Literary Vibes - Edition L ( 10 Jan 2020 )

Dear Readers,

With great pleasure I present to you the Fiftieth edition of LiteraryVibes. This e-Magazine was launched as a literary supplement of PositiveVibes on 1st February, 2019 and will complete a year in another three weeks. We have been able to publish it every Friday of the week without a break. Many new poets and writers - some of them as young as ten years - have started their literary journey with us and many of the accomplished ones have adorned the pages of LiteraryVibes as shining stars. The quality of LiteraryVibes has improved tremendously in the last few months, the poems have got prettier, the stories wittier. I wish to convey my sincere, heartfelt thanks to all the poets and writers who have contributed to LiteraryVibes and made it an extremely readable weekly magazine. A big thanks to Dr. (Major) B. C. Nayak for the beatuful logo designed by him at the top of this page. We will continue to strive for excellence and offer you enjoyable reading in future also. 
In the present edition we welcome Ms. Reena Naushad, an Assistant Professor of English and an extremely promising poet from Mallapuram, Kerala. Poetry is her passion and we do hope that her poems will continue to charm us in future. Dr. Biswa Prakash Sarangi is a Post Graduate student of Surgery at the Medical College in Cuttack. Like many other doctors in the family of LiteraryVibes, he is also endowed with a great creative sensibility and has written lots of short stories and poems. We wish both the new entrants into our family, plenty of success in their literary and professional career.
With the withering footsteps of a waning winter Bhubaneswar is pleasantly cold, there are flowers everywhere and Flower Shows adorn our beautiful parks. Music festivals, dramas, literary events resonate in this quiet little town. I presume winter must be equally enticing everywhere. So what better time than this to present the Fiftieth edition of LiteraryVibes to all of you? 

Hope you will enjoy it. Here is the link:
http://positivevibes.today/article/newsview/259
Please do share the link with all your friends and contacts, reminding them about the previous editions which can be accessed at http://positivevibes.today/literaryvibes

With warm regards and wishing you a Happy New Year, Mrutyunjay Sarangi

 

 

---

 

ORPHANS

Prabhanjan K. Mishra

 

Conceived with love or force,

sire unknown, just a gully boy,

but sacrosanct as angel-born,

brought up in a manger*

by my angel-mother;

 

without a brand, or halo –

white, green, or orange; no tag,

an ivory or mahogany fish on the slab

from an immaculate pond

perennially muddied by wily eels.

 

I turn pages backward, go back

a few hundred years since,

meet an ancient fore-father,

he could be a Pathan, a Mughal;

Chalukya, Magadhi, or Rajput,

 

but not an Indian!! He dons

the tag of his king and kingdom.

Step in the whites, conquers him,

and his ilk, loots and ravages.

The whites jeer at them, ‘Indian’.

 

He and his people love it, it is cute.

They worship it, it sounds holy.

They wear it on sleeves, a talisman;

an umbrella over their heads,

a magic carpet to fly together.

 

My ancient fore-father, his heirs,

tiers of successors, tired of licking

the white man’s boots, scan

the sky for the messianic star,

wait for the magi*, the good tidings.

 

But arrives a diminutive magus -

dark, bald, in loin cloth; the star,

the magi, and the messiah, all

rolled into one furl; ill-wrapped, but

bulging with magical words and resolves.

 

He stirs them, and they simmer;

the stew of free and frank thoughts,

their panacea, the white man’s poison;

they ask the whites: leave, get lost,

you, the parasites and leeches.

 

Shot at, hanged, maimed, jailed,

they don’t raise a finger, but their voice

stentorian, gives clarion call, blows foghorn;

shatter the white man’s ears;

they get tired, helpless; they leave.

 

One of them goes mad, kills

the messiah, the golden goose.

No golden eggs found in his stomach,

a can of worms rather opens,

a Pandora’s Box lurks on the horizon.

 

I close the book: that’s how

our cookie crumbles: we misrule ourselves,

we lord over us, our cruelty unmatched,

even the white men look liberal;

hate our spanner, fear our tongs.

 

We enslave ourselves, our prisons

overflow with us, soak with our tears,

our poverty legendary, our bigotry

exemplary, we the children

of gods, but orphans with no country.  

 

(*Manger and Magi – of Christian myth.)                        

 

---

 

