Dear Readers,
Welcome to the Forty eighth edition of LiteraryVibes.

In LVXLVIII I am happy to present, among others, a story of exceptional beauty that will light up your heart like the Christmas sky and ring the bells of eternal joy in your heart. 'The Inverted Cross' by K. Sreekumar is a timeless creation, one of the best Christmas stories you would have ever come across. There are other excellent stories and exquisite poems adorning the pages of this edition to warm up your heart, a fitting way to say goodbye to 2019 and welcome the New Year.

LiteraryVibes wishes you and all your loved ones A Happy New Year. May your days be filled with abundant happiness and nights with boundless cheers.

Please remember to share LVXLVIII with all your contacts through the following link:
http://positivevibes.today/article/newsview/255

All previous editions of LV can be accessed at:
http://positivevibes.today/literaryvibes

With warm regards
Mrutyunjay Sarangi

 

 

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SUBURB

Prabhanjan K. Mishra

 

It is not Bombay

unless one looks

at the postal addresses,

the varicose city

growing elsewhere.

 

In the east

the salt pans bask,

the creek lies languid

in the north,

a well-fed boa –

 

having swallowed

the city’s garbage

from mouths

of belching drains,

an occasional carcass.

 

Next door, a stable

for tired trains for a drink

or smoke, they grunt and gasp,

until the announcer urges them

to take to their tracks.

 

In a coral tree

beneath our balcony

silence nests

except at daybreak,

sparrows chirp a racket.

 

‘Guest, Keen and Williams’

the tool makers,

thud and thump the night;

in viral fever, the factory aches

the whole night.

 

On Sundays,

balloonwallas come,

other vendors

turn up on cue,

guests throng

 

the neighbourhood,

people come out

in their Sunday best;

it seems, the city arrives

on for a weekend soiree.

 

(A poem before Bombay became Mumbai)

 

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THE INNER VOICE

Prabhanjan K. Mishra

 

The Panchayat of Narihatpur had gathered for an emergency meeting to settle a serious matter. It was not the usual fortnightly meetings to decide small complaints of the residents, or take stock of various ongoing welfare projects under the Panchayat’s supervision. The meeting was in full attendance. The five members of the Panchayat including the Sarpanch Atmaram Patnaik were appropriately seated. The four Panchayat members sat on a big rug on the tall and broad front verandah of Sarpanch Mr. Atmaram Patnaik’s house near the entrance door. The Sarpanch himself, looking impressive in his ensemble of kurta-pajamas-jacket attire, also sat on a small rug by the double-paneled entrance door, almost leaning on door panels kept half-ajar. The villagers numbering around thirty sat around the verandah, or kept standing on the street, listening to the open-court like discussions of the five Panchayat members.

During earlier Panchayat meetings, some villagers would claim in whispers of the glimpses of a woman lurking in the dark behind the half-ajar door panels just behind Atmaram. Others would rebuke them in whispers, “What’s so surprising or bothersome? It may be Atmarambabu’s wife listening to Panchayat proceedings out of curiosity. Don’t be a dirty spy.” These whispers had never reached Atmaram’s ears for reasons of a mix of love, respect, and fear he commanded in the area.

Any issue, that was discussed among the five members of thePanchayat, was often participated and enriched with information and suggestions by the villagers, present in the meeting. But final words were always expected from the Sarpanch himself. Atmaram never disappointed the villagers in giving quick and just solutions whenever he was on the Sarpanch chair. In fact, barring brief periods he had been the Sarpanch of Narihatpur Panchayat for over fifteen years. Narihatpur Panchayat included four small and large villages including the most populated and prosperous village Narihatpur. His decisions in the Panchayat had been exemplary - balanced, impartial, and all along beneficial in a larger sense. Every now and then during the discussion, whenever a complication arose awaiting his opinion, people would notice that he had closed his eyes, and leaned against the half-ajar door-panels for minutes as if in deep concentration. People knew from experience that during these small breaks he talked and listened to his Inner Voice. After such a posturing that might last between a few seconds to a minute, he would open his eyes, and surprise everyone with a balanced opinion or a just final decision, keeping with the need of the hour. Actually, the ‘Inner Voice’ was a phrase coined by Atmaram’s childhood friend Gopinath Mohanty living in a house adjacent to his.

Atmaram was close to Gopinath Mohanty who was of his age, and was his immediate neighbor. He was a rich farmer like Atmaram. For reasons not clear to villagers, Gopinath was a bachelor though he was middle-aged, when he should be much married with a brood of brats as any other householder in his area. In privacy, villagers were jealous of his carefree and happy-go-lucky bachelor life. But outside, they would show false concern, “Poor chap, who would take care of him if he fell ill, and who would do his last rites when he died?”

Gopi babu depended on a male and a female daytime house-help to run his housekeeping and cooking. Often mouthwatering dishes came for him from Atmaram’s and other neighbours’ houses. During Panchayat meetings he would sit a few feet away from his friend Atmaram and take part in the deliberations. His special gifts were oblique satire and pun. He was good at humour and pulling legs. Often his remarks kept the audience in splits. The juicy remarks served as relief after heavy brainstorming to lighten the moods and prepare them to proceed to the next serious issue.  

Atmaram’s wife Gouri Devi was reputed for housekeeping and cooking. Before, during, and after the meetings, cups of tea would go around from her kitchen for members of the Panchayat, and any of the villagers who would like to have a sip. Her tea would always be hot and sharp with a dash of ginger to open up jaded brains, and was therefore immensely praised by imbibers. Her beauty was legendary in the area, also her devotion to Atmaram and the Blue Lord in the village temple.

Gopi babu and Atmaram would take walks along village lanes or deep into their crop-fields together most mornings. The walk would terminate for an occasional tea or smoke at Hotel Taj Mahal, a ramshackle thatch kiosk of tin sheets selling tea, soft drinks, and snacks, located at the south edge of the village where a Krishna Temple gives it company. People love both, the tea-stall and the temple and throng to them all day long.

Gopi would take jibes at his friend, “Atma, are you sure you have the permission of my little sister Gouri to get spoiled by me, the incorrigible bachelor? Are you sure that your ‘Inner Voice’ won’t mind your sharing a cigarette with me?” Atmaram would simply give him an open-palmed resounding whack on the back in reply. Both the friends would enjoy a good laugh. Their friendship was also legendary in the area like Gouri’s beauty and Atmaram’s Inner Voice.

It would then be Atmaram’s turn to banter back, “What does our obsessive-compulsive bachelor scheme these days against me, the poor and weak married man? Any advice for this prisoner, you free rascal?” Banters and counter banters maintained the pep of their friendship.

During festivals Gopi babu would dine with Atmarams, partaking with the latter’s family the savouries prepared by Gouri. Gopi babu regarded Gouri with great brotherly affection, rather more than a real big brother. He knew her as an intelligent and smart woman in addition to being an accomplished cook, who created wonders in her kitchen with little of this or that available around the village and the only village grocer. Also, he was the only person privy to a secret besides the Atmarams that his little sister had another engagement besides house-chores, working as his friend’s ‘Inner Voice’.

Being an incorrigible joker, Gopi would not let go of a chance to pull Atmaram’s leg. He would always take sides with his sister Gouri and tease Atmaram with juicy adages like ‘langur ke hath pe angur (grapes in the hands of a monkey)’, ‘maankad haatare saalagraam (god in the custody of a monkey)’. But both the husband-wife team understood his good intention of tying them together with a tighter bond and diffusing acrimony and monotony of conjugal life. Also, they knew he was paying compliments to Gouri, through these jokes on Atmaram. That pleased Atmaram who was still in love with Gouri even after three children and sixteen anniversaries, a rare phenomenon among the village folks.

When the emergency meeting was sitting to discuss and decide the serious issue, Gouri was visiting her ailing mother in her city home at Bhubaneswar. So, Atmaram was a bit fidgety in the meeting. But the Panchayat meeting could not be delayed as a boy from the village had eloped with a girl from the neighbourhood. Both were minors, boy being seventeen and the girl fifteen. People were afraid if the girl’s relatives took the matter to the police, there could be complications. The boy’s career might be in jeopardy, if a case of abduction or rape of the minor, or with both the charges, was registered by the police. Atmaram was hesitant to preside over the emergency meeting with a complaint of severe headache.

Gopi babu sensed his hesitation and declared encouragingly before Atmaram could recuse himself on health reasons, “The matter is serious and we must save our two endangered brats before it is too late. We have full confidence on our Sarpanch babu’s Inner Voice. It will give us a balanced solution.” When Atmaram looked at him obliquely to express his helplessness, he ignored him and added, “Don’t worry Atma, you all discuss the matter threadbare, when I run inside to bring a Dolo tablet, panacea for headaches. I will be back in a minute.” Saying this he went inside his house, crossed over into Atmaram’s residence using the backdoors of their houses, and positioned himself behind the half-ajar door panels.

People were relieved to see their Sarpanch again in good mood. They thought, the name of Dolo tablet had a placebo effect on Atmaram. The meeting progressed. The matter of eloping children was discussed with their parents and the over-excited relatives from both sides. A little quarrel had to be doused also. At the end of the deliberation, all looked up at the wise Sarpanch for his final words.

As usual, as in times of difficult decisions, Atmaram closed his eyes and reclined on the half-ajar door panels for quite some minutes. People couldn’t hear his voice from their positions, but they saw his mouth and lips moving silently as if talking to his Inner Voice. Then he opened his eyes, cleared throat, and delivered his decision on behalf of the Panchayat, “I strongly advise the guardians of the girl to keep patience, and not to go to police. I advise you, parents of the boy, to locate them, probably they are with your city relatives, go and meet them in company of our Gopi babu. I advise both families and relatives not to be harsh with them, they have not done anything wrong in God’s eyes. Even our Blue Lord had eloped with his sweetheart Rukmini. Only our two youngsters have done it before their adulthood and consummation may be a crime in the prevalent law. I know these two, they are good children, they had to elope because of you parents, and especially you, the relatives who had no sympathy for them. You, the relatives, please don’t give uncalled for twists to their eloping for your fun. Treat their feelings with reason and sympathy. So, go and tell them to return. Give them my letter where I offer them a solution they can’t refuse. I would promise them marriage in three years when both would be adults, if they continued to hold each other in affection until then. I believe all would be well and end well. I strongly advise to both the parties to keep peace and fulfil the wishes in my letter, and the decision of this Panchayat.”

All clapped with praise for such sagacious settlement. Then people noticed Gopi babu returning with a tablet. Atmaram again cleared throat and said, “Thank you Gopi, you are a gem, but that Dolo tablet wouldn’t be necessary. My headache is gone.” Gopi babu smiled, “I know. Now write that letter. Let us proceed to Bhubaneswar by the earliest bus before the impatient young people oblige the hormones by default.”

