked one of my new neighbours whose two-storey house overlooked this one, about the Palace, as I called it to myself.

”O that’s the house built by Dr Ramkumar.” He was a revered doctor who had been one of the first to bring the blessed western art of healing to our little city. Long dead, of course. “His great-grandson stays there now; I hear he is an engineer. Doesn’t mingle with any of us.” She sniffed eloquently.

“All those outhouses?”

“O! He lives in style. Has pots of money, you know. He has hired six or seven people. Two gardeners, one man to care for those dogs-haven’t you heard them barking their heads off?-a caretaker with family, two drivers, a security guard.Those little sheds on the other side of your wall; that’s where the men stay. None of them is friendly, though.”

There was a spreading mango tree that bordered my wall. These days, it showered some of its blooms onto my marginal backyard.

My neighbour pointed to it.

“The lord of the house will not allow a single mango to be plucked; they are all for the birds, squirrels, bats!” She wrinkled her nose in disapproval. “Alphonso mangoes, going waste before our eyes, year after year!”

I suddenly remembered that her name was Alphonsa!

Alphonso: the King of mangoes! Bright yellow skin with a streak of red, like the sky at sunset. The insides, saffron, creamy and sweet. Poor Alphonsa. Seeing the fruits bud, swell, ripen and not getting even a single mango to taste! No wonder she was crabby about the King.

Alphonsa pointed out the other fruit trees similarly left for the birds and the beasts. Guava, ruby- fruit, jamba, chikku and seethaphal trees flourished along one side of the vast grounds.

  I never did get to see the King though Alphonsa had said that he did walk around his kingdom occasionally. This was probably because my trips to the terrace were mainly early in the mornings or late in the evenings; times when he was either fast asleep or indoors with his family. Yes; he had a wife and two children, I had been told; there were three swanky cars lined up for the four of them. The wife and children never did step outdoors, I think; theirs was a car-to-carpet life.

  Gradually the workers grew familiar to my eyes and ears. I could identify the shrill voice of the caretaker’s wife, usually chiding her husband in unchaste Tamil; his replies were low and grouchy. She was the only woman among the staff. She was a thin virago with corkscrew curls and a big bindi. There was a youngish man in shorts; probably one of the gardeners ; he would often potter around the garden, early in the morning, then go out on his bicycle. Errand boy as well, I presumed. He had a Bihari look about him; “Bihari” is for us in Kerala today, an umbrella term, encompassing migrant workers from several states lying to the north-east. Then there was the old driver who was forever washing and polishing the cars. Once, I had seen him getting into the driving seat of the BMW. It had rolled smoothly out of the gate. Not a glimpse did I catch of its occupants! There was the thin dog-keeper; I would see the two huge German shepherds pulling him around the garden every evening. The other gardener and driver I had not been able to place so far.

 The garden was a lovely one. Exotic roses, orchids, anthurium, heliconia and hydrangea vied with our very own rajamalli, nandiyarvattam and parijatha.The heady scent of the parijatha in flower would drift to me some nights and bring back memories. God gave us memories that we might have parijathas in December.

 The place had captured my imagination. I wove stories about the people there. I took to putting up impressionistic word-pictures of the house and its servers, of the forbidden mango tree and Alphonsa’s delightfully tart comments as my status updates on whatsapp.

 Meanwhile, summer was setting in. The mangoes were ripening. There were the cries of squirrels and an assortment of birds to wake me every morning. When I opened my bedroom window I could see bunches of dangling, luscious fruit, high above me.

 Alphonsa came out for a chat to the corner of the side-road most evenings. It was the modern equivalent of the village well and gave us immense satisfaction. After a round-up of events and scandals in the locality, we moved inevitably to the mangoes. There followed a joint-lament.

  One Sunday morning, while walking on the terrace, I saw the Bihari. He was picking up half-eaten, ripe mangoes that the birds had left behind and dropping them into a thick paper bag. He saw me and gave me a smile: the first I had got from any of them.

On an impulse, I asked him, in Hindi, “Doesn’t anyone ever pluck at least a few of these mangoes?”

 He looked a little confused, then shook his head and turned away without a word. I felt a little embarrassed.

Thar evening, as I was getting ready to go out to the city for some shopping, the doorbell rang. I opened the door and found the Bihari standing on my doorstep. He had a cloth bag in his hand. What struck me was that he was nattily dressed and looked very smart indeed. He addressed me in impeccable Malayalam, “Some of my Alphonso mangoes for you, Madam.”

My evident confusion made him smile. “May I come in?” he asked.

I held the door wide open; he walked in, deposited the heavy bag on the floor and sat down on the sofa.

“Your whatsapp posts were sent to me as screen shots by one of my friends who is one of yours as well. Manoj. He filled me in on a few details as well.”

Seeing that I was still confused, he added, “Madam, I am your next-door neighbour. My name is Ramkumar; I was named after my illustrious great grandfather, the doctor… .”

I smiled weakly and then offered him thanks and a cup of tea.

He accepted the former but rejected the latter.” I see you are going out. So am I.” He smiled impishly as he continued, ”Please don’t use Hindi on me again; I couldn’t string together a sentence in Hindi to save my life; I grew up in Tamil Nadu.” My face, I knew, was bright red with embarrassment; that’s something I have never out-grown.

“I love cycling and it helps me to stay fit in my sedentary life. Some mornings, I cycle right up to Kovalam!” he added, still smiling.

“Son,” I began, “I am sorry….” He cut me short with a smile and a wave of his hand. “Please don’t say a word. You have taught me a valuable lesson.”

  At the door, I saw him pick up another heavy bag of mangoes which he had left just outside. “These are for our common neighbour - that must be her house.” He was pointing in the right direction. I nodded. “Alphonsos for Alphonsa,” he chuckled as he walked briskly away.

 

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PORPHYRIA’S  LOVER

Geetha Nair G

 

I must have taught him twenty times at least.

Thrown him to my pups, alert, for a change;

They had gasped; then wept for Porphyria,

Raged against her lover.

Together we had zeroed in to the kill,

Torn him to pieces,

Dissected his fevered brain.

Praised the poet’s skill.

 

I had felt smug inside he wasn't mine -

Porphyria 's insane lover.

 

Who could have prophesied then

This walk into his dimming den,

This mute surrender at his call,

His hungry hands around my throat,

( my hair not long at all )

And the wait, this interminable wait;

 Inert; Unheard;

While rainwater dries and embers fall-

For still God has not said a word !

 

Ms. Geetha Nair G is a retired Professor of English,  settled in Trivandrum, Kerala. She has been a teacher and critic of English literature  for more than 30 years. Poetry is her first love and continues to be her passion. A collection of her poems,  "SHORED FRAGMENTS " was published in January' 2019. She welcomes readers' feedback at her email - geenagster@gmail.com 

 

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FROM THE EXTRA MEDICAL WARD

Bibhu Padhi

 

1.

 

You pulled down the slender oxygen tube

and let your sweat dry into

the savage hours of the night;

you let your body lose its native heat,

its last lingering shine.

 

You remembered the early morning voices

and how little they meant to you

now that you were

beginning to examine the intricate

maneuverings of the soul.

 

I saw you from a space of difference,

felt near my lips

your warm departing breath.

I watched how my cousin’s fresh blood

danced into my life, drop after drop.

 

As the day was wearing off,

qualified men quietly brought back

their old indifference to going things

and stopped your dark blind look

from the general eye.

 

You never let your good wife know,

although now it hardly mattered;

your soul had sent its message of love

into her ears, and so you straightened your body

and waited for the final nightfall.

 

2.

He thought he was

the lord of the world, now that

he had finally brought

his deaf-mute boy

to such a large hospital.

 

My interfering mother made all the stupid inquires--

how it came, what exactly happened,

can he make proper gestures, now that

his arms were losing their strength

under the pressure of weight.

 

“Under my eyes I have seen his teeth

clench in pain, his body take

the colour of falling leaves,

his innocent, flower-like eyes

turn yellow at their edges.

 

I’ve asked my daughter to read from

the Holy Quran every day. Believe me,

the wise men of my village have assured me

that if he survives the eighth night,

he can eat his favorite cashew-nuts again.”