FRILLS-THRILLS-and-CHILL

Prabhanjan K. Mishra

         
           Tapas Chakravarty entered the two-tier AC compartment and proceeded to his reserved berth. The train throbbed in the mild winter afternoon with intermittent deep breaths as if readying itself to run a marathon from Delhi to Ahmedabad. In the curtained enclosure that housed four berths, he found a man, nattily dressed in white kurta-pajama, of the age around forty-five, his own age, comfortably sprawling on a lower berth, chewing a relaxed pan. The man smiled at Tapas. Taps smiled back and extended a hand, “Tapas Chakravarty here from Calcutta.” The man in kurta-pajama shook his hand warmly, “Nayan Joshi from Ahmedabad.”
          Tapas warmed up, “Myself going to Ahmedabad.” “Same” replied Nayan. In minutes they were talking like old friends oblivious of the compartment getting filled up and buzzing with cacophony of other passengers. It transpired - Nayan was returning to his native Ahmedabad after attending a relative’s marriage at Delhi. He was ingarment business. Tapas said, “I serve as a manager in a Delhi branch of the State Bank of India (SBI). I am visiting Ahmedabad for the first time and for a banking training. I would stay at Ahmedabad for seven days at a guest house ‘Amrapali’ by name, located at Sukhipura. The training would take four days and I have kept three days to know the city.” Nayan said, “Don’t worry Tapas bhai, I would be at your beck and call during your stay at Ahmedabad. Any problem, you just call me.”
         They discussed at length their food habits and life style; likes and dislikes. It further transpired - both were strict teetotallers, both hundred percent vegetarians, both believed in spartan living, etc. etc. By then the train was rolling out of Delhi, a landscape of prosperity and penury jostling by cheek and jowl, and was entering the rural belt surrounding the city. By ten that evening, they ate their vegetarian meals served from the train’s pantry and retired to bed. Both felt cosy in their new camaraderie, they sort of developed a proprietorial right on each other, and became a one lonesome island on the rain, impervious to other passengers’ activities. The next day they exchanged mobile numbers.
         Tapas later would recall Nayan saying, “I belong to the Mahatma’s land of total prohibition, wouldn’t touch liquor. I am hundred percent non-violent, would not lift a finger even on my own murderer. I am a celibate from birth, my mentor Gandhi was rather delayed in practicing celibacy, but not me. Also, being a Gujarati Brahmin, I am vegetarian, out and out.” So high moral… Tapas was impressed. Similarly, Nayan would recall Tapas saying, “I was born and brought up in a family pickled in Netaji’s valour. For a right cause, I can kill, spill blood. I am a man of steel resolution.”
        Nayan offered to drop Tapas at his guest house on his way home. But at Ahmedabad station after alighting from the train, Tapas lost Nayan in the milling crowd of passengers. He couldn’t call him on mobile phone for it had no charge left. But he waited for Nayan till the platform cleared of people. When he took an auto-rickshaw to his guest house, he kept worrying, Nayan might be looking for him. But his worry was shot-lived.
         That evening, Tapas went out for a stroll in lanes around his guest house. Surprise… surprise, he met Nayan coming from the opposite side. “Hi Nayan, Howdy? You are here? See, there is my guest house Amrapali. Come, have a cup of tea. Where did you vanish from the platform?” “No tea for me now Tapas, it is dinner time. Was just passing by this area after attending to an errand. Why don’t you come with me? I know a little eatery in the next alley, small but cosy, with good food. I would have asked you home, but my wife is away.” Tapas gave a surprised yelp, “Wife? Aren’t you a celibate from childhood? You naughty chap!” Nayan made a hangdog expression and said after a while, “Why, even my wife is a celibate from her childhood.” Tapas swallowed this novelty with visible effort, uttering, “Oh! That’s really great, yar!”
         The restaurant was tiny but neat, located in a dark alley, ensconced on the first floor of a derelict building, just like a secret agent’s hiding hole. There, Nayan ordered lamb chops cooked in spicy gravy, fish curried in mustard paste, and Roti. Tapas was taken aback and thought, “So much meat and fish for a proclaimed vegetarian Gujarati Brahmin!” He also ordered identical fare. Nayan raised questioning eyes, “Didn’t you, Tapas, say you were a hundred percent vegetarian.” Tapas’ reply was loaded with humour, “Very strict vegetarian indeed just like you friend, same here as there.” Nayan laughed aloud enjoying the repartee, his contrite feeling over celibacy disappeared. Tapas joined his laugh.
         After dinner, Nayan went to loo. The food bill came, but Nayan was taking his time. Tapas tch tch-ed, “Poor fella has a leaking bladder.” When Nayan took a long time, Tapas was piqued, “A weak bowel as well? Must be having a big evacuation. If not his vegetarian stomach, at least his Gandhian conscience, he was so loud about, has revolted against the meat and fish.” He hesitated, “But can I pay the bill? Nayan invited me to dinner, he may mind if I take away his privilege.” But the waiter kept on standing sort of over his head, trying his patience. He could not resist but paid the bill. As soon as the waiter turned around and walked away, Nayan appeared from nowhere. He rebuked Tapas, “How do you forget common etiquette? It was my pleasure. You are a guest in my city, and moreover, I invited you to dinner.” Tapas rued, “I am sorry boss. I would remember the rule in future.”
          Nayan saw Tapas to Amrapali’s gate, and saying bye, he walked ahead to hail a rickshaw for his place. Four days of Tapas’ banking training was over. On his sixth day he went around the city to see the routine tourist attractions taking a guided tour, sitting on the rooftop of a city tourist bus. Nayan could not show him the town or gave him company, for he was busy in some unavoidable business deal.
        While walking by his guest house that evening, he again met Nayan on a side street in the neighbourhood. Loitering the desultory lanes, discussing Gandhian ways, a topic apparently dear to both, suddenly they came across the eatery where Nayan had taken Tapas earlier. Tapas asked Nayan, “Why not have a cosy dinner?” So, they went up and ordered the same dishes as earlier, the best there as Nayan had said. After finishing, Tapas said, “My stomach is churning, let me run to the washroom.”
          He returned quite fifteen minutes later and found the bill on the table, as well as the waiter standing by and scratching his head, while Nayan seemed busy with his mobile phone in one hand and a toothpick in the other digging at teeth. Tapas found the unpaid bill like a big question-mark looking at him and Nayan turn by turn, and asking, “Who of you two rascals would attend to me?” Tapas hastily paid the waiter and Nayan spoke, “See, I didn’t pay. I feared you might mind. You are so sensitive Tapas!” Tapas was not sure if it was a compliment, or a barb.
         At that point, a hefty youth, waiting for a table in the fully occupied little restaurant, lost his temper, “Hey you two oldies, people are waiting and starving, but you two taking your leisurely half an hour to gossip after having food? Get out of here.” He came to them menacingly. Tapas, the bold follower of Netaji, kind of shrank to his seat. But Nayan, the follower of the apostle of non-violence, of the Mahatma, stood up to his full height, and gave two quick resounding slaps, hissing, “You senseless brat, no respect for seniors?”
          The aggressive youth shrank away and ran out of the eatery. Nayan turned to his surprised friend, “Even this would fit into our Bapu’s code of non-violence. I was afraid, you being a follower of Netaji could kill the insolent brute. In that comparison, hadn’t my two tight slaps a touch of kindness, rather?” Tapas saw his friend’s other side, not only he resolved a nasty situation with quick action, but also gave him an honourable exit for his momentary cowardice. He felt humbled with a new respect for Nayan.
         His last afternoon at Ahmedabad, he went to the balcony of his third-floor room in Amrapali with a cup of coffee and looked down. Lo! Who did he see? It was Nayan, fully manifested on a swing-sofa with a glass of beer. He was sitting in a lawn-cum-garden just across the narrow road opposite Amrapali. Tapas uttered a cuss word under his breath, “Bastard. You live just by me, and have been playing Tom and Jerry with me for these seven days!”
          Their eyes met and Nayan signalled him to come down. Tapas went down, helped himself by pouring beer into an empty glass from a bottle kept chilled in a big ice-box, and joined his friend on the spacious swing-sofa. The two proclaimed teetotaller friends sipped their beer with a rare understanding, exchanging amused looks. Tapas looked behind and found Bapu’s statue standing there on a pedestal in his iconic pose. As if he was in a hurry to go somewhere with his walking stick. He seemed frozen in time.
          Nayan explained, “The adjacent plot is a municipal garden, Bapu’s statue is its pride.” Nayan now lowered his voice, “I took this plot and built my bungalow to live by Bapu’s side, and for the plot I had to pay fifty percent its worth in hard cash. You know, all of us here have the black cash, earned by cheating taxes. Why to pay through your nose, when you can avoid it by bribing the taxman just a pittance? I had always wanted to walk Bapu’s path of honesty, truth, non-violence etc. So, the plot by his garden was important for me.” Tapas was thinking, “You are an honest man, an honest liar, an honest tax evader, an honest cheat! What an apt company for the Mahatma?”
          At that charged, emotional moment, a comely rotund lady with soft and shiny texture came out of the house with two kids at her heels. Nayan introduced them, “Tapas, meet my wife Priya and our two cute brats, Madan and Mohan.” When Tapas greeted her, “Good afternoon Priyaji, it is really a pleasure to know you”, he was thinking, “Sala, celibate from birth. So, was his wife. Holy immaculate conceptions twice, two holy Christs in one family!”
          Like a mind reader, Nayan said, “You are thinking, how did the two celibates, me and my wife, beget children. No, no-immaculate conception, nor involvement of holy-ghosts please. We two pure celibate souls were ourselves holy ghosts and did the job on each other. In mind we remained celibates, but what could we do about our bodies? Body, and its hunger were riddles to mind that tested us ‘Let’s see, how far can these two go?’ But we went too far and too often, and you see the result, two cute pranksters.” Here Nayan winked at Tapas and laughed uproariously. That melted the ice and Tapas was again at peace with his friend. He was so convinced that he felt like looking at Bapu’s “My Experiment with Truth” from Nayan’s perspective.
          He noticed Nayan’s wife dispatching her children somewhere by a rickshaw with a servant. She came and stood behind Nayan, her front touching his behind like wives would do with husbands when they were in love. She whispered something into his ears, and went inside. Tapas thought he must allow the couple to be together when the children were away. He asked Nayan to go inside and give company to lonely Priya. Nayan leered at him and said, “I love the sense of humour of you Bengalis from Calcutta. But you have logic. Bye, meet you later this evening.” Nayan went inside the house.
        Tapas sipped his leisurely beer thinking endearingly about his own estranged wife. Suddenly her memory went tender in his mind. If he could share with her his strange experiences about the happy-go-lucky man of the world, his new friend Nayan and his antics. He wished, his wife might be missing him. He looked behind and saw Bapu frozen in time. Nayan might be into another bout of experiments with truth. He suddenly felt lonely and missed his wife after years of their separation. He decided to meet her on his return and try another chance with life in her company if she agreed.  
 