Some of the participants in the meeting were flummoxed, “How did Gopi babu know of the decision and the letter when he had been away searching for the tablet?”

 

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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WHAT’S SO SURPRISING? (KIMAASHCHARYAM)

Hara Prasad Das

(Translated by Prabhanjan Kumar Mishra)

 

Normal eyes don’t notice

subtleties - 

 

his shadow,

the detached exile,

a seeker’s lamp in hand,

has crossed the verandah,

over to the courtyard

to go away, let him;

 

it is not him,

who is still asleep

in his bed

caught between unreal walls;

it’s his cursed self,

fossilized over ages,

 

a vain seeker

of his own rite of passage,

that flows between the banks.

So, why should

the runaway exile

surprise you….?

 

Drunk on nectar,

dozing inside a flower,

shouldn’t the insect

wake up and escape

before the petals close

entrapping it?

 

Shouldn’t one plan

for a jubilant evening

atop distant mountains

before the sunset dark?

 

If his goal was

a woman’s thighs,

why did he leave his wife;

go attending to his land’s call,

gathering scattered dreams

for a new dawn?

 

Submerged in the joy

of pretty wife’s yielding flesh,

why did he feel cursed;

blood

of thrashing nights in pain

dripping from his nails?

 

Has his terrifying machismo

been a mask

to hide his weaknesses? 

 

The exile does not know

when would this night end;

when would he possibly return

from his self-imposed banishment

with alien fruits and shoots

from distant lands;

 

doesn’t know

if his gifts

would turn out

good or bad.

 

But he knows for sure,

he will find

his comatose stupor

wide awake;

 

while the Devil

would be lurking

by the bed

in hiding

to catch him

in his brisk hypnotic net.

 

Should the man

going to exile

surprise you,

my friend?

 

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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SOLSTICE 
Geetha Nair

The sun that stroked the northern wall,
Leaving latticed patterns,
Little hearts of warmth,
Upon its  pale cold  face,
Has moved on
Leisurely.

No light. No warmth.

He has gone south souther southest
On his excursion
In the cold heart of winter;
He will not be back again.
 

 

---

 

WINE WOMEN AND SONG

Geetha Nair

 

Sara entered our home when I was twelve and my heart shortly afterwards. She had been hired as a full-time maid. My mother had recently met with an accident and was bedridden.  The doctors had called it a miracle that she was alive at all and had warned my father to expect no miracles. With time and luck , she would walk again. As things were, she was confined to bed except for painful, slow walks to the adjoining bathroom.

Sara swept in one March evening, like a gusty, cool breeze. I had just got back from school and was making tea for my father and for myself. Our part-time maid came at 6 am and left by 3 pm. My cats were mewing loudly in hunger and deprivation. Into this din came a voice  from somewhere,"The Lord be praised! Is this a zoo or a human dwelling that I have come to look after?" The voice was high-pitched and the words had the tang of my fatherland-rubbercountry, Pala.

My mind registered this in addition to indignation. Into the kitchen strode a woman. I had a confused impression of white teeth in a dark face, corkscrew curls and a solid body. Then she scooped up two of my cats and tucked them in the crooks of her elbows.

Sara endeared herself to me with that single gesture. She liked cats and -she told me - fish and children.

In no time, she had the household running on well-oiled wheels. The part-time maid was dismissed. Sara was busy all day. She cooked, swept, tended to my mother and sang.  Her songs were Christian devotionals  which soon became a part of me.

I would go up to her just before leaving for school and do an "about turn". She would wipe her hands on her aromatic lungi and plait my unruly hair into a timid plait. (All morning I could smell the chilli-coriander-garam masala -tomato of her hands on my hair.) Then she would hand me my lunch-box packed with my staple - tomato rice. She had cooked some a couple of days after she landed when she gave up trying to convert me to non-vegetarianism; now I was an addict.

I was an addict of her stories as well.

In the evenings, Sara and I would gather in the room my mother lay in.  My cats would be on my lap or milling around me. She would regale us with tales of saints, neighbours and herself.  I liked the latter best of all. "Tell me about the evening that you first saw Achayan, " I would prompt her. She did not need much prompting.

The annual church festival -perunnal- was in full swing. 31 December was the day it peaked. St Augustine's Church and its grounds were packed. Sara and her married sisters were near the front of a stall that sold ornaments. She was in her annual new saree - this time, it was a bright blue one with white flowers.  A blue scarf was around her neck. She was selecting blue glass bangles to go with the sari when there was a commotion behind  her. A pickpocket! The man was running out of the grounds followed by another, a young man in a blue shirt. He caught up with the former and with one blow felled him. Then he picked up the purse that had been stolen and shouted "Whose is this?"

  "Just like Prem Nazir in "Rowdy Rajan," Sara would digress at this point, her eyes dreamy.  The former was a romantic hero who was still running around trees doggedly in our movies; the latter was one of his early popular on-screen avatars.

The pickpocket was marched  off by the constable; the young man was offered a drink of sherbet  by the man at the stall next to the trinkets. As he drank, his eyes met the adoring ones of young Sara. "He followed me after that and in no time we were husband and wife."

There were never any details of the courtship though I asked her often enough. My mother told me I was not to pry.

After these sessions, I would follow Sara into the kitchen. She taught me the basics of cooking. I would sit on the old rice-box while she sliced and cooked. She also taught me how  to roll out chapathis that Michael Angelo would have envied for their circular perfection.

When my father frowned that I wasn't studying enough hours, my mother smiled that I was being educated instead. 

And what an education it was ! It took me two decades to fully comprehend and appreciate Sara's s role in my making. I think I was to her the daughter she never had. Her adored husband had passed away in an accident just a couple of years after their marriage, leaving her a childless young widow.

From an admonition  to wash the coconut scraper thoroughly after each use -only harlots leave them unwashed!- through codes of conduct for menstruating girls to the pervasive presence and the mercy of the divine (when my cats attained the clawed feet of the Cat God),  my education was all-encompassing and awesome.

Wine-making was something Sara took great pride in. Months before December, the ritual would begin. I would be at her elbow, her bacchanalian handmaid. Just before Christmas, the wine would be decanted and poured into empty beer bottles. Sara made me drink little glassfulls during the festive season. "Sweet, wholesome, with just a little kick,"  she would say complacently.  That hendiatris described Sara as well.

Sara  illuminated our lives for six years. My mother had improved;  she could now  walk with crutches. My father got a promotion and a transfer to Karnataka. Sara declined to accompany us to Gadag. Reluctantly,  we parted. 

We kept in touch with Sara. My parents used to send her money at Christmas. They passed away when I was thirty seven, within a few weeks of each other. Sara came to attend the last rites of both.  She must have been in her sixties then, I think, but was still strong and active. It was a happy reunion even though it was in the midst of sorrow.

I continued the Christmas tradition. Last year, more than 20 years later, I got a call from someone in Ramapuram. She said she was Sara's relative who was looking after her. Sara was very ill and in need of money. Would I help?

I travelled to Ramapuram. Sara's home was close to the church that had been a part of my childhood -St Augustine's.  It looked magnificent. I visualised  the young Sara and her young man, both in blue against the gleaming white of the church.

I found Sara sadly changed. She was emaciated; just  skin-and-bone. Worse, her mind was wandering;  she no longer recognised people. I sat on the bed and held her claw-like hands in my old ones. "Don't you remember me?" I implored. I mentioned names, places, animals , things. No light shone in her sunken eyes. Then I sang, softly, her favourite song-"Daivasneham vannicheedan... -no words can  adequately praise  God's love... ."

She sang along with me in her high-pitched voice... .

I spoke awhile with her niece who was tending to Sara. "What about her husband's relatives? Don't  they help?" I asked. The niece looked at me blankly. "Husband?" she repeated wonderingly. "Auntie was unmarried..." 

As I turned to go, having taken leave of Sara, I felt her tug at my sari. She said with a smile, "I hope they are well -Nachiketa and Sundari and Vicco... "

I nodded dumbly- they were the cats of my childhood. So, she had recognised me, finally. 

As I left, she was singing again: "No words can adequately praise His love."

 

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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THE INVERTED CROSS

Sreekumar K.

 

All her children, three boys and two girls, her annual productions, had gone to bed. No, not to bed since there was no bed, but torn wall posters spread around where the foot path was the widest. The wall posters showed the famous movies stars and every night there was a fight on who slept on whom.

On a chilly night like this no one likes to see a leper, more so if he is walking towards you and even more so if the only place you can withdraw into, your own house, happens to be a sheet of plastic stuck on a single pole much shorter than you. That was the predicament she found herself now.

She knew he was a leper, his limbs were all bandaged, a bundle under his arm, a begging bowl in his hand. On the other hand he had a short piece of reed with a few holes burned into it, almost a flute which made him a street entertainer, one of the many who wander around in the city. He came in and beyond him the sky lit up with the fireworks going up near the church. She wanted to wake up her children to see that. It was Christmas eve.

“Jesus! It is so beautiful,” she exclaimed.

The leper also turned back to look at the sky and turned back with an expression of cynical disdain. She stood outside the hut as if it was not hers at all. He may look around and go away. She herself had nothing; a beggar, even on a Christmas night as this was unwelcome and there was nothing unfair about it.

But he rudely went past her and sat down. Now what! Sing a carol song for nothing? Not bad!

He took a few loaves of bread from his cloth bag and the children who were fast asleep jumped up and stood around him. When you are hungry, food has such a strong aroma.

Each of them got a loaf and they say down munching it. He took out his flute and played a tune. The children seemed to have heard it before. He asked them whether they would like to hear stories. They said yes. He gave them the choice of a subject. One of them put up his half bitten loaf of bread and said he wanted to hear a story about bread. He told them the story of how Christ fed five thousand people with just five loaves of bread. He added that it is no miracle. Tongue in cheek, he told them, it would have been a miracle, had he made five people eat five thousand loaves of bread, even five hundred would have been impressive. The children were so hungry that one of them said it might be possible for them to finish five thousand loaves. But one of them smelled the bread doubtfully and said, “Not this kind of bread.”

He told them the story had another meaning. The woman was also attentive now.

“See, me, a stranger comes in and gives you a loaf each. When you grow up and be like your mother or me, wouldn't you do the same for other children. Now if each of you do it ten times that will be fifty people fed. Now they too may do it and in no time you have fed five thousand people with five loaves of bread since that was how it all started.

The woman was moved. She didn't expect this. Jesus! This man was something.

The children also agreed. He was about to go. He got up, turned around and asked the children why don't they have a Christmas tree. He asked for a cross lying in the corner of their hut. The eldest one had made it when he attended a free carpentry workshop. He planted it upside down outside the hut right on the pavement and asked them to decorate it with whatever they could find.