 

That night I invented how language

to console the old man, who

raised his thin wrinkled arms

to Allah, his modest tears

lurking at the corners of his eyes.

 

Before the next sun had touched

the sky, the boy opened

his eyes, saw his world

of small, unremembered things

close at his fingertips, died.

 

A Pushcart nominee, Bibhu Padhi  has published twelve books of poetry. His poems have been published in distinguished magazines throughout the English-speaking world, such as  The Poetry Review, Poetry Wales, The Rialto, Stand, The American Scholar, Colorado Review, Confrontation, New Letters, Poet Lore, Prairie Schooner, Poetry,  Southwest Review, The Literary Review, TriQuarterly, Tulane Review, Xavier Review, Antigonish Review, Queen’s Quarterly, The Illustrated Weekly of India and Indian Literature. They have been included in numerous anthologies and textbooks. Three of the most recent are Language for a New Century (Norton)  60 Indian Poets (Penguin) and The HarperCollins Book of English Poetry (HarperCollins). He lives with his family in Bhubaneswar, Odisha. Bibhu Padhi  welcomes readers' feedback on his poems at padhi.bibhu@gmail.com   

 

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SCARS RESURRECTED

Dilip Mohapatra

 

You sliced me with your scalpel

and your blade’s invasions

leave the evidence engraved

with your signature affixed to it

and you added one more trophy

to your collections

while my scars dried up in time

as the blood coagulated.

 

Now that the scars scream

in immortalised agony

you question my silence

all these years

and accuse me of mudslinging

all out to ruin your impeccable and closely guarded public image

while cartoonists give vent

to their creativity

in lampooning  my pain in social media

debaters and critics pulling me from all sides mercilessly

like the hyenas and vultures tug at the kill.

 

My trauma

my torment

so long in hibernation

gnawing my ins and outs

like a maggot thriving in a piece

of decadent meat

is exhumed now

and it has thawed

and found its voice

that was lost to the vagaries

of time and tides.

 

It’s confession time

come out in the clear

and bury your scalpel for good

for no one really likes to bleed

and the scars never die.

 

They continue to

pulsate

and breathe....

till eternity.

 

Dilip Mohapatra (b.1950), a decorated Navy Veteran is a well acclaimed poet in contemporary English and his poems appear in many literary journals of repute and multiple anthologies  worldwide. He has six poetry collections to his credit so far published by Authorspress, India. He has also authored a Career Navigation Manual for students seeking a corporate career. This book C2C nee Campus to Corporate had been a best seller in the category of Management Education. He lives with his wife in Pune, India.

 

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THE FACE

Dr. Nikhil M. Kurien

 

Where is that difference in each face

Which makes me, you and all different.

Every face that pass by me is assorted.

Some bit pretty, ugly or pretty ugly.

They come in all dimensions:

Elongated, shortened, stretched

Concave, convex , bizarre,

Square, triangular, rounded.

Male, female or child

Quiet different they are.

Threaded eyebrows, gelled hairstyles

Razored sideburns, varied moustaches

Or a designer beard, grey or jet black.

But still every face is different,

And these are just accessories to the face.

 

Eyes, ears, mouth, nose

And to sheath the spaces

Cheeks, forehead and chin.

Every face that I behold has only

These much characteristic elements,

Maybe minus any of above.

But how unique is each face.

A touch here, a swish there.

A snap, a stroke, a blow,

 

A scoop and daub somewhere

 And finally a dash of colour  flinged.

Eyes sunk, lips short, chubby cheeks,

Nose pointed, forehead broad,

Chin advanced or ears flared,

Every such alternatives considered.

A scar, freckles or pimples

Every such alterations  deliberated.

But to create a zillion faces and more

Ever since creation or evolution,

Each varied and distinguishable,

All from the same dye,

‘The human facial grid’

Is debatable and investigable.

 

Where is that difference and why,

Which other animals dont have,

And more incredible the fact,

The same face of yours

Is changing it’s shape throughout

And even more astounding,

Fact that your own face is assymetrical

And differs on either sides.

 

Dr. Nikhil M Kurien is a professor in maxillofacial surgery working  in a reputed dental college in Trivandrum. He has published 2 books.  A novel , "the scarecrow" in 2002  and "miracle mix - a repository of poems" in 2016 under the pen name of nmk. Dr. Kurien welcomes readers' feedback on his email - nikhilmkurien@gmail.com.

 

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WEAVES OF TIME

Sangeeta Gupta

XV

Time disappears
come the hour
of tight-lipped silence,
then when no sound is
only stillness

no noise even of any 
thought, absolute bliss it is
for once you are not 
amiss, but centered in 
your crucial life-cell and 
as to realize
you are
complete by yourself

by yourself—you?
yes you a whole Universe.
 

XVI

Only in an unfractured 
silence can one thrive
there then is no wandering 
mind, no sound, no noise, no 
thought
no past,
no future nor

Time only in the moment is.
So aware be
of each passing moment
time, time only in the present 
is— no not
in no past, no future.

in that moment alone joy,
alive like the crazy
honey-drunk bee
 

Sangeeta Gupta, a highly  acclaimed artist, poet and film maker also served as a top bureaucrat as an IRS Officer,recently retired as chief commissioner of income tax. Presently working as Advisor (finance & administration) to Lalit Kala Akademi, National Akademi of visual arts. She has to her credit 34solo exhibitions , 20 books , 7 books translated , 7 documentary films.

A poet in her own right and an artist, Sangeeta Gupta started her artistic journey with intricate drawings. Her real calling was discovered in her abstracts in oils and acrylics on canvas. Her solo shows with Kumar Gallery launched her love for contour within the abyss of colour; the works seemed to stir both within and without and splash off the canvas.

Her tryst with art is born of her own meditative ruminations in time, the undulating blend of calligraphic and sculptonic entities are  realms that she has explored with aplomb. Images in abstraction that harkens the memory of Himalayan journeys and inspirations, the works speak of an artistic sojourn that continues in a mood of ruminations and reflections over the passage of time.

Sangeeta wields the brush with finesse, suggesting the viscosity of ink, the glossiness of lacquer, the mist of heights, the glow of the sun, and the inherent palette of rocks when wet. The canvases bespeak surfaces akin to skin, bark and the earth. 

Her first solo exhibition was at the Birla Academy of Art & Culture, Kolkata in 1995. Her 34 solo shows have been held all over India i.e. Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Lucknow, Chandigarh and abroad at London, Berlin, Munich, Lahore, Belfast, Thessolinki. one of her exhibitions was inaugurated by the former President of India; Dr. A.P.J Abdul Kalam in August, 2013. Which was dedicated to Uttarakhand, fund raised through sale proceeds of the paintings is  used for creating a Fine Art Education grant for the students of Uttarakhand. She has participated in more than 200 group shows in India & abroad, in national exhibitions of Lalit Kala Akademi All India Fine Arts & Craft Society and in several art camps. Her painting are in the permanent collection of Bharat Bhavan Museum, Bhopal and museums in Belgium and Thessolinki .  Her works have been represented in India Art Fairs, New Delhi many times.

She has received 69th annual award for drawing in 1998 and 77th annual award for painting in 2005 by AIFACS, New Delhi and was also conferred Hindprabha award for Indian Women Achievers by Uttar Pradesh Mahila Manch in 1999, Udbhav Shikhar Samman 2012 by Udbhav for her achievements in the field of art and literature and was awarded "Vishwa Hindi Pracheta Alankaran" 2013 by Uttar Pradesh Hindi Saahitya Sammelan & Utkarsh Academy, Kanpur. She was bestowed with Women Achievers Award from Indian Council for UN relations.

She is a bilingual poet and has   anthologies of poems in  Hindi and English to her credit. Her poems are translated in many languages ie in Bangla, English and German, Dogri, Greek, urdu. Lekhak ka Samay, is a compilation of interviews of eminent women writers. Weaves of Time, Ekam, song of silence are collection of poems in English. Song of the Cosmos is her creative biography. Mussavir ka Khayal and Roshani ka safar are her books of poems and drawings/paintings.