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  

 

---

 

GOODBYE  (BIDAAYA)

Haraprasad Das

Translated by Prabhanjan K. Mishra

 

I won’t be there by morning,

sweetheart – 

let me go without saying adieu

leaving my used empty cup

on your silver tray,

the witnesses of my parting.

 

Your search for me

would turn futile -

neither my friends,

nor the new dawn

or the alert old Peepal,

would know my whereabouts;

 

none would know if I took to left,

or right, was on steady feet,

if my clean white jacket

and the dark moonless night

adequately hid my burn sores

of your harsh words.

 

Didn’t I tell you -

I had to leave,

while picking bones

from your fish curry, or choking

over the moist moles

on your capacious thighs?

 

During your pleasure trips,

deafened by own heartbeats,

you gave a damn

to my entreaties;

for you, just the whine

of a machine.

 

Listen, ’am returning

to my land where lie my roots;

don’t look for me,

and God bless. Don’t open

your fragile heart’s door

to any Tom, Dick, or Harry.

 

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)” 

 

---

 

ZOO  STORY

Geetha Nair

 

Zebra. That was Mohan's nickname; he had worn a black and white striped shirt to school the first day and had told his classmates that he stayed in the Zoo. He secretly liked the name and was proud that he was an inmate of this coveted place. What other children paid to visit once or twice a year, he enjoyed for free round the clock, all through the year; his father was the Superintendent of the city zoo.

Mohan spent much of his free time with the animals and birds. Home, the sprawling old quarters next to the Zoo, was a lonely place. Mohan's mother had passed away giving birth to his sister Abhaya three years ago. Mithun was five and Mohan seven when the tragedy occured.

Soon afterwards, Mohan got himself enrolled in the Mission School next to the Zoo. He had requested his father three times but had been brushed aside like a pesky fly; Krishnan Nair was a busy man. In addition to his zoological duties, the Superintendent was also a contractor. He secured all the contracts for building and maintenance at the Zoo in his imbecile brother's name and undertook the work in his own workshop. He made a pretty rupee that way. He was a tall man with a wiry body  and a loud and firm voice. It was June. Classes had started and Mohan was still not enrolled. Finally, Mohan took the help of Appukuttan Pillai, the kind retainer. The old man and the very young boy walked to the school. The Headmaster was moved by the unusual duo and their request. He admitted Mohan to the second standard only asking for one or two essential documents soon.

 Mohan was happy at school. This was not the case at home. There were always women in attendance on his father at home. Names varied but looks didn't. They would be fair and plump and dressed in the traditional Kerala two piece called "mundum neriyathum" or "set". He overheard the servants commenting on the attire of these women: "Always the widest, most expensive gold jari sets for his whores... ."

"What are whores? " he asked Philo, the old woman who was in charge of his baby sister. "Your father's distant relatives," she snorted in reply. Then she gave him a big piece of sweet appam, set little Abhaya on her hip and walked away. Krishnan Nair had a soft corner for his daughter and was particular that she should be tended to. To his two sons, he was indifferent at best.

The next week in class, Mohan used the new word he had learned in an answer the teacher asked him to read out. "A joint family is made up of father, mother, children, grandparents, uncles, aunts and whores." He couldn't figure out why his perfect answer made her radiate shock waves. Nor did he know that Zebra's answer was the hot topic of discussion in the staffroom that day!

There were many other things he couldn't figure out. He spent long hours wandering around the Zoo enclosures, watching the animals and caged birds. Mohan sometimes felt that the huge cobra in the Reptile House resembled his father: both had a way of thrusting out their head and showing their fangs at the least provocation.

From the hippos Mohan learned how to sink without a trace when there was unpleasantness brewing. From the deer he learned how to bound away from possible harm to other sides of the pen. From the snakes he learned how to slither and sting.

  Kamakshi was the first to feel his sting. She was the current distant relative staying at their home. Sadly, she bullied the children. Mohan bore it all like his friend the Rhino whom he imagined as a big boy clad in a tough  jacket and shorts. One morning , when Kamakshi came out dressed in yet another gleaming "set" and a blood red blouse, Abhaya came skipping up to her. "So beautiful," she exclaimed, looking up at Kamakshi and fingering her gleaming dhoti. "Don't dirty my clothes!" lashed out the the woman giving her a violent shove that sent the little girl tottering to the ground. Philo rushed to pick her up. Mohan clenched his fists deep in his pockets.

  That evening, Kamakshi's screams rent the old wooden ceiling. She had found a snake under her freshly-laundered clothes. It had slithered away when she lifted a blouse from the pile.