So saying he hugged the woman and walked away to cross the street.

She didn't appreciate him hugging her like that in front of the children, he being a stranger, though older than her dead husband and younger than her father.

He was now crossing the street and she was looking at the children trying to decorate the upside down cross like a Christmas tree. She felt hurt to see the cross planted upside down. It was an unholy act on a Christmas night like this, or any day for that matter.

A car was speeding down the street zigzagging with some people coming back from a Christmas party. It was pretty dark and she couldn't see what was happening.

Had he crossed....? She held her breath............

“Jesus!”

The car had passed by. From the other side, the man asked her something, his hands cupped around his mouth. Still he wasn't loud enough. She shook her head from side to side to say, she didn't need any more bread.

But she was not sure that was what he had asked her. But he had gone. It was only later that she figured out his exact words.

“Did you call me?”

 

---

 

CHOICES

Sreekumar K

 

“What? You mean six languages? Are you telling me you can speak six different languages?”

“Not only am I telling you that, I can tell you that in six languages. But, you won't understand four or even five of them. How many did you say you know?”

“In fact, none properly, I confess. If I knew at least one language properly, I would have never shut my mouth. And, here you are all clammed up!”

“True that I know six different languages properly and a few more improperly, but I have got nothing to say in any of them. And you stand there full of stuff to say, with no language to say that in!”

Three weeks later they rented a house together and several years later they celebrated their 30th anniversary of being together. They invited all their classmates at the SAP training programme they had undertaken long ago but two of their classmates could not come. They had left this world. And three sent messages that they were sick and could not come.

The thirty years were not uneventful. In one of those years, they got married just for the sake of getting a marriage certificate. Their reason was pure strategy - just to adopt two kids. Thus they were able to adopt two kids, two boys who brought home several girlfriends now and then, declaring each time they had made their final choice. One of them got married and the other is still on the lookout for one like his own mom.

The major challenge in those thirty years was when Rathi wanted to quit her job. She really wanted to quit her job but try as much as she did, no one supported her decision except Abraham, her dear husband. Finally, she mustered up all her courage and said bye to a much coveted job. She went into catering, her own dream from her childhood days.

That was two years after their marriage and the very next year they decided to have a child and found it might take more than a spent night well spent to have kids. So, they adopted a son, a muslim boy who had lost his parents in an accident. Two years later they adopted one more, now from far away Leh, a Buddhist boy. Four kinds of prayers and rituals were too much and so they decided to have none of those. Evening was spent together on watering the plants or feeding the birds returning to their homes in the wilderness which was several kilometres away.

Several years into marriage, Rathi found it a waste of time to wait for the boys outside the coaching centre as they took lessons in kung fu. She too joined right in and became a district champion in two years. Now, she is a well known instructor too.

When the elder son was 13 years old, they sold their property in town and built a house of their own just outside the town. Both the boys were sad to leave the rented home where they had spent most of their childhood. One had fever for over a week, probably from the well water in the new place. Rathi had desired a house in the centre of the town but the other three members of the family objected.

Three years later Abraham got a transfer to Bengaluru and he took the younger one with him. Now they were together only two days every month.

Abraham didn’t like it much in Bengaluru. While he was there, there was a theft in the office and he was shocked to see how bad the police in Bengaluru were. He applied for a transfer and when it was rejected, he quit that company to join his cousin’s start up. The family income dwindled a little but they managed to pull through. Abraham's partnership with his cousin had a bitter end; they parted. Abraham stayed home doing nothing for a whole year. He read as much as he wanted to and never took any interest in his wife's business which had prospered quite a bit.

The elder boy was good at writing and he published his first book when he was just seventeen. It was a collection of both stories and poems. The younger one was mad about football and made it to a local football team but never progressed beyond that. Both the children took political science in college, thinking it might tell them more about the circus going on around them. Instead, they faced boring lessons on sects and clans. For their post graduation, they chose history. One of them did a project on the Indus Valley script and the other one chose the story of Kerala architecture.

Meanwhile, Rathi’s catering business developed into a full time restaurant. As there was a lot of left over food each day, Abraham suggested that there should be a system of making it available for the poor. With his younger son, he took it upon himself to lug it to different places in the city. Later, they decided to make sure there is enough left over every day. So, the father and the son had something to be busy about.

A remarkable thing about Rathi's business was that she worked with the same crew decade after decade, with a few additions, of course but no one left her in all those years. Rathi became well known in the business circles of their small town. At club meetings, her husband drank and she sang and danced. Once she had joined her husband and drank a little but she didn’t like it one bit.

Both the kids were voracious readers just like Abraham but did not inherit their mother’s language brain much though. After his post graduation, the elder one said enough was enough and joined his mother in her business. The younger one decided to be a lecturer. He went abroad for a couple of years and returned to be with his family and work in a local school.

Very late in life Abraham decided to learn Spanish, not from his wife but from a language centre near their restaurant. He says he should have done that long ago.

 

Sreekumar K, known more as SK, writes in English and Malayalam. He also translates into both languages and works as a facilitator at L' ecole Chempaka International, a school in Trivandrum, Kerala. 

 

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EPIPHANY
Ajaya Upadhyaya

Cool Kartik (November)morning:
Air heavy with chants
and incense sticks.
Temple thronging with people,
jostling for a Darshan.

I stood at the door,
hesitant, unsure if my prayer
would reach the Lord
or get lost in the melee.

Looking round,
found a sea of women
of all ages,engrossed in offering
dakshina of all kinds,
for the lucky men folks
to receive punya on a plate.

Gods with myriad moods,
five heads to countless arms,
Garland of severed heads
and swords dripping off blood;

all terrifying to the core.
And, massive pots,
labelled “daana”
at the doors.

Am I in the right place?

A man in priestly robe taps
me from behind:
“Don’t fear my child, step into
the sanctum”.

But, “I am scared”
for, I have forgotten
my shield of dakshina.

Shields are bulky:
They weigh you down,
and unwieldy enough
to topple you.

Looked round at the crowd,
Only headless figures:
topped with huge pots,
labelled- Punya.

Puzzled and panicked;
I have nothing to barter,
Oh Lord, I cried out.

Rid off the shield, my child;
You shall see things for
what they really are.

I looked back,
to see all vanish in a flash.
Out of my reverie,
I wake up,
blessed by the Glimpse!

 

Dr. Ajaya Upadhyaya from Hertfordshire, England. A Retired Consultant Psychiatrist from the British National Health Service and Honorary Senior Lecturer in University College, London.

 

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THE BOXING RING

Dilip Mohapatra

 

You stand in the red corner

and I on the blue

your front toe and back heel in line

and your head behind your gloves

you size me up through

the corners of your eyes and I you.

 

You step forward with your left foot

and drag the other

and then pivot to position yourself

to deliver your punches straight at me I mirror your moves and keep

myself out of harm's way.

 

You throw your jabs your hooks

and your uppercuts

through your opprobrious glances

and scathing silences

through your vituperative utterances

and oppressive mails

and I try to block and parry

your sardonic punches.

 

And then it's my turn

to throw the counter punches

return the rights for the lefts

more acerbic than yours.

We fight till one of us or both of us are beaten to a pulp pulverised

and knocked out or we decide to reach the point of inflection.

 

Our fertile attacks and counter attacks multiply exponentially and we

trace on the mat hyperbolic paraboloids.

We had forgotten  perhaps

that we were not really

meant to be in the ring

and life breeds life while

death gives birth

only to new deaths.

 

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.

 

---

 

MARTHA'S SYNDROME

Dr. Nikhil M. Kurien

 

A belch from Martha was enough to jolt Suhara from her sleep. They both lay down in neighbouring beds in the otherwise empty hospital ward which had fifteen beds. Two of the in-patients who were there with them got discharged in the morning and Martha was impatiently awaiting her turn to go home for it has been a long time since she was admitted. Suhara was admitted three weeks back after a fall which fractured her hip bone and she was slowly recovering from repeated infections after her surgery. Both the ladies had become close by now in between their infections and sorrows.

Suhara  looked at Martha quite inquisitively as though asking what was that loud belching about. Martha understood the meaningful look and she giggled and said, “These medicines have converted my stomach into a gas factory.” 

“Did you take the tablet for nine ‘o’ clock?”, Suhara asked with much concern to clarify if it was that big round orange coloured tablet which was making her to belch.

“Tablet?” Martha had a questioning tone. “ It’s tablets. A multitude of them”.

“Don’t feel bad about it. They are for your own good.” Suhara made a weak attempt to pacify Martha who was fed up of all the treatments she was having for quite a period of time and she was no better than what she was when she was admitted few months back

“You look more pale than yesterday. Didn’t you have the iron tonic ?” Suhara asked with empathy. “Don’t you feel better after the changes in medicine?”.

“Better?. I feel bitter. I don’t feel like taking anything Suhara. All I require is somebody’s hand to scratch my ever itching body", as she pointed to the lesions that had grown a bit more in their circumference and had become red. “ Who knows with what I am diseased with.  Even the doctor excuses himself before I ask of my own state of affairs.”

Martha slowly got up from her bed to drink some water from the jug kept nearby on the bedside table and Suhara couldn’t help noticing how much  hair of Martha had shed onto the bed sheet.  "The pillow is full of your hair”.

“Please don’t call my attention to that. I know the hair is raining out of my head. Maybe within another month I will turn bald unless the doctor helps me”, said Martha as she rubbed her right palm gently over her head reminding her of  the thick cascade which was her pride sometime back.

Martha was a retired professor who led a lonely life after her husband died early into their marriage and she didn’t have any children. She at first ignored the small rashes that erupted and healed at intervals. She first visited the doctor when she had spikes of fever along with joint pains. The rashes were now taking more time to heal. It had now been more than a year since the symptoms became more severe and numerous tests had been carried out but still the doctors seemed to be clueless as to what kind of disease the symptoms were pointing to. Later on she was admitted in the hospital for a careful observation and her condition was also such that she was finding it difficult to travel the distance between the hospital and her house. Her muscles too were failing which made her difficult to stand for even a short period of time. She had tried umpteen times to talk with the doctors who examined her each day but all they did was pacify her with kind words that things would improve soon. Nobody seemed to have an answer. She had often heard in the Sunday sermons that God was there for the destitutes. But for her there was none except her bed side mate Suhara till the time either one of them got discharged .

“Oh, please don’t cry!”   Suhara tried to comfort Martha as she  saw tears brimming up from the eyes of Martha. “Isn’t this the day that the chief doctor said he will come specially to meet and have a talk with you?"