She has directed, scripted and shot 7 documentary films. Her first film “Keshav Malik- A Look Back”, is a reflection on the life of the noted poet & art critic Keshav Malik. He was an Art Critic of Hindustan Times and Times of India. The film features, several eminent painters, poets, scholars and their views on his life. The film was screened in 2012, at Indian Council for Cultural Relations, , Kiran Nadar Museum of Art, Sanskriti Kendra, Anandgram, New Delhi and at kala Ghora Art Festival, Mumbai 2013. Her other  documentaries “Keshav Malik – Root, Branch, Bloom” and “Keshav Malik- The Truth of Art” were screened by India International Centre and telecast on national television several times.

Widely travelled, lives and works in Delhi, India.

 

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THE DESIRE NOT-TO-BE

Major Dr. Sumitra Mishra 

 

The last time we saw him

My father-in-law,

Eighty-eight calendar years

In the pocket of his life,

His soul restless, body decimated

Was groping for an eyehole

On the trap door of his body

I was not sure

Whether he desired

To be or not to be.

 

The shadow of death

Hanging somewhere near

The bed-head or above the pillow

His appetite drowned in drugs

But the palate pleading

For cakes and mutton,

The body trying to severe earthly ties

With the sharp scissors of silence,

Withering eyes sunken-soft yet vigilant,

Nerves feeble, languorous,

Yet the mind alert and attentive,

Counting the steps towards

His dream destination-Swargadwara

Calculating the expenses of the funeral

A figure of pitiable fragility

In his immaculate white attire,

I could not be so sure

Whether he desired

To be or not to be.

 

The desire to relinquish

Apparent yet unreal

The determination to leave

Unvarnished yet fake;

All his mortal duties

Completed in due course of time,

He was preparing for

The final long journey

But was it deliberate euthanasia

 

From the unhappiness at the apathy,

The pain of being rejected

The lack of dignity in living

Or a state of Samadhi

For a peaceful end

And ecstasy to return home,

Or silent prayer,

Meditation or self delusion

The austere face did not show,

So I was not sure

If his abstinence

Was a practice of Samadhi,

Or a shallow pretense

Hanging between

The desire to be

Or not to be.

 

Major Dr. Sumitra Mishra is a retired Professor of English who worked under the Government of Odisha and retired as the Principal, Government Women’s College, Sambalpur. She has also worked as an Associate N.C.C. Officer in the Girls’ Wing, N.C.C. But despite being a student, teacher ,scholar and supervisor of English literature, her love for her mother tongue Odia is boundless. A lover of literature, she started writing early in life and contributed poetry and stories to various anthologies in English and magazines in Odia. After retirement ,she has devoted herself more determinedly to reading and writing in Odia, her mother tongue.

A life member of the Odisha Lekhika Sansad and the Sub-editor of a magazine titled “Smruti Santwona” she has published works in both English and Odia language. Her  four collections of poetry in English, titled “The Soul of Fire”, “Penelope’s Web”, “Flames of Silence” and “Still the Stones Sing” are published by Authorspress, Delhi. She has also published eight books in Odia. Three poetry collections, “Udasa Godhuli”, “Mana Murchhana”, “Pritipuspa”, three short story collections , “Aahata Aparanha”, “Nishbda Bhaunri”, “Panata Kanire Akasha”, two full plays, “Pathaprante”, “Batyapare”.By the way her husband Professor Dr Gangadhar Mishra is also a retired Professor of English, who worked as the Director of Higher Education, Government of Odisha. He has authored some scholarly books on English literature and a novel in English titled “The Harvesters”.

 

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POTRAIT

Kabiratna Dr. Manorama Mahapatra

Translated by Sumitra Mishra

 

 

The one who could have impeded

the tides of surging youth

is now inside the womb.

 

The surging currents of 

female feticide haunts the mind.

An unpleasant uneasiness persists.

She may not see the light of this world.

Then what?

When the billows of 

youthful pleasure 

breaks all the bridges of restraint

May be, the aroma of a forlorn soul 

would be squandered

in the darkness of distrust!

 

What would remain is 

the portrait of the massive grief.

 

Kabiratna Smt. Manorama Mohapatra is a renowned poet of Odisha who is revered as the ex-editor of the oldest Odia daily newspaper “Samaj”. She is a columnist, poet, playwright who has also contributed a lot to children’s literature in Odia. She has received several awards including the National Academy Award, Sarala Award and many more. Her works have been translated into English, Sanskrit and many Indian languages. Her works are replete with sparks of rebellion against dead rituals and blind beliefs against women. She is a highly respected social activist  and philanthropist.

 

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CATASTROPHE
Sharanya Bee 

 

Our voices strike pandemonium;
Spears and arrows hurled in the air
Daggers dripping red, it's a war zone
a verbal match. It isn't about what you or I did anymore;
There is no voice of reason;
Only our worst imaginations for each other
pelted against our insecurities;
While every mistake made in the past wiggles around 
like freshly unearthed vermins, multiplying.
Yes, we've dug through the mud of forgiveness
that promised to keep them buried in forever;
We growl at each other like mad dogs,
baring sharp fangs, ready to tear each other down;
We rip off each other's shields of dignity,
"It's a heated argument." Say the neighbours peering out of their doors,
Meanwhile our house is renamed 'Catastrophe'.

 

Sharanya Bee, is a young poet from Trivandrum, who is presently pursuing a Bachelor’s degree in English Literature in Kerala University. She also has a professional background of working as a Creative Intern in Advertising. She is passionate about Drawing and Creative Writing.

 

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WEDDING

Prof. Sridevi Selvaraj

 

I entered the wedding hall and was received warmly by the hospitality committee at the entrance. The young, bedecked girls showered me with their love and fragrant water and sandal paste. They were very happy to see me – very keen to please me. I was very happy with all the attention at the end of a working day – pleased with this beautiful world. 

It was my friend’s wedding and I was naturally excited. She would be busy in her bridal room and I didn’t want to demand attention for myself. It must have been a hectic and hard day for her. I didn’t want to add on to her troubles of attending to guests. I could take care of my self –  after all,it was my friend’s wedding. I decided to just enjoy the moment.

I drank the cool and lovely lemon juice that was brought to me by another sweet- looking, gentle girl. It refreshed me and I went to the last row and sat down. All these girls are so kind, and calm, I thought. And just look attheir smiles…amazing. Life was at its best.

 

M.S. Subbulakshmi’s ‘kurai ontrum illai’ was being played on the violin by a young man, and I just relaxed and listened. Now and then I closed my eyes and was lost in my world. There are no complaints actually. Life is fine as it is.

Half-an-hour went by and still the bride and groom had not turned up; it was already 7pm and it was after my day’s work that I had gone for the wedding reception; I began to feel a little tension. I would have to start for home by eight pm at least, and still the bride had not turned up.

Suddenly another friend of mine, not exactly my friend actually, just someone I knew by-smile-smile contact, looked at me and we smiled at each other. She showed happiness at seeing me and came to me and asked if was related to the groom.  I said I was the bride’s friend. She showed surprise and asked me how I knew the bride and I said we had studied together. She was a little perplexed. 

I wondered about her perplexed expression.

And just then the bride entered – a girl in her early twenties, but my friend was in her late twenties. 

Now it was my turn to be perplexed and the lady with whom I had the smile-smile contact came closer and asked me if my friend’s name was Sountharya. I said ‘‘Yes.’’

She said, ‘‘That’s it. There are two weddings – one on the ground floor and one on the first floor – and both the girls have the same name.’’

She began smiling – not the contact smile – the real smile of understanding. I also began smiling. What else to do? 

I climbed up the stairs and there was my friend with her husband on the dais and the first thing she asked me was – ‘‘Did you by mistake go to the ground floor wedding?’’

How did she come to know about my adventure? This is my question even now.

 

Prof. S. Sridevi has been teaching English in a research department in a college affiliated to the University of Madras for 30 years. She has published two collections of poems in English: Heralds of Change and Reservations. Her prose works are: Critical Essays, Saivism: Books 1-8 (Co-authors-C.T.Indra & Meenakshi Hariharan), Think English Talk English, Communication Skills, and Communicative English for Engineers (Co-Author-Srividya).  She has translated Thirukural, Part I into Tamil. Her Tamil poetry collections are:  Aduppadi Kavithaigal, Pennin Paarvaiyil, Naan Sivam and Penn Enum Perunthee.