  A week later, she found she had bared her fat body before the beady eyes of a viper perched on the bathroom window. He had landed silently, seemingly from nowhere. She streaked through the house and left the same evening, vowing there was some malignant spirit there and that she would never return, gold jari or no gold jari.

  The year Mohan turned twelve, a tiger cub was brought from the Zoo as a pet for Abhaya.

Tiger, as he was imaginatively named, was a delight. Like a humongous kitten, he gambolled with the children, ate from their hands and slept with them. He was as intelligent and as faithful as a dog. They knew Tiger would be confined to the Zoo in a matter of months when he grew too big for safety. They made the most of his stay with them.

   Mohan's tenth Divali night was memorable. His father had called over some of his friends. Soon the drawing room was loud with their boisterous laughter and loud voices. There were never any noisy crackers for Divali as it upset their four-legged and winged neighbours.The children made merry with catherine wheels and sparklers. Abhaya at seven was bold enough to hold lit sparklers in her chubby little hands. Her new hair clip sparkled on her curly hair; it had been the latest little gift from her doting father.

  Tiger was uneasy to begin with. He paced to and fro a good distance from the courtyard, like a big security guard.

  Later he grew bold enough to sit near the frangipani trees where Abhaya was standing and watch the lights whirring on the cement floor.

  After a special dinner - fried seer fish and prawns curry with appams - the children went to bed.   

  Tiger and Abhaya shared a bed; Mohan and Mithun shared another.

  Sometime in the night, Mohan came awake; Tiger was pacing the room, his tail stiff and upright. Mohan sat up in bed and called softly to him so as not to wake up his sleeping siblings. Then he saw that his sister's bed was empty.

  He opened the door and walked out. The merrymakers were silent now, in various stages of inebriation. Then he heard muffled cries from the clump of frangipani trees. He moved swiftly towards the sound with Tiger bounding before him. He saw Abhaya struggling in the arms of one of their father's guests.

  Mohan picked up the iron rake that was propped against a tree. He hit the man on his back. The man staggered and half-fell to the ground. Mohan hit him again. Tiger joined in, armed with tooth and claw. It was his first taste of blood. "Run; fast! Wake up everyone" Mohan shouted to Abhaya. She fled, the missing clip she had come to search for sparkling in her hand.

Krishnan Nair shed his fangs that night; they did not grow back.

Tiger having grown his, was led from the house to the Zoo.

And Zebra? Beams of fatherly love, pride and gratitude warmed and transformed him; he turned into a Tiger.

 

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 

 

---

 

DON'T

Sreekumar K

 

Returning from a poetry reading session held as a part of protests against the Citizenship Amendment Bill, I was horrified to see a woman in my car porch. I would have run over her had I not been careful. In fact, her safety was more because of her luck than my carefulness.

I was very tired and had been eager to reach my home without falling asleep at the wheel on the way. When one is so sleepy, home is a welcome womb, safe and secure. The poetry reading session had gone on for long and worn me out so much that I wouldn’t have seen her had she not jumped up and screamed out loud.

My wife came out and turned on the light in the car porch. I was still shivering. I didn’t know whether it was fear or anger that made me throw a look at the familiar face in the car porch and go in with my wife.

I sat down and could not speak for some time though my wife was showering me with questions. I drank the ice cold water she brought me in one gulp and asked her whether the children had gone to sleep. As if in answer, the duo came out of our bedroom and my wife took them over to their own bedroom. Then she came back to ask me whether I would like to eat something.

I had had some food offered at the venue by the NGO which organised the protest. It was something I had never eaten before. It tasted so good.

I told my wife I had had my supper. Nothing more needed to be said.

“Was it Bashu or Mahi?”

“Mahi.”

“Oh! She looked so different. Is she sick or something? Where is the other one? Bashu?”

“I asked her. She talked about her for long and was weeping bitterly. I could not understand her.  Gone missing, I think.

What could have happened to Bashu, her soul mate?

I was anxious to know but I didn’t want to go out and wake up again that night.

Mahi and Bashu used to visit my parents when they were alive. They came from some tribal settlement near the border. Mostly they visited us during the Bohag Bihu observed in April. I remember that they  had also come to my marriage and also when my mother died. On both occasion we were not able to invite them. It was always a mystery how they came to know what was happening.

My father had told me that it was Mahi who used to visit us and bring us some rare fruits and honey. Once she brought Bashu also with her. My father thought it might be her niece or her younger sister. But neither of them ever made it clear to any one what they were to each other. Maybe they did try, but no one around could understand their language that well. Sonowal-Kachari and its variations were hard languages to understand.

Years later, from various interactions and checking their responses with some colleagues, I put together their story, piece by piece.

Mahi had found Bashu wandering around like her. Like two souls which got separated in some previous birth, they felt a strong affection for each other and from then onwards slept together, ate together and wandered together. They also looked alike though they were from two different tribes. They spoke similar languages and could perfectly understand each other.

After my marriage, I had taken a three year assignment in Haryana and took my wife with me. We missed the duo for three years but the neighbours said they used to come looking for us during every Bihu without fail. We met them just once and then missed them for the next five years as I went abroad along with my wife. When we returned, we were richer but not happier. God had not blessed us with a child. We had tried every known treatment and finally decided to bury that dream. That year, the duo  paid us a visit exactly the next day after the Bohag Bihu. They had brought a jar full of honey and a scarf for my wife.

Before they returned they talked to me and my wife separately. Though we could not understand every word they said, it was clear to me that they were blessing us. But my wife told me later that it was not a blessing but a prediction. They were predicting progeny for us in the near future.

The next morning my wife googled the meaning of a certain Assamese word though she was not sure about the spelling. After trying several combinations for what she had heard from Mahi and Bashu, she got the answer and turned pink with excitement. I was curious and asked her the reason for such a change of colour on her face. She told me it corresponded with a dream she had seen a few months back.

“They repeated the word ‘l‘Ora’ several times and I know it meant 'boy'. I was happy to hear it from them.”

“This you told me yesterday. What’s new?”

“What is new? Do you believe that a dream that we see will not happen if we tell someone about it?”

“No. There is no connection between what we dream, what we say and what happens. It is all superstition. We see things the way we want to. As simple as that. Now, are you going to tell me what made you turn pink? It is not just the prospect of having a baby, I am sure.”

“Yes, it is not. You are right. Yesterday, every time they said ‘lOra’ they added one more word to it. I thought it meant cute or handsome. LIke, cute boy. No. They were repeatedly saying ‘lOra bor’.

“What? A boy like a boar?”

“No, dear. The word means boys, plural. We are going to have twins or even triplets or quadruplets.”

My heart just skipped a beat. After having no children all these years, we were going to have twins? My happiness sky-rocketed.