Till today the doctors examining her have kindly evaded all her queries and finally yesterday the nurse came and informed Martha that the chief doctor will be here soon to talk to her in detail about her condition. Martha  was tired about this prospective visits of doctors. Everytime she expectantly would wait for a favourable reply about her disease but the doctors seemed to talk to  her everything in this world except her medical condition. So she was least bothered about the doctor’s visit and instead wanted her attention to something else than diseases. She said to Suhara, “Now forget all these things about diseases. Go through the news paper and tell me what all important news are there for today”.

Suhara picked up the well folded daily paper which was provided to them every morning and checked randomly the printed news. “Nothing important in the headlines. Only daily scams and controversies”. A pause was there during which time Suhara dug into the news items and finally took a piece which was worth telling Martha. “ Yeah. Here is one. This year's Nobel prize for literature goes to an unheard name. I can barely spell his name even. God has blessed him”.

Martha didn’t believe in any blessings because she now felt she was the most unblessed of all the human beings . “ I don’t believe in any blessings. It is his imagination and power of writing that has fetched him the award”.

“Of course. Imagination which God had bestowed upon him” said Suhara, an equivocal supporter of the Almighty

“Yet another man has made a reputation for himself. From now on people will respect and have  regards for him. His words will be quoted and his views will be discussed and debated. Yet he was a little known personality till yesterday”. Martha felt proud for that Nobel awardee.

“Strange are His ways” Suhara exclaimed looking up to the Almighty and at the same time Martha gave another belch as she shifted in the  bed and said “I wish I were him”.

To Suhara it sounded as a comedy when a lady with undiscovered illness wishes that she was a winner of that prestigious award

“Has it ever occurred to you how much more lucky is this guy Nobel than the guy who actually won this award”, Martha asked pensively.

Alfred Nobel was dead, buried and gone but Martha considered him to be the luckiest of all, more than the awardees who won the recognition in his name. He was remembered even after death, talked about with respect long after death has eclipsed him and his name echoes year after year. His name has been etched in history by an award and is secure for the rest of future. He is now more famous than when he was alive.

“Isn’t he the fellow who is remembered for inventing the dynamite ?” Suhara enquired

“True!”. But the fame and recognition his name now carries is simply not proportional to the name he had when he was alive. Were there not greater and more wonderful discoverers, inventors and explorers. It was Alfred Nobel’s father Emmanuel Nobel who invented plywood. Do we know anything about him. Though we know and remember many of the great people, it’s  Mr.Nobel’s name that regularly come to our minds more than the others and we speak that name with reverence.  Death has frozen him in time and the award has embalmed his name in our memory.

Suhara  couldn’t quite grasp the emotional content of Martha’s words and she went back to the newspaper and changed the page. There on the next page she found one which interested her, a scandal about  the supply of unpasteurised milk in the town and she read out the news to Martha.

“Now here is another man who has secured a place in every man’s mind and tongue”, Martha exclaimed to which Suahara wondered who this other man was.

“Louis Pasteur has secured a place for his name in this world forever by the term pasteurisation. It’s another term we use knowingly or unknowingly almost daily.  Haven’t Mr. Pasteur done many other greater works and of them how many can we enlist now?".

Suhara tried in vain for a moment to enlist his achievements but finally admitted, “I can tell only about his pasteurisation technique”.

“True”, Martha said.  “So is it with me. But I can recollect some if I travel down the memory lane of my school days. If I’am right, it was he who developed vaccine against anthrax and rabies.  He is considered as the father of microbiology.  He showered light on fermentation process and introduced various techniques for sterilization. If the pasteurisation technique was known by any other scientific term,  Mr.Pasteur might have gone into oblivion like many greats who have found things of great value but are not remembered. Not that we are ungrateful to these great people but simply because they couldn’t ensure their name against the face of time. Their names could have been preserved by simply naming whatever they were concerned with”.

Suhara  really felt that  Mr. Pasteur was indeed lucky to  lend his name to that technique and thereby carving his name on the wall of common people's minds.

The monologue of Martha was not over, “It’s the only reason why we still remember great men like Albert Einstein for Einstein's Theory of Relativity which we learn in awe though it’s for another work of his that he actually won the Nobel prize.

“As Issac Newton is remembered for Newton’s Law of Gravity”, Suhara finally had something to contribute from her side.

“Exactly. Put  it simply as law of gravity and the next generation will not associate Newton to his great work. Edison has made a thousand inventions but comparatively his name sprouts less on our tongue. The  number of times Edison's name sprouts on our tongue is inversely proportional to the number of inventions he had made. His name is seldom used. But  imagine if the name Edison itself was used as a term for any of his great inventions, his name would have remained viridescent. Very much like the name of James Watt whose name appears on every electric bulb

“But isn’t the electric bulb really called the Edison’s bulb?”, Suhara wondered.

“Then  he is unlucky in having his name lost in the battle of sovereignty to the term bulb. Very much like the case where Roentgen’s own term roentgenogramloses the space to the term x-ray. It will not be much long before their names are pushed off peoples tongue only to be read in text books for examinations or in general knowledge books”, Martha added and now Suhara was beginning to get the vibe of Martha’s debate. The point was, it is lucky to have your name left behind and it is all the more lucky if the people would use it as an everyday term or language, reminding each other of the particular man though unintentionally.“ You lend the name to the product  and you are ensuring that you have  labeled your name in this world. Your name should be insured as an award like Mr. Nobel’s or it should be synonymous with an act like Hitlerian or Chaplinesque or the thing itself should be the name like diesel of Rudolf Diesel or bell of Alexander Graham Bell “, Martha equated.

In life many people might be respected and praised for their worthiness, work and standing in society but who cares for them after their death. How many from these billions on earth get to be remembered.  Lucky is the man who gets remembered occasionally like Socrates or Edmund Hillary. Great if it is systematically like Mr.Nobels. Fantastic if its uttered often by our tongue as part of everyday language like Mr. Pasteur’s or Bell’s. The fact is, only a handful get to be remembered knowingly or unknowingly”.

Suhara  was all praise for the Creator as she thought about the great names that changed the world, “God determines whose all names should be left behind to be studied, revered, followed and used”.

“I too wish that I had an opportunity to leave behind my name in this world. Who wants to be one in a million. It should be one out of a million”. Martha expressed a desire which was in her heart for a very long time but alas she had nothing in her to make her famous. The utmost recognition she got was that of the best teacher award before her retirement.

“God can do it”, Suhara gave the indications that she was an optimist and anything was possible with her ever trustworthy God and she continued her newspaper reading.

“That is quite impossible now in this age and situation”, Martha declared. She just said what a practical mind would say and she was not a pessimist. “For that you need to do or find something or else you should be tremendously lucky”.

Suhara  was hearing Martha but at the same time she was going through the news paper too. "They say there  has been a record sale of greeting cards for this year’s Valentine’s day compared to what has been for the Christmas or New Year celebrations."

“Yeah ! That’s it. Lucky like Saint Valentine”. Martha found the right example to deliver her new point. “He didn’t do anything much to be ascribed about except for the reason that he advocated love and now he has become synonymous with love. Great, isn’t it!".

“He indeed is blessed to be a saint of such a wonderful, loveable day”, Suhara said passionately. “Saint of Love”

“Weren’t there better advoactes of love and intense lovers. But who gets to be talked about on the day kept as a homage to love. A priest. He is lucky to have his name secured in this world though by chance”, Martha finished her description on that matter.

Martha’s wish to  leave a name behind her for the world to talk about , discuss or study was growing in her though she knew it was a vain dream.  She thought of the  people pronouncing  her name, at least occasionally, when greeting or when describing things and she gave a belch again.

“Seems your system is rejecting your excess dreams”, Suhara joked as she realised that Martha was lost in her dreams for a moment. Martha knew that her dreams were in excess but then commoners like her who have been sent into this world merely to fill in the voids between the great people have every right to dream, however far-fetched it maybe and can derive their own pleasure. The freedom to dream was there since the stars were right above them.

“Be calm. God is great. One can’t determine one's own fate. Tomorrow you may become famous “. Martha was stupefied at Suhara’s consolation and she laughed out, “I haven’t heard of a more ridiculous consolation. You don’t even deserve a consolation prize for consoling”.

But Suhara  stood by what she stated,”I mean it. Strange are His ways”.

“It’s your words that are strange. I thought you were a prudent lady but now I realise that you are a hyper optimist. Well, I won't blame you for that because it’s a good medicine for someone who lie dejectedly on a hospital bed”. Martha knew Suhara was not trying hurt or tease her but was just complementing her wish to leave behind a name to be talked or used upon. “ I am over sixty years and I haven’t got the least literary sense or voice to sing. Surely you don’t expect me to  earn fame in the sporting arena nor do I have the brain to invent or the eye to discover a thing. I can’t do humourous roles to be remembered like Charlie Chaplin nor can I get out of this bed to do services like Mother Teresa. If it is luck you wish me like Father Valentine had, well know that I wouldn’t have been in this condition if a fraction of his luck had passed on to me”.

“You can't be sure of anything Martha. If God decides to keep your name back on earth, He will”, it now seemed as if Suahra had taken up Martha’s case with God.

“Considering all the explanations I have offered to you just now, can you still tell me or offer God a way by which He can make me famous and retain my name for others to quote and  remember?”. Martha just completed what she wanted to ask Suhara and just then the nurse entered the room with some of the results of the blood tests done few days back and she announced that the  chief doctor had started his morning rounds of inspecting the patients and would be here to meet Martha soon. The chief doctor had  promised Martha that he would definitely speak to her about her condition in detail after getting a few more laboratory results. Now the moment had come. Considering the number of  investigations they have done on her by countless names during the past one year and the number of specialists doctors that have visited her, it certainly had created an inquisitiveness and anxiety in Martha to know what  truly was  going on inside her. She knew that they were treating her to their best of abilities without success and now she had a  hunch that they might be trying to do something new.  Martha didn’t care what they did to her as long as it helped her get out  of the bed.

The morning looked pleasant out of the window and the conversation in the morning had put a lively face on both the female patients and they were ready to face the day and their diseases. The chief doctor came in with his usual comforting smile and behind him rallied a few assistants of his with stethoscopes and notes. He wished Martha and Suhara  a warm good morning and both the ladies too wished him back . Martha immediately asked before the doctor could evade from her with some pleasantary enquiries, “Did you get my results?".

“Yes, but did you sleep well yesterday?”, the doctor asked with much concern to which Martha replied, “Not quite. Did you get my results?”

The doctor stood quiet for a brief period of time as though rehearsing how to deliver what he had to say and then he began in a very soft tone, “Well, let me first tell you how famous and important you are going to be from now on. Get ready by noon. A group of researchers are coming over here to talk to you and perhaps take some of your pictures and ask you some questions. You are going to be  well known from now on”.