 

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WHAT IS WHAT

Dr (Major) B C Nayak

 

If you know “what is what”,
about this,
refresh your knowledge.
If you don’t know,
boost your knowledge.
The price tag on the former,
“Thumbs up”,
on the later;
“thumbs up and a clap”,
Obviously, for the author.

War of Roses,
fought between
Rival royal houses,
a bloody civil war
in England in the Fifteenth Century.

Richard, Duke of York,
killed in 1460,
at the Battle of Wakefield against
the House of Lancaster.

His son,
King Richard III,
was killed at the Battle
of Bosworth Field in 1485,
and discovered buried
under a carpark in Leicester,
five centuries later.

This story:
Encroached,
And Hidden between infra and ultra,
The famous mnemonic, vibgyor:
Sequence is Newton’s sevenfold
red, orange, yellow, green, blue,
indigo and violet,
remembered by another mnemonic
“Richard Of York Gave Battle In Vain (ROYGBIV)”.

Manifests in the sky
as a mesmerized
multi colored arc,
still with petrichor,
post a shower.

A meteorological phenomenon
of reflection, refraction
and dispersion of light
in water droplets,
to give a spectrum of light,
opposite the sun,
seen in morning western sky,
and in the eastern sky
of early evening.

It is said,
“rainbow represents a paradox.
A unique mix of light and clouds;
it’s radiance cloaked.
Every living human being,
every element of our lives,
is analogous to one of its colors,
Our job is to blend
all the hues of life
in one beautiful rainbow.”

 

Grateful to  Dr Ajaya Upadhyaya, my friend for editing the poem.

 

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THE 27TH LETTER OF THE ALPHABET

Dr (Major) B C Nayak

Surprised ??!!!
A symbol,
Representing the word ,
and(&).
It is ampersand,
Now-a-days,  used for aesthetic 
in various logos and names.
And no longer holds it ‘s position 
as the 27th letter of the English alphabet.

Development:
ET
et
?t (Some modern fonts, like Trebuchet MS, employ ampersand characters that reveal its origin)
eτ
& (italic, 1735)
& in modern handwriting
&.

Not much in use
Only symbolic,
Long dead the status,
Still gasping, 
in the epitaph “&”.
Like all except,
Krishna and Vikarna of Mahabharat.

The most revered epic,
with the most shameful,
most sinful disrobing
of Panchali ,wife of five
invincible  warriors ot that age
and the most wise
most learned kiths and kins,
except Vikarna, who objected to it
and Srikrishna who saved her.!

And the rest with their heroics,
like the 27th letter of the alphabet,
left this world with,
“We may be pardoned,
for our sin, for our unpardonable
Act, we did it as forced by the circumstances”

Befitting epitaph !!!!

 

Dr. (Major) B. C. Nayak is an Anaesthetist who did his MBBS from MKCG Medical College, Berhampur, Odisha. He is an MD from the Armed Forces Medical College, Pune and an FCCP from the College of Chest Physicians New Delhi. He served in Indian Army for ten years (1975-1985) and had a stint of five years in the Royal Army of Muscat. Since 1993 he is working as the Chief Consultant Anaesthetist, Emergency and Critical Care Medicine at the Indira Gandhi Cooperative Hospital, Cochin

 

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CAUVERY TEACHER

Barathi Srinivasan

 

The River Cauvery has always played a crucial role in the lives of the Delta People. Be it for the crops or for the ceremonies held at her banks, she had always been with them from their birth till death. She is a source of wealth, health and devotion for the simple folks who live on her banks. Most of these people worship her as a Goddess and when a girl child is born, they name her Cauvery. The protagonist of this story too, is born in such a family, where their livelihood is based on the flow of the river.

Cauvery’s mother Ponni and her father Subbaiyah are farm workers.  They owned a piece of land at Kattuputtur, a village near Musiri, Trichy district. On the land, Subbaiah mostly planted banana trees like other farmers in the area. Usually, people think that banana farms do not seek much attention. But ironically, bannana farms are the ones that need constant grooming. One has to be always alert to the seasonal rains that come as a whiplash and destroy the banana trees at the fruit-bearing stage. Subbaiah being a hard worker toiled day and night on his small farm. He was happy to be helped by his wife, Ponni.

Ponni is a rare breed of a woman. She is a foundling brought up by Subiah’s grandmother Karruppayi.  Four decades ago, when Karruppayi was trying to catch some fish for preparing her husband Muthaiah’s favourite tasty Meen Kuzhambu (Fish Gravy), she heard a child’s cry at some distance. “Ayyah, I hear a child’s cry somewhere, do you hear that” she asked her husband. “Arree, this is all your illusion. Always you are thinking about your grandson Subiah, that’s why you always keep hearning this or that… now, concentrate on the task at hand. I’m already hungry ” responded Muthaiah. Again the same strange sound of an infant “…ingahh…kuwahh…kuwahh..ingahh” Without further delay, leaving the net and mud pot on the shore, Karuppayi ran to the nearby mulberry bush. 

Karrupayi could not believe her own eyes. She saw a small female child wrapped neatly in a piece of soft white cloth. The child was crying in hunger. Not knowing what to do, Karuppayi took the child in her arms and held it close to her bosom. Her body warmth comforted the child a bit and it stopped crying. “Oh Karuppayi, here I am dying out of hunger, what are you doing there in the mulberry bush, plucking fruits for Subaiah,” came Muthaiah yelling. But when he neared his wife, he froze with shock. “Oh! Such a sweet rose… which idiot has left her here” he questioned. There was an unnatural silence between them for a few minutes. Finally, Karuppayi broke the silence and spoke, “It seems the mother is not in a position to take care of this child.  Our daughter Kuyili has left us to join her husband’s family. Perhaps this small girl may fill the empty space” said Karuppayi.

Again there was a deadly silence for a while. At last, Muthaiah spoke in a gruff voice, “Look Karuppayi, we are not a young couple to bring up this child. I am already sixty and you …” “Areyy, when will you stop talking about such things? You may be old, but look at me… I am still young and energetic. Moreover, you can’t find a grey hair on my head. Can you? I bet…” said Karupayi. “Ok, lets not argue over this… come on I’m already hungry.” “Hey, why can’t you wait for sometime; I will cook food in a jiffy just wait and see” saying so, she took the infant in her arms and started to walk fast towards home. There she put the infant in a comfortable bed made of her cotton saree. Then, rushing to the kichen, she started grinding the herbs in a mechanical way.

Time rolled on and the small infant is now a eighteen year old girl. They named her Ponni, after one of the perennial rivers in Tamilnadu. Ponni helped Karuppayi in her household work and farming. When Ponni attained age, Karuppayi married her off to her only grandson, Subaiah. Now both Karuppayi and Muthaiah are no more. They attained heaven one after the other after a year of Ponni’s marriage.

Life in a village is not so easy as city dwellers think. Ponni struggled with Subbaiah to make both ends meet. Further, the lack of certain facilities made the village a dull place to live. Many of the villagers had already relocated to the nearby towns for a better lifestyle. Subbaiah was also trying hard to shift his family, but the time has not yet ripened for him. So, he had to be happy with what he had.  In this situation, Ponni had some good news to share with Subbaiah. When she whispered it in his years, Subbaiah became exuberant with joy. He scooped Ponni in his arms like a small lamb and carried her off to the river bank. Holding her hand he closed his eyes and made a wish to the river that was flowing as a silent witness to the happenings around.

***********************************************************

 

The setting sun outstretched his golden hands to caress the lass’s rosy cheeks.  The lady, in her early twenties rushed out of the school and took an auto rickshaw. “Take this Twenty rupees, brother” said the sweet female voice. “Oh, Amma, in which world are you ? Give me forty rupees.”

”What! Forty rupees for just two kilometers! Had I known, I would have rather walked. Don’t try to be over smart, take these twenty rupees and be satisfied. What do you think ? Does money grow on trees?”

“Oh, amma, please stop. Give whatever you want to, but don’t go on talking like this” saying so, the driver disappeared in a cloud of dust and smoke. “Oh, my dear child, why do you always argue with others?” Ponni came out of the house to receive her daughter Cauvery.