That morning we both agreed that it was too early to give up. We were still very young.

So, the next day we again searched for another infertility clinic, the eleventh one in our life. Two days later, we flew to Kolkata and got admitted in a hospital for treatment.

It was a small hospital, just a bit bigger than a clinic. But the doctors were so confident about giving us a baby and at some point it became clear to me that having no good track record to boast of, they were desperate to help us have a baby so that it would also be a promo for their hospital. We were not the only ones there. Several couples had turned to them as a last resort.

In another three months, my wife was diagnosed pregnant and pretty soon it was also confirmed that we were to have twins.

“How I wish Mahi or Bashu had a mobile!” That was my first response when I heard the news. I decided to buy one for each of them the next time I see them.

For the next Bohag Bihu, Mahi and Bashu came to visit us. They brought with them a couple of toys and some rare fruits and medicinal oils.

We were so excited to see their confidence that I got my wife to play a prank on them. I showed them only one of the twins. My wife played along and behaved as if it was the only baby we had. They just laughed their head off. They uttered some funny comments to each other in their own language and went on laughing to embarrass us. We were sure that the joke was on us. Finally, we joined in the laughter and brought out the other baby.

My wife prepared a quick feast for the honourable visitors and I gave them some dress we had bought for them. They did not accept the money we offered them. They said that it was against their tradition to do so since they were there to see the babies for the first time. They said they would surely accept it the following year. Before they left they gave us a strong warning that even for fun we should not keep the babies separate in anyway. They were very vehement about it. They were twins because they were destined to be together.

“Like you two?” asked my wife.

They both smiled and said she was right. They believed that they themselves were twins in another birth and got separated because of what some evil men did to them. One died earlier and was born earlier. So, she had to wander seeking the other. It was only when they found each other that they became happy.

They said that our twins had had a perfect life in their previous birth. They referred to some birthmark as the evidence. Those who try to keep them apart for any reason would suffer the wrath of God, they said.

They did come the following year and for the next three years too.

They didn’t come the previous year and we really missed them.

Now, only Mahi was there in the car porch and  we had no idea why Bashu had not come.

I could not sleep that night. At some point, I woke up my wife and we both went to the other bedroom to sleep with our children. I held them close to me the whole night. The next morning, my wife said that she had heard me sobbing a couple of times. She asked me whether I had had a bad dream.

I could hardly remember the nightmare I had. I could only recall some vague scenes of people being pulled away from their dear ones, of cages crammed with lean, hungry looking women, mass graves of children and letters slowly disappearing from rain drenched A4 sheets.

Mahi woke us just after four in the morning and said bye to us.

I was about to ask her about Bashu when she broke down and wept bitterly. She came in to see our twins and then got ready to leave.

She said she had to reach some other place before sunrise.

She said day light had become evil.

 

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. 

 

---

 

REMORSE

Sakuntala Narasimhan

 

The train was moving very fast, its wheels creating a racket when rattling over the points. The carriages swayed rhythmically from side to side and the sleeping child bumped into Shanta. With a jolt she awoke and glanced drowsily at her watch. It was almost noon and she was hungry. Lunch would be around noon, the guard had said the night before, but the train was running late this morning. Would they make it to Pune on time and get the connecting train to Mumbai, she wondered, and turned to ask her husband but she  found his berth vacant.

Shanta yawned. She was beginning to get that restless feelingshe usually had when she was hungry. She eased the baby gently out of her arm and propped herself up against a pillow. The landscape went streaming by – ploughed fields and clusters of huts huddled together, all shimmering in the strong afternoon sun.

She glanced impatiently at her watch again and frowned. Ten  minutes had gone by. She picked up the book she had been reading when she had dozed off, and tried to read but she felt the beginnings  of a headache and snapped the book shut.

I wish they’d bring lunch soon now, she thought. Why was Vasant gone such a long time? I hope he at least had remembered to order lunch – it would be just like him to forget such mundane, domestic details of existence as lunch, she thought with a stab of anger. Really, this husband of hers was impossible. It was true he was a scientist, but why couldn’t he be like other husbands, sharing the responsibilities of a family? A partnership, that was what a  marriage ought to be. But no, she had to think for two and decide for two and take all the irksome details of family life off his shoulders and leave him free to concentrate on his research – his first love.

Shanta squirmed in her seat. How long was it since he took her to a picture? How long, for that matter, since he had spent an hour with her, just sitting together and talking, like they used to, when they were engaged? Five years ago, was it? It felt more like fifty, she thought bitterly. And of late he had even taken to coming home late, just around dinner time, when the baby was already asleep. Oh, life was miserable.

Peevishly she glanced at her watch again. Half an hour had gone by and still Vasant hadn’t come! She stirred uneasily. Had he gone to speak to someone in one of the other compartments? No, it couldn’t be, she decided, he just wasn’t that type. If he could accost strangers and strike up a conversation he wouldn’t be Vasant.

She remembered the party her father had arranged the day before they left Bangalore. Several of the guests had come expressly to meet the illustrious ‘scientist son-in-law’ but throughout the evening Vasant had sat shyly in a corner, looking slightly lost, and as soon as the first guests left he had excused himself and slipped to the study, unaware of the angry looks she gave him.

He never enjoyed parties and he was, she knew, on the brink of “an exciting solution to an important problem”, but surely that did not prevent him from spending an evening with friends?

Oh no, she could safely rule that one out. It was more likely that he got down to buy a paper or magazine while she was sleeping and – and missed the train? That wasn’t a happy thought and quickly she turned her mind away from the possibility. He  must be in the toilet.

But forty minutes had elapsed! She felt the shadow of a vague, unspoken fear within her, and with a brusque movement, she rose to her feet and walked up to the toilet. She found the door ajar and swaying with the motion of the train. Assailed by a definite qualm she stumbled back towards the other toilet at the far end and tried the handle. He wasn’t there.

She stared at the open door for one long terrible moment while the full import of her discovery sank into her. The train leapt and jumped over a bumpy stretch of track. Blindly she took a step back towards her seat and lurched suddenly against the door of the compartment which, she noticed, was wide open and flapping with the wind. She clutched at the handle for support and staggered back to her seat.

Where was Vasant? That open door – had he gone to the toilet and got thrown against the door just like her, and failing to steady himself in time….

Don’t be stupid, she told herself, trying to push back the rising wave of anxiety. Grown up people don’t fall out of trains..

Don’t they? And if Vasant was, as usual, immersed in those eternal problems of his and oblivious of his surroundings, he was no better than a child.