Martha couldn’t quite grasp what the doctor was talking about and sat there on her bed plaintively. Suahara felt as though some heavenly intervention had happened after the discussion they had sometime ago. The doctor noted the expressionless face of his patient and said to her, “I am talking about you Martha. From now on your name will be discussed, debated and studied upon”.

“What is all this about?”. Even Suhara was getting miffed over such confused statements.  "Are you saying that she is going to be famous”.

“Yes, in a way, yes !”, said the doctor without much happiness although Suhara’s face erupted with a smile that showed her joy deep inside.

“Just as you wished Martha. Just as I said. Didn’t I tell you God is great and answers all our wishes”.

“This is all unbelievable. Why me? How do you think it can happen?. I think you have got it all wrong”, Martha objected to the suggestion that she was on her way to fame.

“It’s because through you a great contribution has been made to the field of medicine. You have shed light on an important aspect which from now on will benefit thousands of people. Practitioners and researchers of medicine will remember you and your name will be found on all medical texts and journals besides dailies and weeklies."

“Just as you wanted Martha!” exclaimed Suhara as she turned to the doctor and confirmed once more, “So she has carved her name for this world to remember!”.

The puzzlement for Martha was still not over because there was no logic in she being world famous suddenly. “I can't believe it’s all happening. Am I dreaming?. When did all these things happen?".

“It’s  just as we talked. God selects only a few names to be retained in this world and one among them now is Martha. You are lucky and just think how strangely God has acted”, Suahara said with tears of joy in her eyes.

“But how can all these things happen?. Please explain to me so that I can wake up to reality from this abnoxious state although it's not so bad now after you told me I will be famous.  For  once I can taste what I always wanted to. How a new celebrity feels for the first time when fortune comes jingling at the door step. Please doctor, explain to me what’s going on."

“Well, it’s all about a new syndrome that has raised the concern and curiosity of this world and we have named this syndrome as Martha’s syndrome”. The doctor started to explain.

“What is a syndrome?” Suhara  intervened.

“A syndrome is a group of symptoms which announces that there is an underlying particular pathological condition in a person”, explained the doctor. Seeing the puzzlement which was evident on the faces of the two ladies. the doctor began to explain in detail. “Let  me put it this way. Your incurable, vexed disease is due to a faulty gene. All that could be done was to replace this bad gene with a normal, good gene which was introduced by us from outside. To carry the good gene to its site we required a vehicle. A virus is considered to be the best carrier and so we chose one that is safe to humans after eradicating all its lethal aspects. But strangely things have gone astray. The virus appears to have thrown off its bridle and has acquired a new character evolving thus into an entirely new variety of virus which is now on a rampage showing new manifestations. The  field of genetic therapy is a minefield of uncertainities and probabilities and we have accidentally stepped on one."

"So what does a new virus in a human being mean?” Suhara  wanted the ultimate answer instead of all the mechanisms a virus does.

“Maybe it is irrecoverable or irreversible but we are studying the character of this new virus  by the symptoms it shows and if our predictions are right, this virus will lead us to unfolding the mysteries of many things in virology and genetics. Our conclusion is that this virus can be tamed for human benefits but we are uncertain of  the time period it will take to do that.

“So the story says......?"

The fright in Martha’s eye's was visible to all.

"I am sorry that I had to relate all this to you. It’s because you have no relatives and a stage has come to let you know so that you can be prepared”, said the doctor in all concern.

“Prepared ?”, that sent a jolt through Martha.

“Have to be prepared for the effects of Martha’s syndrome”. It was a small warning from the vastly experienced doctor in a hushed tone.

“It simply means ?” Suhara asked with tears in her eyes though it was not of joy now.

“It simply means it will take us time to bring the new virus strain under control. Till then we have to keep observing the virus and study it as it progresses as long as Martha is there”. The doctor had nothing more to hide. It was not in his plan to reveal so much to the old patient but he did. Now it was better to tell her the final eventuality so that she could be well prepared to face it. “She is terminally sick. As she wanted it, she is going to leave behind her name for generations to come “.

Martha seemed to be quick in absorbing the shock that just came, for she had already withstood many such shocks in her life. She had nothing to live for. Then why not she could be useful to the entire humanity if such was His strange way of answering her wish. She now had a face of confidence and her voice was stronger as she said, “Yes, Iam leaving behind my name as I wished. For all to talk and know about. Iam famous now and forever. Indeed Suhara, indeed, strange are His ways”.

 

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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FEAR

Sharanya Bee

 

Decades ago when I was only three or four

I fell from a jungle gym

at a children's park, 

hurt myself quite bad,

it bled a lot.

 

Ever since then,

I've been so afraid of the setup

Just their sight makes me

re-live the whole incident in my mind.

 

Years later,

even now it makes so much sense

to have all this fear caged inside,

to be petrified

of climbing up higher

frightened to hold on

and terrified to let go.

 

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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RESURRECTION

Dr. Preethi Ragasudha

 

Judge me if you dare!

 

I don't belong to you.

I am not your perfect toy,

to shut me in your doll-house!

Neither am I your love-bird,

to restrain me in your golden cage!

Face it, I am a free spirit!

And nothing can stop me  now.

 

I have broken  those chains

That bound me to my earthly shadows!

The knots of fear, jealousy and melancholy

No longer binds me to your heart!

I dance, I sing and laugh to my heart's content

Like I have never done before ever!

 

No more demons threaten my dreams

Nor does the uncertain future mar my smile.

My solitude is my solace, for I am a free spirit!

I have found peace within me, which is with me forever!

 

Dr. Preethi Ragasudha is an Assistant Professor of Nutrition at the Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences, Kochi, Kerala. She is passionate about art, literature and poetry.

 

 

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PRECIPICE

Major Dr. Sumitra Mishra

 

I’m hanging on the precipice

Unable to unchain and amble away

Unable to leave the earth and touch the sky!

 

I’ve not forgotten

The words of prayer or chants or the aazan

Yet troubled by the battle between churches, temples and mosques!

 

Still I could see the red rose

Amid the bouquet of pale orchids in the hamper

Nodding and swaying, seeking love, and beckoning hope!

 

I would like to jump and hop

Melt into the golden rays of dawn on the horizon 

But doubt straps my limbs, feels numb like a frozen fish!

 

A blanket of skepticism

Clouds my vision fixed on the temple tower

I can’t see the golden gate or the beams of divinity!

 

So here I’m standing still

Waiting for your immanence Lord

Hanging on the precipice of faith darkened by reason!

 

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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THE FISHERMAN ( DHIBAR)

Kabiratna Manorama Mohapatra

(Translated by Sumitra Mishra)

 

The stream of time flows

In front of me incessantly

Oh, Fisherman!

Give me patience, tell me gently, 

A boat is waiting for me at the shore.

 

I am floating on the stream 

Eager to ferry my boat

In the reverse flow of the stream.

Though I don’t see any boat or boatman

Yet I am waiting for the scheduled day and time

Folding my hands in prayer

When will that day arrive?

Oh, Fisherman!

Flash a signal in my consciousness

Hang your banner on the other side of the stream.

 

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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WEAVES OF TIME

Sangeeta Gupta

XXV

Life kept searching—
a whole night—for me

it kept searching my dreams 
asked about my whereabouts

Life even inquired from
the dark night,
but none could help.

Life kept on the look out for me
night after night quite desperate
only to realise
that I was lost
entangled in
the sun-struck rays
of an arising dawn.

 

XXVI

The mounting morning mist
surely is the manifestation
of Nature’s very own
non-stop symphony

the soft music
of the breeze reaches me
and after a meeting with you
we both—
born after a divide of 
decades— are still twins
of that one timeless
moment
where souls lock
beyond body and belief.

Love has its own dialect
not expressed except in fine feelings

words spoil
loves purity
without fail

hear, silence alone
manifests love
better than the lines
of all my poems.
 

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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WITH TEARS IN MY EYES

Dr. Molly Joseph M

 

Xmas is nowhere more near

than here,  in  Hyderabad

where the cold nip in air

pierces, bites

to take you to that chilly night

of goodness, kindness

incarnated  as the innocent newborn,

when the heaven and  earth hugged,

and glittered in the eyes

of the naive and innocent...

 

Yes,  once again

reliving those moments...

 

As I sit in my  balcony watching

the  stir and flow of life

in Aparna,  cyber zone

the little indoor plants

wave in gentle air..

 

the wind chime brings

echoes of that century old

sweetness that wafted through time...

 

yes,  happiness is the here and now, contentment is to take in

this air, fresh and clean...

 

I see kids gathering in the corridors, meeting,

lisping out, gleefully showing off their Xmas gifts,  sharing...

 

they the mini India of varied groups

the parsi  the punjabi,  the southie, northie, the hindu,  the muslim, christian and the jain..

lisping out their joy

of an oncoming day of gaiety and cheer..

 

tears well up..

ruffling my veneers of

contented self..

 

it flashes..

the teeming millions clamouring for their space

haunted by  the insecure shrouded in fear,

and the passionate, unafraid  youth

yelling out their hearts for

a world they well deserve

and warp out for sure

determined to the core..

 

their anguished faces

disturbing my Xmas waves...

 

with tears in my eyes

I think.of the India of my Bapu,

the nimble footed, emaciated soul force of ours

who  strove hard,  struggled

till his last drop of blood,

zest so sincere

spilled for an India for all...

 

With tears in my eyes,  I

read my Tagore, my inspiring Bard

who sang for minds without fear, free from narrow domestic walls..

 

here

the innocent little ones

haven't finished their play..

still all aroar in corridors,

mirthful...

 

with tears in my eyes

I watch,

what the world holds for

them, 

the earth in tatters, the very air and water in crisis,

their burgeoning world

to be clipped and broken apart

on random winds that carry

no rhyme and reason to blow..

 

Dr. Molly Joseph, (M.A., M.Phil., PGDTE, EFLU,Hyderabad) had her Doctorate in post war American poetry. She retired as the H.O.D., Department of English, St.Xavier's College, Aluva, Kerala, and now works as Professor, Communicative English at FISAT, Kerala. She is an active member of GIEWEC (Guild of English writers Editors and Critics) She writes travelogues, poems and short stories. She has published five books of poems - Aching Melodies, December Dews, and Autumn Leaves, Myna's Musings and Firefly Flickers and a translation of a Malayalam novel Hidumbi. She is a poet columnist in Spill Words, the international Online Journal.