Unlike her parents, Cauvery was convent educated. It was Subbaiah who wished that his daughter must be educated and be of service to the society. As per her father’s wish, after her graduation, Cauvery joined the local school as a teacher.

Cauvery’s thirst for knowledge and social service never had any boundaries. She educated the local children free of cost. Also, she took initiatives to educate the poor farmers on how to economically cultivate their land and so on. Cauvery’s parents forced her to select a suitable boy for marriage. “Mummy, Daddy, please forgive me. I am your daughter and you have all the rights to do whatever you like. But, I have a goal in my life. I want to serve our village by constructing a school here. This needs much time and money. So please, don’t talk about sending me off from this village. ”

Years rolled by and the once-young Cauvery sits on the rocking chair reminiscing the past. The photo of her ever smiling parents hangs above her head. On the table a name plate shines, bearing the title- Ms. Cauvery, Head Mistress.

 

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TEACHER'S DAY

Barathi Srinivasan 

 

Rathi has a big group of followers and whatever she says becomes the rule of the rooster.  As Teacher's Day is nearing, students in every class have started making plans to celebrate it in their own way. Some of them have even started to save their pocket money to buy beautiful gifts for their favourite teachers.

Rathi held a meeting with her gang. This time, she wanted to do something big and most memorable. Last year, her rival Ranjula had bought a Parker pen each for all the teachers. This had became a reigning sensation and the talk of the school for almost a year. So, this time, Rathi had determined to beat the plans of Ranjula. For this reason, she called for a meeting with her friends Ratna, Meghna, Sanjana and Shubhangi. Every one in the gang gave their suggestions. But Rathi was not at all satisfied. "Oh, all your ideas are just so dumb, why can't you think differently?" "Rathi, that's all we can think. You see, we don’t eat ladies’finger as much as you do," said the friends in chorus obviously to mock Rathi who was chewing her thumb.

Rathi couldn't concentrate on lessons as she was thinking of buying a gift that had to beat Ranjula's. Immediately after reaching home, she broke open her piggy bank and counted the coins and notes. She had a total sum of two thousand five hundred bucks. "Oh, it's quite a good sum! " she spoke to herself and with that money, she bought a costly gift from Big Bazaar and neatly packed it in golden foil sheet decorated with small button roses. She held the gift at arm’s length and admired her own choice. " Surely, this time that Ranju can't beat my gift" she thought with pride.

The next day, Rathi got up earlier than usual and checked her bag to confirm if she had kept the gift ready. Soon students started crowding the entrance and it was very noisy with cheerful greetings of the little girls.

As the bell rang, Rathi entered her class . She eagerly waited for her teacher. She planned to give the gift as soon as the teacher entered. So she kept a strict vigil of the entrance. When the teacher entered, her face lit up and as she got up with her gift in hand, she saw her teacher looked a bit troubled. So without a word she withdrew herself and walked towards her bench. Her bench mates were surprised by her act. The teacher took the answer scripts from her bag. She was searching for something in the bag. Just then, Ranjula entered the class and greeted her teacher and gave her a red pen. The teacher’s face became bright; she thanked Ranjula and asked her to sit in her place. Then she called everyone by their roll number and gave out the answer scripts. Some students got severe criticism and when it was Ranjula's turn,Teacher said she had topped this time too. The whole class clapped for her. Then Teacher called Rathi and advised her to set aside all her pranks and concentrate more on studies. She had secured the second position. Rathi’s face fell and with a long face she took the paper from her Teacher and handed over the gift to her. Soon the bell rang and all the children rushed out of the class. The teacher too, gingerly put the pen Ranjula had given in her purse and closed it. In her hurry to leave, she forgot the gift. It lay there on the table.

 

 

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SONNET TO A RIVER

Barathi Srinivasan

 

I travel down the hills with quiet ripples

I cross the mills owned by the affluent,

the society’s cripples

hinder my path,

constructing reservoirs

with all their greed, and say

they behave with propriety.

 

Such great memoirs

they write about the success of their creed

and I, with no choice succumb

to their need like a numb

humming bird with no voice

 

I run with malice to none

for I am just a flowing river.

 

Dr S. Barathi is a bilingual poet, reviewer, translator and an Assistant Professor in the Department of English at Srinivasa Ramanujan Centre, SASTRA Deemed to be University, Kumbakonam. She is an executive committee member of GIEWEC (Guild of Indian Writers Editors and Criticsk) and a member of SAALT (South African Association of Language Teaching). Her poems were widely anthologized in various national and international poetry collections and magazines. She has translated Gujarati writer Jayanti M Dalal’s novel Ordeal of Innocence into Tamil titled Arindum Ariyaamalum and Mr Sundar Rajan’s short story collection  Eternal Art into Tamil as Nithiyakkalai and Dr K V Dominic’s Poetry Collection Winged Reason into Tamil titled Gyanach Chiragugal. Besides, she has also translated Jordanian poet and translator Mr. Nizar Sartawi’s poems titled My Shadow into Tamil titled En Nizhal.

 

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RASA POORNIMA 
Kamar Sultana Sheik

The heavens seem to have descended,
With the golden Sharad full-moon,
Else why would the city seem,
Like the abode of other-worldly beings?
Crowning, first this, then that,
Skyscraper and high-rise,
Then basking in the full glory
Of a full-moonrise?

Tonight, the Moon makes Earth its abode..
Shining into the minds of bards,
Pouring itself into Jasmine and Lily,
Laying its sheet of sheer moonlight,
Like a sheen, over sand and water,
Dyeing them Golden and Silver,
Working its alchemy on the milk-bowl,
Making it Amrita !
Oh, Maker of Rasa, give me the Nectar,
Of the ever-awake...
For, should She, of the Lotus-Seat 
Arrive at my threshold,
In a million coins of Gold,
I shall rise to welcome her
Into my household.
Give me the secret 
of the Flautist's Leela,
That silences storms and lifts up mountains
Intoxicates lovers and bestows Moksha on Sages..

O Rasa-Moon of Sharad,
Harbinger of bountiful harvests,
Have you harvested my heart, likewise?
For it seems not to obey me today,
Dancing to every nuance, reflected 
On your golden face,
And I, stand there, in willing surrender!

 

Ms. Kamar Sultana Sheik is a poet, writing mostly on themes of spirituality, mysticism and nature with a focus in Sufi Poetry. A post-graduate in Botany, she was educated at St. Aloysious Anglo-Indian School ( Presentation Convent, Vepery) and completed her degree from SIET womens' college, Chennai. Her professional career spanning 18 years has been in various organizations and Institutions including the IT sector. She is a self-styled life coach and has currently taken a break to focus on her writing full-time. Sultana has contributed to various anthologies and won several prizes in poetry contests. A green enthusiast, blogger and content-writer, Sultana calls herself a wordsmith. Sultana can be reached at : sultana_sheik@yahoo.co.in

 

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RENDEZVOUS

Sheena Rath

 

As I walked down the cobbled pathway

I encountered light, tiny, ruby pink petals

Scattered amongst crispy withered brown leaves.

Caressing the sharpest corners of the rock

As I raised my head towards the sky

Under the morning sun

Stood upright the "Camel Foot Tree"

Embellished with strawberry pink blossoms

Blooming silently, curled to perfection at the corners.

A treat to your eyes

Dancing freely to the tune of the breeze

Leisurely, they twirl and tumble down on the ground

The earth blushes as it gets tinted.

 

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GANGASIULI
Sheena Rath

 

Gangasiuli, as the flower is known in Odiya is often called the "Tree of Sorrow" and the "Queen of Night." In sanskrit Parijat means the flowers of God and Goddess. 
Flowers bloom in the evening and as the sun rises, flowers fall and carpet the earth. Orange flame centre surrounded by rich creamy petals, standing on orange stem and an intoxicating fragrance these flowers boost up your energy. 
The mythological story reveals that it's a heavenly tree brought to earth by Lord Krishna and given to his wife Rukmini on which his other wife Satyabhama gets infuriated. So to pacify her he plants the tree in Satyabhama's courtyard and it grows in a slanting position and the flowers fall into Rukmini's garden. On seeing this Satyabhama curses that the flowers will bloom only at night and fade away quickly. 
These flowers usually bloom in October just before the pujas. 