Shanta broke out in a cold sweat and shivered. The train rushed over the landscape. It swooped past a cluster of huts, fields and pastures ran up and receded. The next stop seemed a long, long way off, and relentlessly mile after mile fell behind as villages whipped past. Looking through the window she felt her indignation of a few  minutes ago seep out of her, replaced by a strange churning apprehension that was building up in a slow, subtle way.

The baby stirred in its sleep and with a weary gesture brushed a stray lock of hair off its forehead. Just like the father, she thought with a sharp pang, and suddenly that characteristic gesture hurt, like a hand squeezing her heart.

If something had happened to Vasant; oh God forbid! What was she going to do with a child barely two years old to look after?

She pulled herself up. No, this won’t do, tormenting herself with weird thoughts. It  must be that novel she was reading, in which the girl suddenly finds herself a widow with two small children to bring up.

He  must have got down to buy a paper or a cup of coffee, he was only half human till he had had his morning quota of both, she thought wryly, and probably the train had suddenly started moving and he had got into some other carriage in a hurry. Yes, that must be it…

Five  minutes later the train ground to a halt at a small station that consisted of exactly one shack and a narrow, dusty trail leading away across skewbald fields to some village beyond the horizon. Shanta kept her eyes glued to the door; if Vasant had climbed into another compartment, he ought to return now.

A goods train clanged past in the opposite direction and disappeared. A  minute later the whistle was heard, children ran aside and a flock of sheep swerved away, and the train started moving again.

Vasant, why didn’t he come? A sudden fear gripped Shanta and she found herself on the verge of tears. Vasant, Vasant, she caught herself chanting silently as panic welled up inside her in a  sudden flood. Immediately one ominous thought left her mind, another came.

Vasant, please come back. I am sorry I nagged you. I love you Vasant, with all your imperfections.

Vasant wasn’t such a bad bet after all, was he? He was absent minded, wrapped up in his work, and thoroughly incapable of looking after himself, let alone a family. He was a coffee addict – bad for his health – and he smoked like a  chimney, a habit that she thoroughly detested and had tried her best to wean him away from, only in vain.

And his anchorite habits clashed violently with her love of parties, but there were other failings and foibles that were much worse, of which Vasant could not ever be accused – a roving eye for example. And had he ever – ever at all – shouted at her? Or taken the occasional frustrations of his work out on her?

The train slowed down and crawled through a stretch of track under repair. And then, a few  minutes later, as they were picking up speed again, she saw it - a twisted and mangled bogie lying grotesquely on its side beside the track. That Express accident six  months ago, she remembered in a flash, in which she had lost her cousin, the son of her aunt who had herself suddenly died after a stroke two months later. And swiftly, in the wake of that memory came the thought: Never two die without a third…

In spite of the clattering din of the wheels there seemed to be an uncanny silence around her, an eerie hush that forebode misery.

She had a sudden odd desire just to kneel down beside Vasant, to fling her arms round his neck, to hug  him. A terrible longing rose up in a wave in her, snowballing  till it wedged in a tight  big lump in her chest, and threatened to choke the breath out of her.

She sat staring at the vacant berth before her, and suddenly the future seemed to stretch before her in a vast, arid nothingness. And into that vacuum incident after incident erupted grotesquely, whipping up a swirl of remorse until the  mind was riven by fear and foaming with guilt.

 

The train squealed to a halt and she wondered if she had pulled the chain after all.  Apparently it was only a signal, and with a jolt the train lurched forward again.

They were approaching a town, she noticed, and in a few moments the train would steam into the station. What was she going to do? Tell the guard that her husband was missing? But an hour and several miles had passed since she saw him last before she fell asleep, so how effective could they be in tracing him now ?

She heard the door slide open and whirled round. With total disbelief she saw Vasant walk in, his face wreathed in smiles.

“We are making up time and we’ll get the Bombay train after all. And Shanta, guess who I met at the other end of the –“

The words did not register. She just stared at him, relief pouring onto her in a sudden deluge that left her breathless and wordless for a moment.

How she had tormented herself, letting her imagination run away with her! Swiftly relief turned into indignation. How could he – how dare he – leave her and disappear so irresponsibly for an hour without telling her where he was going and letting her torment herself like that?

With a sobbing intake of breath she arose and took a step towards him.

“Where have you been –” she began, then she caught it, straight in her face, the strong, sickening whiff of tobacco. A wave of nausea rose in her.

“Smoking again !” she flared up, “after you had promised me not to, only yesterday ! And if you fall sick, who do you think is going to……”

 

(This story appeared in Caravan magazine, issue dated December 1967.)

 

---

 

TURNING FIFTY

Sakuntala Narasimhan

 

Fifty. Half a century. Somehow, other numbers – thirty, forty, seventy – do not have the same resonance, right ? Fifty is a landmark – a golden jubilee, no less. A cricketer hitting fifty runs gets applauded (he doesn’t  when he reaches thirty or forty) and  acknowledges the applause by raising his bat in thanks.

In then Indian tradition, it is sixty that a man celebrates as the ”shasti abda poorthi” – completion of  the age of sixty, not fifty, but somehow fifty is observed as a landmark universally, whether it is a human being  or institution.

At fifty, one is at the “right” age – not too young and immature, but at the same time, not yet “old” either. Just right, with  experience as an adult and still physically strong before  the infirmities associated with old age set in. Hence, time to celebrate.  One’s children are grown up and off the parents’ hands. On women, the burden of childcare is no longer heavy or taxing and this is when she gets some time to herself, without  having to prioritise the demands of the rest of the family.

I should know – for twenty five  years, while the kids were small, I had no  time to call my own, whether to write my articles, or practice music, or even just take time off to sit and stare at the birds returning to their nests as dusk falls. Prepare three meals a day, day after day, pack school  lunch boxes, iron their uniforms, polish shoes, supervise homework, fetch groceries, take the youngsters to the sand pit or park in the evenings, tell a bedtime story……

Once the  children were off my  hands and could amuse themselves without adult supervision, I could  plan to work on the book manuscripts I had pending, or do whatever I couldn’t all the  earlier years due  to the pressures of parental obligations.

Great.

But wait – there is a gender dimension to turning fifty too. Most fellowships, grants and scholarships specify an upper age limit of forty or less. A woman of fifty is no longer eligible to apply, never mind even if she is still hale and hearty and at the peak of her  physical and intellectual powers. At thirty five or forty, she still has demands made on her by her family. By the time she is free from those, she is fifty and “too old” to apply. Why? After twenty years or more spent as a housewife, it becomes difficult for her to re-enter a professional career. For men, on the other hand, their professional careers don’t take a break because of marriage or parental responsibilities. Also, in the meantime, they have accumulated professional expertise and experience that strengthens their case for grants and fellowships (even if the age bar is forty, they can lay claims the way a woman often cannot, unless she has a very supportive spouse (which is rare—it is the man’s career that takes precedence, even if it means leaving his wife to cope with the children while he moves away on a promotion) A man who prioritises his family’s needs is called “not serious about his profession and career", whereas a woman who prioritises her career is called a “bad mother”.