She has been awarded Pratibha Samarppanam by Kerala State Pensioners Union, Kala Prathibha by Chithrasala Film Society, Kerala and Prathibha Puraskaram by Aksharasthree, Malayalam group of poets, Kerala, in 2018. Dr.Molly Joseph has been conferred Poiesis Award of Honour as one of the International Juries in the international award ceremonies conducted by Poiesis Online.com at Bangalore on May 20th, 2018. Her two new books were released at the reputed KISTRECH international Festival of Poetry in Kenya conducted at KISII University by the Deputy Ambassador of Israel His Excellency Eyal David. Dr. Molly Joseph has been honoured at various literary fest held at Guntur, Amaravathi, Mumbai and Chennai. Her latest books of 2018 are “Pokkuveyil Vettangal” (Malayalam Poems), The Bird With Wings of Fire (English), It Rains (English).

 

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BRAHMASTRA – THE LAST MORTAL TO POSSESS IT 

Dr. (Major) B.C. Nayak

 

Vrishaketu the youngest son of Karna,
the only one out of ten
to survive the Mahabharata war.

With revelation of Karna’s identity
He became the cynosure of Pandavas
Fought many wars as Arjun’s ally,
Including the one with Babrubahan,
Where both were killed.

Subsequently, Arjuna,
Revived by Nagamani
And Vrushaketu,
by Srikrishna.

He was the last mortal
who had the knowledge of divyastra
like brahmastra, varunastra.

With Vrishaketu ,not gone
the days of Brahmastra !
From individualisation,
became state possession.

Brahmastra,deadly nuclear weapon,
hardly used during epic Mahabharat.
The triggered release
of the weapon;

“Had it not been blocked by Narad and Vyasa,
Triggered by Aswatthama and Arjuna respectively,
The world would not have been in existence
where we are living today.”

The modern warfare inching,
day by day towards a nuclear war,
mainly a showdown of
Brahmastram.

If deterrent doesn’t work,
World will meet it’s doomsday,
sooner than the present expectation.

Mass destruction could damage
much of the Earth
and kill most humans
and many other living things.
Leaving a cripled civilisation !

Albert Einstein said, “I know not
with what weapons World War III
will be fought, but World War IV
will be fought with sticks and stones.”

 

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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SPECTRUM

Sheena Rath

 

A Life not envisaged

That left me raged

Helpless in a cage

Performing non stop on life's stage

Each day facing new challenges

Administrating my autistic boy's prances.

Minutes of profound despair

An unwanted guest

Looking for a new nest.

Keeps creeping in now and then.

I shall be your voice

As we have no choice

We will work hard together

To make things better

You are different not less.

You fall into a spectrum

Come, let's share a tiny glass of rum.

I know you don't like the sounds of drum

Or even fruits like plum.

Oranges you peel

After every sumptuous meal

Your anxiety is an ordeal

Need to handle it with much zeal

One step at a time

As the clocks chime

Time slows down

Every minute seems like a mess around

Until your face breaks into a smile

As a mother I know I have to go miles

'Autism'!!....we want to ostracize you

Don't come so close, we don't need your views

You have been with us twenty two years

Time you stepped out of the front door

We don't need you anymore.

 

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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A SALUTE

Narayanan Ramakrishnan

 

For the last two years and more, I have been addicted to listening to Thirukural being broadcast in two frequencies from Chennai and Trichinapally, AIR, every morning at 5.50 am, one followed by the other in next five minutes.  So, I could hear two golden couplets of Thiruvalluvar.  But, sometimes, even  the simplified short wordings in Tamil I find it difficult to grasp. To obviate that, I  have a Malayalam version of this valued book which I always keep at hand, while I am all ears. I warn my wife not to switch on any tube lights, lest the audibility gets disturbed,  while this 'tube light' is on in rapt attention. 

Just before commencement, the announcement comes, which gives information about the chapter and subsection of the chapter from which the Kural is being elucidated.  So it helps me in  quickly turning to that chapter and relevant subsection.  Even with all these, sometimes luck runs out.  Trichy frequency gets overlapped by the Kuddapah AIR, at the nick of time.  Then that one Kural is lost for the day.  It is hardly on air for two minutes.

Today's kural was so true to me, that it drove my memory down to 2009, when I was the Branch Manager of a brokerage situated on the outskirts of the city.

A  friend of mine for the last so many years, had asked me if I could do some intra-day trading in shares.  I was very wary of intra-day and always focused on long term, delivery based trading.  But on that particular day, I found a blue-chip scrip trading at very low price at around 700 per share.  Looking at the pivotal chart, I placed an order near the next lower support level for 100 shares.  Soon it was executed.

The share price dropped by 20 rupees soon.  I bought another hundred to average.  By that time, news broke about the Satyam Computers number scam. Market suffered a huge fall.  Shares bought in my friend's account too suffered. My idea to sell it off that day would not happen.  To average the buy price I added another two hundred.  Market was about to close.  If I sell it would  result in a loss of more than 10000/- to my friend.  Soon call came from the risk department enquiring about this account.  I informed that the client is taking delivery and will pay up on due date.  The trading value was approximately three lakhs.  My throat was drying.  I had no idea how to convey this to my friend. But I could not help it.  He was working in a city branch of a nationalized bank.

I reached the branch where he worked, by 7 in the evening.  He was still busy at his work.  Seeing me at that odd time, he asked me to join him for a tea, while I was in another world thinking about how to inform him about the commitment I had caused him, that too, not in just thousands.  It required to be settled on the third day.  I moved behind him like a machine.

He was a great face-reader.. "Narayanan, something is wrong with you.  Tell me".  Words were difficult to come by, my eyes welled up with tears. "I want to sit somewhere", I said with chocked throat.  We found a corner.

I began, "Markets crashed, you know".

"I heard, some scam in Sathyam Computers.  But why should that bother you.  Did you dabble in that?". 

"No, not..at....all".

"Then?".

I somehow delivered the shock.  "I bought 400 shares in Titan for you and could not sell because, if I sold, you would have lost more than 10000/-".

"400 shares of Titan in my account!  How much debit is there because of this buy?"

"Nearly three lakhs", I said without meeting his eyes.

"When is it due for payment?"

"Day after tomorrow".

"Oh! That's terrible. I will call you tomorrow morning".  Obviously he was perturbed.

I had a sleepless night.  I eagerly wanted the day to break. I felt jealous of other sleeping souls in my house. Switched on the TV. All business channels were agog with Sathyam scam.  Rumors about such scams in some other reputed companies too painted bad days for market ahead.  What if Titan, too, falls further.  My friend's loss would mount. So many imponderable thoughts clouded my mind.  Day break continued to linger on and on.

Somehow day broke for me and my wait for his call began.  All unimportant calls came and one friend, who had never called me all these years, too, called.   I had to simulate interest.  When you receive an unexpected call from a long lost friend, most probably, that call would be more of interest to him than to you.  That call truly stood testimony to the statement.  He had gathered my number from a common friend, imploring me to attend a meeting in the evening to know about a 'Once in a life time, God sent opportunity' to join an upcoming MLM.

My mobile rang. It was the call I was waiting for.  "Narayanan, I have transferred an approximate sum to my trading a/c on line. It will cover the debit. Do one thing. See that the relevant contract note comes to me than to my house address by post. Reason, you know". I read between the lines.  "I don't know whether to say  thank you or say sorry for the unexpected burden I created for you", I fumbled for words.

Then came the golden words.  "Narayanan, you did that with good intentions.  Had it gone in my favor, I would only have reaped the benefit.  Unfortunately the opposite happened.  The share you bought is very good one.  I will hold for the time being.  But keep a watch.  The minute I am at break-even, sell it off.  Don't worry.  But the contract note....".  I just nodded, but immersed in emotions, no words came out.

I salute him for the greatness of his heart.

THIRUKURAL CHAPTER 81  PAZHAMAI,  FIFTH KURAL

WHEN YOUR FRIEND CAUSES YOU DISTRESS BY AN ACTION, BUT NOT  WITH THE SLIGHTEST OF  INTENTION  TO CHEAT YOU, DO NOT BLAME HIM; ACCEPT THAT.

 

Narayanan Ramakrishnan began his career as a sales professional in a tea company from 1984 selling Taj Mahal, Red Label tea and Bru coffee. After that he joined a leading brokerage firm dealing in stocks and shares.  Last one year, he is in pursuit of pleasure in reading and writing. He is based out of Trivandrum.

 

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THE FESTIVE SEASON

Akshay Kumar Das

 

The year chilling under the blanket,

Festive season knocking down the wicket,

Poor to rich under one closet,

Joining the annual feast,

 

Christmas trees in illumination,

Blinking & shining like the stars in sheer jubilation,

Christmas carol songs enthralling the atmosphere with oblivion,

 

The year is just a week away,

Celebrations & felicitations at bay,

Everyone waits with full anxiety,

How to join the celebrations?

To fulfil the moods of the festive season.

 

Sri Akshaya Kumar Das is poet from Bhubaneswar , Odisha the author of "The Dew Drops" available with amazon/flipkart/snapdeal published by Partridge India in the year 2016. Sri Das is a internationally acknowledged author with no. of his poems published in India & abroad by Ardus Publication, Canada. Sri Das is conferred with "Ambassador of Humanity" award by Hafrican Peace Art World, Ghana. Sri Das organised a Intenational Poetry Festival in the year 2017 under the aegis of Feelings International Artist's Society of Dr.Armeli Quezon held at Bhubaneswar. Sri Das is presently working as an Admin for many poetry groups in Face Book including FIAS & Poemariam Group headed by Dr.N.K.Sharma. Receipent of many awards for hos contribution to English literature & world peace. A featured poet of Pentasi B Group. Sri Das presently retired Insurance Manager residing at Bhubaneswar."

 

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MID-AFTERNOON DREAMS

Mrutyunjay Sarangi

 

There is a way to dream,
standing still in mid-afternoon
at the steps of the minaret
watching people pass by,
their shining eyes filled with hope.

The one in the bright dress
flowing with the crowd 
smiling to herself,
she will meet her lover in a few moments
to hear words of sweet endearment
dreaming of a happy home and a happier life.

The man in tatters rushing to the Dargah
dreaming of succulent pieces of mutton
in a plate of colourful biriyani,
he wishes he is not too late for it. 

The lady behind the Burkha,
her husband lying on a hospital bed,
dreams of a bundle of notes
to pay for his medical treatment,
the knees replacement
that will bring him back on his legs
and bring food for her famished children. 

The school boy weighed
under the heavy backpack,
returning home to plunge into books,
dreaming of becoming an engineer
to earn in dollars and spend in rupees!

Two young men ambling over
to the Xerox shop at the corner,
debating, if settling in America is better
or going over to Australia,
Dreaming of distant shores,
these two dreamers
on this steaming afternoon.

And I with fire in my eyes,
dreaming of a great India,
the land of lost opportunities.
Ah, if only i could get
the reins of this behemoth for a year! 