Sheena Rath is a post graduate in Spanish Language from Jawaharlal Nehru University Delhi, later on a Scholarship went for higher studies to the University of Valladolid Spain. A mother of an Autistic boy, ran a Special School by the name La Casa for 11 years for Autistic and underprivileged children. La Casa now is an outreach centre for social causes(special children, underprivileged children and families, women's health and hygiene,  cancer patients, save environment)  and charity work. 

Sheena has received 2 Awards for her work with Autistic children on Teachers Day. An Artist, a writer, a social worker, a linguist and a singer (not by profession). 
 

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UNEVEN HAIKUS: 

Kunhunni

Translated by T.R. Joy

NOTE: The poems below are numbered as they are done in the Malayalam original, Kunhunni, Kunjunnikkavithakal: Complete Poems, Current Books, Kottayam, 1997.

 

38

Let me adore the Christ

Who routed the traders

From God’s own temple.

 

43

Be a poem,

That’s the dream,

My big dream.

 

44

I’m a rented house:

Who owns it,

Lives in it!!

 

59

My life’s bitter and biting

Still I like it real bad:

I can draw, paint, sing a song,

Laze and lay out my madness.

I can stick out as a rock,

Love and thaw out a stone.

Reckless I simply lie down,

Just looking at the blue sky.

I can melt and fade away.

187

Time churns and

Art turns up.

235

I know I’m short;

That’s how I’m tall. 2

 

260

The Buddha’s one

Morons a million.

 

276

Fools never know

The fools they are.

 

297

Can a cross scare

Jesus on the cross?

 

310

The day before

It was politics;

Yesterday

They faked politics;

Today

They politicize a fake.

What’s there

For tomorrow?

 

ABOUT KUNHUNNI MASTER

Rains are ever new

Proverbs, never new

The above quote is one of the axiomatic pieces of Kunhunni, the Malayalam poet who passed away a few years back at the age of 79. This poet has not only made some of the proverbs “ever new”, but added many more of his own that will stay with the readers as “ever new” too. He is famous and popular for his Kunhunnikkavithakal. This compound word in the Malayalam can have a humorous etymology to mean Kunhunni’s poems as well as little bits of poems. The humour becomes doubly effective in the case of the diminutive poet, Kunhunni (literally means a small baby or the short one) as he dares in one of his pieces “I know I’m short / That’s how I’m tall”.

The fact that the volume of Kunhunnikkavithakal has gone into several editions shows how popular, ever fresh and easily marketable is his work. Commenting on the volume, M.N. Karassery writes about one of the poet’s life ambitions: Kunhunni wanted to visit the Himalayas and look straight into the eyes of the Mighty One. And late in his life, he did achieve that. A poet all of 1.5 metres stands bang in front of the mighty Himalayas of over 8000 metres! The paradox in the contrast and reality of this is quite symbolic of the fun and finality of his poetic bits set against the so-called grand traditions of Malayalam poetry.

 

Kunhunni was born on 10 May 1927. His parents are the late Neelakandan Moosad and Narayani Amma. A bachelor for life, he worked as a teacher at the Ramakrishna Mission 3

School, Kozhikode. After retirement he lived at Valapad, some 15 kilometers west of Thrissur, writing and entertaining both children and common people through his stories and recitals. Besides his poetry, he has published a number of stories and features, some of which are specially for children.

Even his personal life was not very far from such paradoxes. Born into a family of traditional ayurvedic physicians and trained to be one, Kunhunni was disappointed that he never became a practitioner himself. Instead of having his own children, he loved all children and has become a children's poet. The ironic modesty of his following words reveals a poetic consciousness the people of Kerala enjoyed immensely: "The only proof of my being a poet is that some of my verses amuse not only me but also others."

(Courtesy: An edited version of my piece in Indian Literature, 233, May-June 2006, pp. 8-9.)

 

THE TRANSLATOR

T.R. Joy is an English & Life Skills Consultant as well as a writer in English and translator.

Allied Publishers, Mumbai brought out his book of poems, Brooding in a Wound in 2001. His English translations of O.N.V. Kurup’s Malayalam poems are included in Gestures: An Anthology of South Asian Poetry edited by K. Satchidanandan, 1996 and This Ancient Lyre (Selected Poems by ONV Kurup) edited by A. J. Thomas, 2005, both published by Sahitya Akademi, New Delhi.

He has also published critical studies and cultural features, some of which have been anthologized in Rainbow Redemption: New Bearings in Indian Poetry edited by Dr Binod Mishra, 2007 and Indian Poetry in English: A Comprehensive Study, edited by Vijay Kumar Roy, 2011, Adhyayan Publishers, New Delhi. He was the publisher and an associate editor of Poiesis, a journal of the Poetry Circle, Mumbai.

A Ph.D. in English, he taught at A. Vartak College, Vasai Road near Mumbai, at the University of Mumbai, and at Loyola College (Autonomous), Chennai. A consultant with IDP-IELTS Australia, he was also a guest faculty at the Department of Humanities & Social Sciences, IIT Madras.

Currently he is working on Uneven Haikus, an English translation of the late Malayalam poet Kunhunni’s collection of poems, as well as has finalized the draft of a critical study, The Secular Aesthetics: An Indian Model.

 

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THE LIES IN OUR TOWN

Mrutyunjay Sarangi

 

All the lies in our town

ran to the river

one summer night and jumped in,

carrying sordid tales

of our leaders, the policemen,

lawyers and the firemen,

of officials and their agents,

who trumpeted their wares.

And of our gullible townsfolk

who made a beeline to get them.

 

The lies lurked in the background,

bemused but terrified.

Innocent men and women

were falling for empty talks

and false promises.

No lie could stand up

and unmask the liars,

Strange is our town,

where even the lies were bribed

to keep mum and be a party

to the shameless scams.

 

When the town began crumbling

its edifice shaken to the core,

The lies could no longer breathe,

buried under heaps of shame.

That's when all of them

ran to the river and jumped in.

 

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SCARS

Mrutyunjay Sarangi

 

After this war is over

I shall go back to my mother's grave

and ask her,

why she brought me

into this grim battlefield,

this dust, the grime and the ruins.

Did she ever see this

desolate terrain

where flowers get crunched

under heavy feet and heavier boots,

the stones get a life

to smash a thousand heads

and lives turn to stones,

felled by unknown bullets.

Did my mother ever see

in her mind's eyes

the thousand scars I would carry

from lost battles

on my delicate body,

copious tears making

a feeble attempt

to wash away the blood

from numerous wounds.

Yet I will survive

and visit her grave

to tell her

all the sorrowful tales,

of us, the men and women

she fostered on her ample bosom,

only to fight among ourselves

and carry our own scars to our lonely tomb.

 

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JUHI, VISHAL, AND A WINTER EVENING IN DELHI

Mrutyunjay Sarangi

From his car a young bank manager sees a beautiful young girl and her handsome friend clinging to each other on a motorbike in a foggy winter evening in Delhi. In an irresistible impulse he loses his heart to her, though he knows he has no chance of coming anywhere near her. But suddenly the young couple on the bike start fighting and in a fit of anger the girl gets down on the wayside. The young bank manager approaches her, drawn like a moth to a flame………….

 

November evenings in Delhi have a beauty of their own. There is an air of expectancy everywhere, with people waiting for the approaching winter, which has a cute habit of stealthily creeping in and making itself comfortable in layers of quilts and soft comforters. A light fog descends on the streets and settles on the tree-tops. Weary travellers returning home are treated to a wonderful display of flickering street lights playing hide and seek under the covers of the white fog.

On such a beautiful November evening, I locked up the Bank where I work as a Manager and got into my white Maruti. I was in a hurry, aware that my parents and Bhabhi, my elder brother’s wife, will be waiting for me at home. Despite my promise to them that I would return early that evening, I just couldn’t get out in time. The evening was pleasantly cold. A light breeze added to the dream-like fragrance of the winter. For me, a young man of twenty-six, there was romance in the air, a pining for someone cute, soft and loving!