How much women at fifty can enrich their country with productive and creative outputs, if there was gender equality and equity!  I know many men who share the familial responsibilities and chores equally – my  father could cook well (in fact he taught my mother cooking when they got married and set up house). My brother lends a hand in putting  meals on the table while his wife lends a hand at his office with her expertise as a computer expert. That’s true equality which enriches both their lives and gives them a happiness at fifty that is as full as when they were newly married….

If you are a male, think about  this. If you are married, give a thought to what your wife would like to do, “in her own right”. If you are a woman with sons, teach them about gender equity and sharing responsibilities without outmoded  “macho” ideas about patriarchy and “women’s job/ men’s job”. Your daughter-in-law can then, at fifty, enjoy a fulfilling, creative time at fifty, instead of ruing her “female” destiny. It is  not necessary for  her to go out to hold a job; even pursuing music or painting, for personal fulfilment, is something to be proud of. Right ?

 

 (Dr Narasimhan had to wait 36 long years before she could acquire the PhD degree that she had set her heart on and had to abandon at the time of her marriage. By then she was in her fifties and her daughter had got her doctorate. Thirty six years – must be some world record….!!!)

Sakuntala Narasimhan  has won prestigious  awards in journalism, classical music and consumer activism, all at the national level.

She has two doctorates – one in women’s studies and another in musicology. She has taught music, journalism, women’s studies, and economics  at the post –graduate level, at Bombay and Bangalore university, and also in the US on a Fulbright fellowship.

She has presented papers at international conferences on media, music and  feminist studies, at Boston, Oxford, Norway, Pakistan,  Nairobi, Kampala (Uganda) the Philippines, Barbados, Bali, Bangkok, Sydney  and Nepal.

She reported on the  U.N. Global  Conference on Women in Beijing (China) for the Deccan Herald  in 1995, and on the UN general assembly session at New York in 2000. She was also one of four Indian journalists  selected to attend and write about the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg (South Africa) in 2002.

She received the Chamelidevi award of the Media Foundation for Outstanding Woman Journalist, and the PUCL national award for Human Rights journalism for her investigative lead stories. Her fortnightly columns, on gender issues and consumers’ rights. ran in the Deccan Herald for 27 years till 2009 and won her many awards. One of the first short stories she wrote won the first prize in a national fiction contest organized by the Times of India group in 1968. The Karnataka government conferred on her its prestigious Rajyotsava award  of Rs one lakh, for her multiple achievements, in 2016.

She has published  around 3,800 articles and authored 11 books, on consumer rights, music and feminist issues. Her writings have been translated into Russian, German, Swedish, Japanese, Hindi, Tamil , Malayalam , Kannada and Telugu. 

She has translated and published stories  by leading Tamil writers like Sivasankari and Rajam Krishnan, besides trsnlating famous writer Sujatha's science fiction from Tamil to English, for serialisation in Science Today

She has been interviewed on radio and television in five languages – English, Kannada, Hindi, Tamil, and Telugu. She turned to journalism when she lost her singing voice for nine years during the 1960s, and has  subsequently continued  her involvement in both disciplines, as performer and teacher. As consumer activist, she was Vice President of the Consumer Guidance Society of India (Mumbai) during Justice Lentin’s tenure as President, and received the government of India national award for consumer protection twice, in 1994 and 2000. Her short stories have been published as a collection titled Lucky Days (Writers Workshop. Kolkata).

 

 

---

 

DRIFFTWARD: GOPALPUR-ON-SEA

Bibhu Padhi

 

This doesn’t always happen.

 

We watch the sea at the old harbour-town,

its last thin edges withering into

a gentle white feeling under our feet.

 

A faraway wind from the coasts of Malaya

sends large handfuls of the sea to our

tired faces. The touch keeps returning.

 

Slowly, the sun starts losing its height.

Under a benevolent moon,

the dark waters rise into the long night.

 

When the waters start falling,

we let our thoughts of ancestral journeys

sail upon them towards the darker waters.

 

Over our eyes the moon

goes into its long- awaited sleep.

The long journey begins now.

 

(The poem first appeared in PROSPICE.)

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

 

 

---

 

THE VISIT

Dr Ajay Upadhyaya

 