The dreams never fight,
theirs and mine,
nor do they talk to each other 
and exchange notes.
Yet I know for sure
their breaths mingle 
in an air of sanguine sunshine.

Somewhere the one
who adjudicates on dreams,
listens to us and smiles,
Asking us to come back again,
And yet again,
And to keep standing and dreaming.

Gently he chides us,
if all dreams are granted,
we will be left stranded on the steps of life
only dreaming of dreams! 

 

 

---

 

DEBTS

Mruryunjay Sarangi

 

Anirudh stormed into his father's room, breathless and perplexed:
"Baba, did you issue this advertisement? It has your number and the address of this place!"
Baba took his eyes off the Indian Express and smiled indulgently at his seemingly agitated son,
"Oh, what newspaper is that? Dharitri? They published it today, did they? So my trip to their office yesterday was not a waste; I have given a similar advertisement to Sambada also. Get me a copy of it on your way back from office."
"But Baba, what does this advertisement mean?"
"Read it, read loudly, let me hear if they have published it correctly."
Anirudh started reading it aloud, his voice choking with emotion:
"Yesterday, I completed eighty years. By Kaliyug standards, it is twenty years more than I deserved. Before I leave this world I want to settle all my debts. All those to whom I owe anything or those who owe me anything, may contact me at 9975300537. Biswambar Acahrya,168, Maitri Vihar, Bhubaneswar."
Biswambar heaved a sigh of relief,
"Correct, they have printed it without a mistake. These days one can never say, people have lost the ability to read anything handwritten.”
Anirudh was even more perplexed, after knowing that his Baba had actually issued such an advertisement,
"But Baba, what are these debts you are talking of? You never told us you owe any debts that you want to pay off? How much do you owe to others? To whom?"
Baba chuckled; his son was getting worried over how much it would cost to pay off the debts! Whether he would have to go for a loan to arrange the payment! The poor chap didn't understand that life was a constant game of lending and borrowing! Every moment we live is borrowed from the past, from the great event of our birth and every breath we exhale is lent to the inevitable march of time, ultimately leading to our final farewell.
He tried to reassure his son:
"Don't worry. It's not much. You don't have to arrange huge funds to repay my debts."
"Baba, you should tell me who your lenders are; it may take time to locate them after all these years. And who are your borrowers? When will they pay back their debt to you?"
"Don't worry, they will know when they read the ad. My mobile phone account is almost exhausted. Just add a few hundred rupees more to it today."
"What are you saying Baba, your creditors will pay you back by phone?"
"Ani, my son, I was a teacher of English for forty years, in P.M.Academy, one of the best schools in Cuttack. So many of my students became judges, bureaucrats, diplomats, professors and lawyers. Some of them will read my ad and recollect what they owe to me. Someone will call and say, Sir, I learnt English from you, today my judgments are quoted everywhere for the beauty of their language, I owe it to you. Someone might say, Sir, today I corrected my grandson's grammar, I had learnt it from you."
Anirudh smiled to himself! Baba, his dear Baba! Always the dreamer, the idealist! And he must be feeling lonely, must be wanting to talk to people! That explains this ad in the paper. Ever since Mama died about a year back Baba has been feeling lonelier.
Anirudh was still curious to know what debt Baba owed to others.
"Baba, I know you want people to call you and tell you what a wonderful teacher you have been to them. But Baba, your teachers must be dead by now. How can you pay your debt to them?"
Baba closed his eyes for a minute. Memories came flooding to his mind, mixed with a longing for the days gone by, never to return.
"Things rankle in the mind, one often thinks, if only he had done things a bit differently. When your Mama was alive, I used to relive the past with her so many times, recounting tales of dreams and despair, of things done and left undone. She was a patient listener, I miss her so much!" 
Anirudh felt bad for his dear father.
"Baba, please tell me what you owe to others, I will pay it back for you, I promise."
Baba smiled wistfully, a little sadness clothing the smile like a small sheet of fog,
"When we were students in Ravenshaw college, some of us in the hostel wanted to watch the movie Mughal-e-Azam, the magnum opus of the great K. Asif. You must have heard the song “Pyar Kiya to Darnaa Kya”? It was from that movie. And Prithviraj Kapoor, Dilip Kumar, Madhubala - all gave the performance of a life time in that epic tale of unrequited love. One had to get tickets in advance at the Capital Talkies where it was running. None of us had a bicycle and there was no question of going by rickshaw just to buy tickets in advance. We had a class mate, Vikas, who used to live in Sutahat, very close to Capital Talkies. His father was a government official; Vikas used to come to college on a costly bike and spent all his leisure time in our room in the hostel. He was a very decent chap. I used the hostel phone to call him and asked him to get tickets for ten of us. He did. In the evening we walked all the two miles to the cinema and enjoyed the movie. Vikas got us pakodas during the interval; that must have cost him another five rupees. Once the movie was over, everyone started leaving, without paying him for the ticket. I could see Vikas's face losing colour, he must have got the twenty rupees from his father with an assurance that he would collect it from us, and none of us had any money with us. He was too decent and embarrassed to ask us. Except me and three others, he  didn't even know who the others were; they were not his friends! I could never forget that drained, scared face when we left him abruptly without even thanking him. He must have got a big shouting from his parents for not ascertaining whether we would pay for the tickets and for being a sucker. Gradually, he stopped coming to our hostel and in due course we drifted apart. Later I came to know that he got into the IAS and worked in Andhra Pradesh. I met him only once many years later at some marriage function. I saw him from a distance and felt too guilty to go anywhere near him. Where others saw a pleasant smiling face, I saw only an emabrassed, scared face from the past about to break into a sweat. I wish I could pay him back now!"
Anirudh was shocked, why was Baba worried about such a small thing?
"Baba, what is so difficult about that? If that uncle lives here let's go to him one day and pay back the money. How much will it be in today's cost? Five thousand rupees? Ten thousand?"
A shadow of pain passed over Baba's face, 
"No, no, five or ten thousand rupees may not mean much to him now. I just want to tell him how sorry I am for what we did, and if possible, can he transfer the pain of all that he endured that day, the fear, the admonishment of his parents to me? Can he say that he has forgiven us for that old wound?"
Baba sat silently for a few moments, remorse filling his heart.
Anirudh held his Baba's hand and shared the pain in silence.
Baba looked up,
"You remember Gokul Sir?"
Anirudh's face brightened,
"Yes, of course! How can I forget him?  He is the one who taught me maths, step by step."
"Yes, he was a wonderful teacher. When you were in seventh grade, I found your maths were very weak. Gokul Babu was the Maths teacher in Collegiate School. He had an excellent reputation particularly for coaching those whose basics in maths were weak. So I approached him. He was very happy to see me, he had heard about me from others. He readily agreed to take you as a student in his tuition class. When I asked him how much I should pay he almost burst into tears, 'What are you saying, Biswambar Babu, if I send my son to you for tuition in English will you take money from me? Don't worry, I will treat Anirudh like my son. Please leave him in my charge and I promise I will make him good in Maths.' He kept his promise, you started scoring centum in Maths from the third year of tuition. Unfortunately in your final year he got transferred to Dhenkanal, and felt very bad that he could not see you through the High School exam. But he had laid a solid foundation for you. In your final exam also you scored a centum."
Anirudh smiled,
"Yes Baba, I got admission in the Engineering college and got this excellent job because of that. I owe all my success to him."
Baba looked at him,
"Have you paid off your debt to Gokul Sir?"
Anirudh sat up, jolted,
"Paid off? No Baba, I thought you would have done that? Where is he now?"
"He retired from service one year after me. After your high school results, many times I thought I would go to Dhenkanal, taking with me a kilo of Mithai, a good pant and shirt piece for him and a saree for his wife. But due to my lazy nature I kept on postponing. It never happened. I heard from a friend that after retirement Gokul babu stayed with his son for some time, but his daughter in law kept quarrelling with him. His son played some tricks and got the house transferred in his name and poor Gokul Babu and his wife are now staying in a small one room house on rent. His son had earlier got some papers signed by him allowing him to draw his father's pension and he hardly gives anything to his father. I feel really bad for him. I wish I can pay back my old debt to him now." 
Anirudh sat up.
"We will do that Baba, this Sunday we will go to Dhenkanal and pay him fifty thousand rupees. We will take some good dress for him and sarees for Madam. And Baba, we will not rest with that. My school mate Subodh is Deputy Superintendent of Police at Dhenkaknal these days. I promise I will make sure the pension amount will be drawn by Gokul Sir and not his son from next month. His son needs a summons to the police station and a good roughing up. He will get the thrashing, I promise Baba, he will get it, I will make him pay, the scoundrel!".
Baba felt relieved, a weight seemed to have been lifted from his mind!. He looked at his son with love and affection. When did he learn these tricks of life, his innocent, doting son? All this talk about a summons to the police station and roughing up! Baba softly caressed the hair of Anirudh, who looked up and asked,
"What else Baba, don't tell me you have so many debts coming back to haunt you." Baba's eyes got moist,
"There are so many Ani, my life has been enriched by so many kind souls who have given their love selflessly, I wish I could speak to them at this late stage of my life and tell them how indebted I am to them for a life of fulfilment and abundance. When you were only one year old, your Mama fell seriously ill, she lost weight and had continuous fever. I took her to the doctor at the government hospital, who detected bone TB. We were shattered, we thought that was the end of the world for us. The doctors at the hospital reassured us, sent us to the TB specialist who put her on a strict treatment regime for one year. You as a one year old was a champion howler. You kept on screaming all the time when you were taken away from Mama and made to sleep with me in another room. We badly needed someone to take care of you. The TB specialist was extra kind to me because his son was in our school and was a student of mine. He arranged a nurse who had just finished her nursing course and was about to return to Jamshedpur to look for a job. On the doctor's request she stayed back for a year and took care of you. She was unmarried but her love for you was more than that of a mother. Do you remember her?"
Anirudh tried to turn the pages of his memory, but could not locate her. He shook his head. Baba continued,
"In due course your Mama became alright; Padma, the nurse left. She joined a hospital in Bihar. We were in touch with her for sometime, she sent us an invitation after four years to attend her wedding; we could not go, but sent fifty one rupees as a token of our blessing. In about five years we drifted apart and lost touch with her. I wish I can meet her now, just to show you to her and tell her, see this is the toddler you had so lovingly cared for. Sorry we lost touch with you, we don't even know how many sons or daughters you have and what they look like. Are they as handsome as the one you took under your wing for a year and nurtured? At my age Ani, the regrets pile up, making one feel inadequate to have repaid the many debts of life. Your Mama would have understood, she had a few of her own."
Baba looked down, weighed by memory. And when he looked up again Ani saw a rare sadness in his eyes, the like of which he had never seen before. He got worried, what is it now? What else Baba owes, to whom? He held Baba's hands and asked,
"Baba, why are you looking so crestfallen? What happened?"
"There is one debt I have been carrying for the past forty years, I don't know whether I can pay it back, or whether it can really be paid back."  
Baba came closer to Anirudh and with trembling hands he took hold of his son's hand. Anirudh was in panic, what was Baba doing, what other debt weighed him down?
"Baba, which debt worries you so much? Won't you tell me?"
"Yes, for more than forty years, I thought of telling you, but held myself back. My paternal arrogance stopped me. But today when I am talking of paying off all my debts, I must unburden myself of what I have been carrying in my heart as a deep seated guilt." Anirudh was shocked,
"Baba, please don't prolong the suspense. You must tell me now, what is worrying you for so many years."
Baba again caressed his son's soft hair and looked into his eyes,
"When you were twelve years old, we had been invited by one of my colleagues for lunch. For some reason you kept on eating without a stop, asking for more and more. Everyone started laughing at you and I felt insulted. I kept seething in anger. The moment we reached home, I bolted the door and gave you a big slap. You looked at me, hurt, deeply saddened, and ran to your room, bolted the door from inside and kept crying. Your Mama was very upset, she explained to me how my colleague's two daughters had instigated you and made you promise that you would eat non-stop and finish off ten rasgollas. You had a bet with them, and if you had given up midway, you would have had to pay them twenty rupees. Your Mama pleaded with me to go to your room and console you, but my pride and arrogance stopped me from doing that. I never beat you again after that, but I can never forget the sad face and the hurtful eyes, brimming with tears when you looked at me after the slap. Every time I see some father punishing his son, tears come to my eyes. I remember your crying face and my heart is always filled with a deep sadness and an unspoken guilt. Today I want to free myself from the debt of the guilt and the insensitivity of that cruel afternoon. Ani, my son, I want to say sorry to you..."
Baba started sobbing. 
Anirudh clamped his hand over his Baba's mouth and stopped him from saying anything further. What was Baba saying? Why? Can Anirudh ever think of paying off the debt of immense love and unbounded affection his parents had showered on him? All the sacrifices, the sleepless nights they endured to bring him up? The son closed his frail father in a tight hug and broke into tears. In that blessed moment of soulful intimacy between a doting father and a loyal son, there was no space for words, only silent tears tied them in a bond of timeless love, beyond all debts and redemption.
 