At the Tuglaq Road traffic signal I stopped the car. A motor cycle came zooming down and braked on my right side. Drawn by the sudden movement I looked out. A young couple was on the bike – a very handsome young man and an extremely beautiful cracker of a girl. I was stunned looking at her. She was slim, and fair like freshly churned butter, with a face resplendent with colour of youth, cheeks glowing like a pink rose and bright eyes alive like a flashlight. The boy was tall, fair with a sharp nose and a shining face. He must be a Pahaadi or a Jat. Both must be around twenty or twenty one years of age. They were made for each other, in looks and appearance.

The boy sat still, looking straight ahead, not moving his eyes. The girl was talking excitedly, saying something to him and he pretended not listening to her. She was sitting very close to him, her petite body glued to him, her hands around his waist. I just couldn’t take my eyes off her. Girls have this peculiar sixth sense when somebody stares at them. Suddenly she turned and looked at me. I felt embarrassed, for staring at her so yearningly. The light turned green and we moved on. 

At the next traffic crossing, where Lodi Road meets Aurobindo Marg, the motor cycle again stopped by my side. I looked out eagerly to catch a glimpse of the lovely girl again. She was talking non-stop, the boy was silent. Something had obviously excited her. Once or twice the boy spoke to her and that made her talk even more excitedly.

I was curious. On this winter evening, with the air filled with romance, what was going on between them? From the way they were sitting, glued to each other, they appeared to be either a very young husband and wife, or more likely, a pair of young lovers. What is it they might be talking? The girl, a rare beauty, what is she telling him so excitedly? Must be offering her unconditional love to him!

The girl looked at me again and flashed a big smile and went back talking to her companion. She placed her head on his shoulder and whispered something in his ears. He shook his head.

We moved again. The heavy traffic was moving very slowly due to the dense fog which usually hangs over the Safdarjung airport flyover at this time of the year. For the next few hundred meters, the couple drove by my side. I was getting distracted, stealing glances at them repeatedly. The girl was saying something to her companion, but he was disquietingly silent. At the next traffic signal at INA market, I sensed something was wrong. For some strange reason they had started quarreling. I was surprised. What happened so suddenly? Why were the lovey-dovey couple who were sitting glued to each other a few minutes back quarreling now?

Without being conscious about it, I had been looking at them continuously, unable to take my eyes off them. Suddenly the girl said something, half angry, and half imploringly and started mildly hitting the boy’s shoulder with her fists. It was a gesture of surrender and intense plea. I wondered what has gone wrong. Without realizing what I was doing and propelled by some kind of acquired right over their affairs due to the proximity of a moving car and a motor bike, I gave a mild honk to draw her attention. 

Startled, she looked at me. I gestured at her, asking what happened! Why were they quarreling? I got a stab in my heart, seeing her sad face. A drop of tear had welled up in her lovely eyes, which looked like a pair of cute golden bowls filled to the brim in silvery water, waiting to overflow at the touch of a finger. She gave me an excruciatingly sad look, and looked away. I knew the girl must have been deeply disturbed. Otherwise a smart and modern girl like her would have hurled abuses at me for taking such an unwarranted liberty! 

Before I could ask her again, the traffic eased and everyone drove fast. In no time the motor bike disappeared from my eyes. I felt sad and empty, realizing with regret that I would probably never get a chance to see her again. Sometimes it so happens, a whole life- time is not enough to know a person, but a few moments of familiarity can bring two people together in a bond of lasting memory.

With a heavy heart I kept driving fast. I had got really late, stuck in the traffic jam on Safdarjung airport flyover. On the Ring Road my eyes got riveted to a new, beautiful bus shelter which must have opened that day or a day before. Airtel company had sponsored a beautiful advertisement on the bus shelter. It was bright red, glowing with a carefully crafted maze of resplendent colour. I crossed it and suddenly applied brake to the car. Wait a minute, the girl sitting on a forlorn bench under the shelter! Was it not the same girl? The one on the bike? I parked the car to the left, locked it and walked back.

My heart jumped with joy and wonder. Yes, it was the very same girl, the one in light green dress with yellow dotted flowers. All alone? In this desolate bus-shelter at eight thirty on a winter evening? Where is the boy?

I went and sat near her. She looked at me, and her eyes registered recognition. For full two minutes we were silent, waiting for each other to break the ice. Finally I asked her,

“What happened?”

I was half expecting her to shout at me, “Mind your own business” or something like that. She simply looked up at me, eyes welling up with tears. I repeated the question.

“What happened? Why are you sitting all alone here?”

Her voice choked with tears. She said, “He left me here.”

I was shocked, “Left you here, in this desolate bus-shelter? What kind of a boy is he?”

Her eyes flashed with anger. I realized, she wasn’t prepared to hear any harsh words against the boy. 

“Actually he didn’t leave me. I forced him to drop me here.”

“Why?”

“If he is not prepared to give me company for the rest of my life, what’s the point in spending a few more minutes with him?”

It sounded logical. But I was not convinced.

“At least he could have dropped you home. How could he be so irresponsible?”

“Irresponsible? Vishal? No, he is not irresponsible. For the last ten years, he has been dropping me home every single evening. Not even for a day he has neglected to do that.”

“So? What happened today?”

“Today he told me, ‘Juhi, this is where we stop. From now on we go our separate ways’.”

“Why? Why did he say that?”

She didn’t answer. I waited for a minute.

“Your name is Juhi?”

“Yes.”

“Such a beautiful name! It suits you.”

She flashed a cute smile and relapsed to an agonizing silence.

“And his is Vishal?”

She nodded.

“Fits him. The name means “big”, the boy is big.”

She laughed, it helped in easing the tension.

“You sound amused. Have you ever had a cut in your finger? By a knife?”

I was surprised at the unexpected question.

“Yes, many times, once the cut was quite deep.”

“When you cut the finger, for the first minute or so, there will be no pain. And then it starts, and lingers, till your entire attention goes there and remains fixed.”

“You are right”

“I feel the same way at the moment. I was angry with him and asked him to drop me here. He simply stopped the motor bike and drove away when I got down. The idiot didn’t even look back at my crying face.”

“How heartless of him!”

“Heartless? Vishal? No, for the last ten years he has been with me like a shadow. In fact he has practically done nothing else, other than being a bodyguard to me and a soul-mate.”

“You two are childhood friends?”

“Yes, we were class-mates in the Central School, from fifth grade. When we passed out of Central School, he went to Venkateswara College, my dad put me in Kamala Nehru – a girls’ college. But Vishal comes every afternoon to pick me up after the classes and drops me home. For the past one year he has started working in a call centre, but he has chosen the night shift so that he can spend the afternoon with me after the college.”

“So what’s the problem?”

“Problem? The problem is, Vishal’s father is a clerk in the same office where my dad is the Chief Engineer. Right from our childhood days, my parents don’t like Vishal’s friendship with me. They behave rudely with him, but Vishal doesn’t mind. He is an exceptionally nice chap. I have never heard him speak against my parents. Actually he not only doesn’t speak against others, he doesn’t even think bad about anyone.”

“Such a nice boy?”  I asked teasingly.

“You can’t believe what a fine gentleman he is. His entire family is like that. They are from Himachal Pradesh. Vishal has a younger brother. All of them mind their own work, and never speak ill of others. And you should see how helpful they are. The house will always have a guest or two from their village in Himachal. Vishal’s uncles, other relatives bring rajma and apple from home and stay there for days. His parents never object to relatives coming and staying with them, although Vishal’s father doesn’t earn a big salary.”

“And your parents? How are they?”

Juhi’s face clouded with a touch of sadness.

“I am the only child in the family. My father has tons of money, and lots of arrogance which typically comes from ill-gotten wealth. My mom loves to splurge money. No matter how much money my dad gives her, she is never satisfied. They fight most of the times, over money. I hate it when they fight. My father insists that I go to college by car, but I take the bus.”

“So that Vishal can drop you home after the college is over?”

Juhi flashed another of those cute smiles and nodded.

“There must have been many handsome boys in your school. How did you fall for Vishal?”

“Vishal is so handsome and such a nice boy that if I had not taken him, he would have been snapped up by a dozen other girls.”

“Oh, is he so much in demand! Is he a Hrithik Roshan or what?”

“Vishal? Even a dozen Hrithik Roshans cannot match him.”

Juhi had relaxed completely. She wanted to talk, to unburden her heart.