 

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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Critic's Corner

 

ELEGANCE OF POETRY IN THE 47TH ISSUE OF LITERARY VIBES 

Prabhanjan K. Mishra

(Poets covered: Haraprasad Das, Geetha Nair, Bibhu Padhi, Dilip Mohapatra, Bichitra K. Behura, Ananya Priyadarshini, Sharanya Bee, Hrushikesh Mallick, Manorama Mahapatra, Sngeeta Gupta, Sheena Rath, B. C. Nayak, Kabyatara Kar, and Mrutyunjay Sarangi.)

 

      I would rather desist from commenting on my own poem ‘The X-Factor’. I may be over-indulgent or too-critical to it, both approaches unjust to the poem; after publication, a poem assumes a persona of its own, a live throbbing and inviolable entity in its own right.

       The poem DEIFICATION (Avatar) by eminent Odia poet Haraprasad Das is a metaphor applying to most self-made and over-confident do-gooders, who also boast of being accomplished and successful in life. But their claim to success and over-confidence becomes their bane, and trap them in their own halo. Kind of being blackmailed by the success story and their goodness, they cannot say no to washing others’ dirty linen. The complex dilemma has been highlighted through images and symbols from myth and local lingua franca like ‘hunting embossed birds on a woodwork’, ‘trapped light in a pukhraj crystal’, ‘the bath in river Vaitarani’, ‘crawling on ivory elbows’, ‘walking in mud with brass feet’ etc.

         Professor Poet Geetha Nair’s CATACLYSM is replete with symbols, moods, and shocks, the right mix of elements to make a short and sharp poem. The title kind of asks us to get ready for unleashing of a disaster with our boots on, guns cocked, and standing ready on our marks to bolt from the cataclysmic onslaught. Without that warning, who would apprehend that a ruthless assassin is hiding inside an apparent pacifist’s ‘flaccid’ and ‘placid’ exterior, an otherwise harmless looking, a bit moody character that could lunge for the jugular? The metaphor of a cat serves as an apt symbol to bring around the mood. The poem takes me back to a scene in the movie ‘Conan the Terrible’. The besieged kingdom’s chief priest charms the armed and almost invincible female rebel warrior with his placating homilies and copious tears. When she is totally distracted by his apparent good intention and harmlessness, and downs her guard, the priest draws out his sword and beheads her with a single sweep. 

         Bibhu Padhi, the senior poet, in his poem THE LAST RAINS IN CUTTACK broods over the delayed rain in his city, missing the sweet aroma of the first showers, the bursting of lush green on its wake, and other associated nostalgia. His poem has a quiet mood, a flowing language that has a weeping quality. The image of ‘perfect angular touch’ is reminiscent of a feeding mother, a rare dimension and attribute of the monsoon that breastfeeds earth like a loving mother spraying it with life-giving milk, the water.

         Dilip Mohapatra, one of Literary Vibes’ regular poets, in his poem EGOSURFING unleashes all sorts of surprises. Putting aside the technicalities of cyber or digital complexity, he pulls out live doves out of a magician’s hat. First, the poet persona sees himself in a mirror as the world would see him (‘through others’ attestations and testimonials’, perhaps he means - suave, smart, elegant etc.) The poet persona develops a self-doubt, or is he aware, that his weak spots remain under the mirror-eye’s ‘blind spot’. So, the mirror is another eye, and as with all eyes it has the blind spot that obliterates an area of vision. He further defends his posturing that if it is a camouflage, it is neither deliberate self-promotion, nor vanity, rather serendipitous. It is just a harmless ploy to expose the best profile. The poem is complex and cerebral, and if I have really cracked its riddle - only the poet can confirm - then I give myself kudos.

           Poet Dr. Bichitra Kumar Behura’s ‘DIVINE WAVE’ reads like a modern Sufi poem. He hears the divine voice in sounds of music as well as cacophony. With his modern mind’s skepticism that many Bhakti Poets keep developing from time to time, he doubts if it is not a disease. The Advaita philosophy creeps into his lovely lines also, “I see dreams fully awake/I talk endlessly to myself”. This asserts how lonely a poet can be in spite of spiritual leanings. His loneliness hopelessly sings, “…/In a world that misrepresents/Each and every behavior/To suit the need of the hour”. The poem strums one’s heartstrings.

          Ananya Priyadarshini’s LIKE BEFORE I LOVE YOU is of alternating moods. First the poet persona appears in a depressed mood full of self-deprecation and self-persecution (first stanza), and then the mood swings to exuberance, almost euphoric (second stanza). We may assume most individuals are subject to mood swings at some juncture of life. She rises from her mood swing to a stable state to take control and sing her two most sweet lines, “Let me love the whole of me/Before I fall in love with the whole of you.” So she appears to accept the truth that life is a mix of sweet and bitter tastes, and a balance is the best course.

        A very evocative and laconic poem LET’S FIND HOME of Sharanya Bee, speaks of big thoughts in a few lines. It speaks of memory, doubts, suspense that make a package that can be called ‘a search for where one belongs’. Water, rocks, fingers have been her metaphors. The strange riddle finally helps her find the goal, her true home, from her anonymity and enormous confusion. Reading the language of eyes, the message in tears, and the sharing of warmth and the cold vibes of loved ones give her the meaning of a true home. A poem of abstract reflections leading to a profound philosophy.

        Odia poet Professor Hrushikesh Mallik’s KARN, brings to memory the unlucky son of an unwed mother who was deprived of his rightful place in history, his greatness and achievements unjustly usurped by competitors at every turn of life. Like Karn of Mahabharata, the child in Hrushikesh Mallick’s poem feels rejected and dejected, but unlike the original, his angst stems from a joke by his mother. Simple metaphors and a reference to myth makes it a rich modern poem, speaking of anxiety, tension, fear; all that for a lie, a joke, a lack of or overwhelming trust on mother. What should a child trust, mother’s words or mother’s intent? A grown up can face the same dilemma, words’ literal meaning or the hidden intention behind the words often make a serious rift.

           FIRE GIRL (Agni Kanya) of the celebrated Odia poet Kabiratna Manorama Mahapatra, translated by poet Sumitra Mishra is a poetic epiphany. The poet experiences a divine presence through her poetry. When she feels lonely, she finds divine company by her side and her soul feels like burnished gold. She describes sort of a transcendental experience.

          Sangita Gupta publishes here two parts of her running poem WAVES OF TIME. I have read some of the poem’s earlier parts. She has written in canto-style, little reflections from her life’s rite of passage. This poem has a brooding quality. Part xxiii is about motherhood and motherly indulgences. But the second portion titled part xxiv is up to my heart. It is a poem of ennui, sad detachment, vacuum in the soul, a state of staid. In this poem she merges with the universal soul that mostly is in eternal search of a source of peace, a meaning. It brings to mind Milan Kundera's ‘Unbearable lightness of being’.

     Sheena Rath’s THE RED FLOWERS take us into the realms of tranquil pastoral peace. Her language is immaculate, quiet and muted like a village evening. May be, a small cameo, a bit of drama would have given it a better edge. But an afterthought tells me let it be as it is in its serene balance, lest any drama spoils its tranquility.

         Poet B. C. Nayak, like always, is in his elements. His poem HOW I EXITED FROM CHAKRAVYUHA is a potpourri of myth and reality. In myth, young warrior Abhimanyu couldn’t exit the multi-layered military formation, and he was killed by deceit ruthlessly by his jealous cousins in pursuit of revenge. In the present military situation, a death kind of ticked a few feet or a few seconds away, only caution and patience saved the protagonist. It is a story of courage and balance written in poetry form.

         The JOURNEY by Kabyatara Kar is an assertion of the riddle often played by the almighty creator, in this case - beautiful eyes without the light of vision. It is a break-heart pass, most of us at times have come front to front with such weird conundrum in nature and life that defies logic of creation.

         The last beauty, THE LONG NIGHT, comes from Dr. Mrutyunjay Sarangi’s pen. A tricky poem. Has the start of an ordinary poem with little promise, and speaks of a night with growling sky and squally rain. But as the poem progresses, it turns into a different night - surreal, unending, like the satanic rule of a dark lord. The darkness is ominous, scary, and demoniac. It is soaked with gory bloodletting. Perhaps he speaks of the contemporary dark days ruled by intolerance and hate, by suspicion and fear. He waits with bated breath for the dawn of reason to break and bring the refreshing sun, but the end seems unreachable.

(A critic’s views)

 

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