“You know, I was so thin as a girl that others in the class used to call me “Hawa Hawaii”. They used to harass me, take away my snacks and empty my water bottle during the lunch break. I was helpless and used to cry. One day Vishal stood by me. Whoever came to snatch the food or the water, he took his hand and twisted it, causing him to shriek in agony. He was a big boy even at that time. From that day, all teasing and harassment stopped. Vishal became my closest friend and was like a shadow, giving me company. For the past ten years, Vishal is my body-guard. If he is with me, I am not afraid of anything or anybody.”

“Why did you quarrel today?”

“My parents are seriously looking for a life-partner for me. Vishal has been asking me to get married to the man of my parent’s choice. I have told Vishal clearly that I will marry him and nobody else, I just can’t live without him. For the past one month we have been fighting over this issue. Today Vishal said, ‘Juhi, let us part ways. From tomorrow I won’t come to your college to pick you up.’ He had taken me on our final trip to the Coffee House in Connaught Place. We were returning from there when you saw us at the Tughlaq Road traffic signal.”

“Why does he want to break off your relationship?”

“Two years back my dad had called Vishal’s father and asked him to stop Vishal from seeing me. Vishal didn’t come to meet me for a week. I called him and made it clear to him that I will take poison and kill myself. He tried to reason with me, ‘Juhi, your parents will find a suitable boy for you, someone with a big job and lots of money. He will make you very happy. You shouldn’t cause any tension for your parents. Nobody gets happiness in life by displeasing his parents.’ I told him, ‘I want to marry you and only you. You may leave me, but I won’t leave you. If you say no to marrying me, I will kill myself. Then I will become a spirit, and your shoulder is where I will sit all the time and scare away every other girl who comes near you’.”

I felt like laughing, imagining the cute Juhi as a scaring spirit, a sort of lady-ghost. 

But looking at her sad face I restrained myself. 

“What is special about today? Why are you parting ways?”

“Yesterday when we were going home on his bike, I had told him that my parents are quite serious about a particular match, and want to finalize it. So Vishal wanted me to be free from any commitment towards him. And the monkey dropped me just like that!”

Juhi started crying silently, trying to hide her tear from me. I kept quiet for a minute or two. 

“How far have you gone with each other?”

“What do you mean?”

Juhi looked up and wiped her face with her dupatta.

I just kept quiet and continued to stare at her.

She understood the question. Her eyes flashed with deep anger. 

“Hey mister, I don’t even know who you are. How dare you ask me a question like that? You think Juhi is a cheap girl? I may be a friend to many and moving around with Vishal. But I have too much respect for my culture and my parents to bring dishonour to them. And Vishal? One just can’t think of him doing anything wrong. Believe me, he is not that type – he is a one-in-a-million kind of boy.”

It took me sometime to absorb that statement. We were lost in our thoughts.

Finally I stood up and told her, 

“Come, I will drop you at your house. It is going to be nine-thirty. You won’t get a bus now.”

She hesitated for a moment and then smiled, 

“You seem to be a good chap, like my Vishal. I feel I can trust you. What’s your name?”

“Vishwas.” There was a naughty smile on my face.

“Vishwas? You mean ‘Trust’? Making fun of me, are you? Or is that your real name?”

I just smiled and kept mum.

On the way to Sector Two, Yamuna Vihar, I tried to reason with Juhi – what Vishal says is correct. He is doing a small job, may not be earning more than ten or twelve thousand rupees a month. Moreover, Vishal’s father is only a clerk in Juhi’s dad’s office. That might be embarrassing for her parents. They must have arranged a better match for her. Does she know any details about that?

Juhi said, “I really don’t know. My mom was trying to say something in the morning when I was leaving for college. I just shut my ears with my hands and ran away.”

“Juhi, I think Vishal is right. It is one thing to be a friend, even a close friend, but marriage is a different matter. One has to be very careful.”

Juhi turned to me and fixed me with a steady gaze. Somehow I felt quite disoriented with that gaze – it strangely combined the intense heat of a raging fire and the iciness of a cold glacier.

“You won’t understand. If I had shared my body with Vishal, I could have gone to another person and offered myself to him. But I have surrendered my heart to him. Heart is like a flowing stream, once it merges with another stream, it loses its identity. Believe me, I just can’t give my heart to anybody else, and die a slow, excruciating death for the rest of my life. In a way that only a heart can understand, I have nothing left to give to anyone.”

We reached Sector Two of Yamuna Vihar. Juhi had given her address to me. I turned the car on the first main road. The second house on the right was Juhi’s. From a distance I could see a motor bike at the corner of the house and a big, handsome boy standing near it, hands crossed over the chest. Juhi didn’t even stop for the car to come to a halt. She just opened the door and ran towards him. In a moment they were locked in a tight hug.

Suddenly I realized my mobile phone’s light was blinking repeatedly in my shirt pocket. Oh God, I had put it on the silent mode when I went for a meeting in the evening and had completely forgotten to set it back to normal mode. The evening had been rather eventful for me and right since the moment I had seen Juhi on the pillion of the motor bike at Tughlaq Road Crossing, I had practically forgotten everything else. I took out the mobile from my pocket. It was Bhabhi, my elder brother’s wife.

My Bhabhi has a booming voice and when she speaks it sounds like a rapid machine gun fire. Now, because she was excited, her voice seemed to cause a minor earth-quake in the mobile phone.

“Babula, where have you been? I must have made a dozen missed calls on your mobile.”

“Sorry Bhabhi, I was stuck with some work.”

“Arrey, forget the sorry, forry, yaar. Listen to what great fun we had. Because you were late and didn’t call us, we phoned up Tripathy Sahab to send his car. So Baba, Maa, Moonmoon and I went to his house to meet the girl.”

“Oh, Bhabhi, I had forgotten about that. Did you like her?”

“Like her? What do you mean, ‘like’ her? We didn’t get a chance to meet her! She was missing!”

“Missing? What do you mean, missing? Have they filed a police report?”

“Arrey, Nehin yaar! There is no need for that! The girl has some other problem. We finished the samosas, kachodi, sandesh and coffee, and waited for more than an hour. Tripathy Sahab and his wife kept telling us that the girl was getting delayed at the college. I thought it was rather strange that the girl returns home so late in the evening. I went inside to use the toilet. When I came out, the girl’s cousin was waiting for me. She told me that the girl is madly in love with a childhood friend. She has threatened to commit suicide if she is forced by her parents to marry somebody else. When I heard that, I told Tripathy Sahab that it was getting awfully late and Moonmoon had to go to sleep early because her school bus comes at 6.30 in the morning. With that excuse we came away.”

“Aha, Bhabhi, you missed out on the girl. But at least you had a good meal at her house!”

“Meal? Blast the meal! Tripathy Sahab has no business to waste our time! He should have known better. If his daughter is having an affair, why does he bother others with offers of a match? Anyway, I am happy for you Babula. You would have simply wasted your time and unnecessarily driven twenty miles all the way to Sector Two Yamuna Vihar on this cold winter evening. That girl is characterless! Good riddance for you. So you come back home. We will find another girl for you.”

The torrent of words stopped.  As Bhabhi’s machine gun fell silent, I switched off the mobile and looked at Juhi and Vishal. They were talking, laughing and behaving like two young teenagers lost in each other’s bliss. It was a lovely sight, one that could fill anyone’s heart with pure joy.

I smiled to myself. Characterless? Juhi? Who has given away her heart to her best friend and believes she has nothing left for anyone else! I remembered Bhabhi and silently muttered to myself, “Sorry Bhabhi, you are wrong. For a priceless girl like Juhi, to peep into her heart and see the brilliant lustre of fathomless love in it, twenty miles in life’s long journey is just nothing. I am prepared to keep looking for her, walking on a long road, shivering under the cover of a thick fog on a thousand winter nights. But you know Bhabhi, my regret is, the journey will be endless, the milestones will keep receding and I will never be able to touch them”.

 

Dr. Mrutyunjay Sarangi is a retired civil servant and a former Judge in a Tribunal. Currently his time is divided between writing short stories and managing the website PositiveVibes.Today. He has published eight books of short stories in Odiya and has won a couple of awards, notably the Fakir Mohan Senapati Award for Short Stories from the Utkal Sahitya Samaj. 

 

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