It was a visit, long overdue; by over fifty years.  Since the age of eight or so, when I left Ram Garh, I never had an occasion to go back. But its memory stayed with me. I often went over it, sometimes repeatedly, in my mind: Often, I just could not help it, but mainly because it had a mesmerising effect, transporting me, into my childhood, thousand of miles away and a yawning stretch of time ago.
Finally, I managed to embark on this long awaited visit. Anticipation of what lay ahead started to build up as my taxi meandered through the rural roads. The spell of picturesque scene of lush green paddy fields with palm trees dotted across, was broken only by jolts from the speed-breakers on the road, which crept up with annoying frequency.
‘What brings you to this village, sir’ my driver asked.
‘I lived in Ram Garh for a few years as a child.’ 
‘Anything special about this place?’ he asked.
‘Yes, the house, I lived in, I said hesitantly, unable to hide my mission, and unsure if it sounded plausible.
It was the house, I lived with my parents here, when my father was working as the Post Master.  I can’t remember, how long I lived in this house, but it was a memorable chapter in my time. The house, a stone bungalow, seemed enormous. I could see the long path from the main road to the house, standing in the middle of massive grounds , with its imposing compound wall. Its solid gate in the front welcomed the dusty foot path from the road and a gate in the back yard led to the open fields behind the house. 
It stood proudly far away from the main road, like a stone castle, proud of its character, as if the distance was a measure of its distinctiveness.   The solid compound wall adorned it like a loosely fitting oversized garland. The image of a castle was more or less complete in my mind, as the space around the house was generous enough for a moat. I felt like a prince, secure in my castle.
My reverie was broken by his next question, ‘We are almost in the village now: Can you remember any land marks for the house?’
“The house is a landmark by itself. It was the Post Office” I said.
‘Nobody lives in a Post Office?  I have never heard of such a thing’ he said in an air of disbelief.
‘Yes, you don’t see it often. It must have been a special arrangement. it was, in fact, one of its charms’, I said.
I was half expecting him to enquire more into the charm, I mentioned. But it seemed to make little impression on him. Whilst I was rehearsing  in my mind how to phrase the charm to him, he fired his next question, ‘Was it big?’
'Yes, it was a big house and had a spacious….’
Before I could finish my sentence, he quipped, “This is not a city; at best, a small town.  How come it had a big Post Office?”
‘It was the Post master’s residence and the Post Office, housed in one big bungalow.’
Before he had a chance to interrupt me with more questions, I continued, ‘And, it had a spacious garden and its own compound wall with gates, in front and the back’, hoping to impress him with features of the house.
‘Sir, you now live in California. I have heard, the houses there are huge, like mansions. I can’t imagine anything in this village to match your house over there, let alone beat it in size.’ He said in a tone of surprise.
Our car had entered the village and I was looking out eagerly, hoping to see something familiar. I was intently gazing at the road, and into the buildings on either side, whilst scanning the road ahead for anything I could recognise.
I cast my minds eyes back to my childhood and visualised the wide road, with vast spaces all round, running in front of the Post Office, the school building next door and the hospital further away on the other side. I could picture in my mind, the bridges on the side streets, branching off the main road, leading to the pond one way and to the orchard the other. 
The excitement of seeing all this again after so many years grew rapidly as we kept driving through the village. Soon, we came to what seemed like the end of the village and I did not find anything remotely familiar. The road felt cramped. The houses on both sides crowded on to the road leaving little space for even trees, in stark contrast with the image of open space, I had carried in my mind, all along.
This unexpected landscape made me ask, ‘Are you sure, we are in Rama Garh?’
His emphatic assertion in the affirmative made my heart sink. We drove up and down the roads once agin in the hope of spotting something I could relate to. While I had resigned to my failure in locating  the house, we spotted a sign of Post Office. But, it was dismaying  to see behind the sign, a concrete lacklustre building, tucked away in a neighbourhood of assorted structures. 
Nonetheless, hoping to get some clues to my dream house, I went inside. However, my introduction as someone who lived in a grand mansion of Post Office in this village, almost fifty years ago, drew a total blank.
‘The Post Office has always been in this building’ was the unanimous response from all the three staff behind the counter.
‘How old is this building?’ I asked.
‘At least thirty years, if not more.’
But I am looking for the Post Office in this village, from almost fifty years ago. Seeing their youthful looks, I realised the hopelessness of my situation.
The House of my dreams couldn’t be more different from this concrete box. The image of the Old Post Office soon flashed back to me. I remember, after migrating to America, visiting the White House in Washington DC, when my friend commented, ‘What a luxury, to have the residence and the house under one roof?’.
My instant and spontaneous reply was, ‘Yes, absolutely. In fact I was fortunate enough to enjoy this privilege as a child’. The very thought of comparing my childhood home in Ram Garh with the White House, had filled my heart to brim with contentment at the time and continues to bring a glow of satisfaction even today.
I looked up to see if there was anything else in this village, which might jog my memory. Another prominent feature of Ram Garh, that came to my mind was the Maharaja’s palace. I remember visiting the palace as a child, walking through its gigantic gates into the court-yard, which seemed bigger than a football field. A short walk led us into a side road and after a few minutes, we were standing in front of a pair of high doors. The doors were shut, but one door had a narrow elongated opening, to allow visitors in.
The inside of the palace cut a really dismal figure. The buildings were in varying states of disrepair, with faded paint and crumbling walls. Shrubs and grass had taken roots on parts of the building. Most of the doors were locked and there was an old motor car, covered in tarpaulin, which had not been used for ages. There was no sign of human life or activity other than a couple of visitors in the courtyard. It looked as if the palace had been abandoned for quite some time.
The deserted look filled me with sadness and curiosity in equal measure. I was eager to find out what happened to the Maharaja’s family and how this fate had fallen on the palace.
The visitors were young men in their twenties, and knew little of the history of the palace. Whilst walking out of the palace gate, I met a man of mature years, who gave me a potted history of the Royal family and their palace.
The Maharaja of Ram Garh, like most Royal families in India, was stripped of his royal status postindependence. They were offered a meagre Government stipend in return for their relinquished sovereignty. But Ram Garh’s Maharaja was relatively well off. He was astute enough to invest his wealth in land, which fetched him a lucrative sum and he had skilfully cultivated friendship with people of influence. He had only one son, who was sent off to Cuttack to study in an English medium Boarding school.
As the narration proceeded, the memory of the young prince came flooding my memory. I remember, one day, while out in the bazaar, with my father, the scene of a young boy caught my attention. He was flanked by two men on either side, one holding an umbrella over his head. He looked rather ordinary, no older than me, but his manners had an air of superiority, exuding a sense of knowledge that he was different. I asked my father about him, to learn that he was the prince, the son of  Maharaja.
I did not see the prince again in the village but he remained on my mind for a long time. I I often wondered how his life was in the inner chamber of the palace. I imagined him to be surrounded by attendants while he was eating, studying and playing.
Nestled in my  castle, I felt no less than a prince. In fact, I considered myself better off in many ways. I could do whatever I wanted: There was nobody to restrict me. No one was watching what I was eating. 
He was escorted, and chaperoned all the time. ‘How could he play hide and seek?  In fact, whom would he be playing with’, I often wondered.
‘So, what went wrong then; how did it come to this?’ I asked, returning from my reverie.
‘Everything was going well, when tragedy struck the family. One day, the boy disappeared.’
‘Disappeared?”, I said, adding, “But, how?’
‘Nobody knows what happened to him.’ ‘Was he kidnapped? Or, even murdered?’
‘God only knows’.
‘How can he just vanish? There surely was a Police investigation. He was not a nobody; a prince after all. Didn’t they find out what happened to him?’
‘Of course, Police investigation into his disappearance was extensive, lasting several years. It was big news locally because, he was a prince , as you say.'
‘But, No. The case of his dramatic disappearance remains unsolved till today.’ after a pause, he went on.
‘Despite years of investigation, his whereabouts from the time he disappeared, remained a mystery. Rumours and speculations were rife: He was kidnapped and possibly trafficked or murdered by someone, whom the Maharaja had slighted in some land dispute. But nothing certain was ever established. He was never seen again, presumed dead although there was no trace of his body.’
‘More tragedy was in store for the Royal family. The Maharaja was shattered by this devastating tragedy. He was afflicted by a strange malady; he gave up food and stopped talking. Soon, he was reduced to a vegetable’  He went on.
‘Couldn’t Doctors cure him? It sounds like a case of Severe Depression. He was wealthy and well -connected. I am sure he could afford the best of psychiatrists.’
‘Yes, no expense was spared towards his treatment. But it seems he had just lost his will to live.
He finally died of grief.’
I drifted off briefly into my thoughts on what else could have been done to save them from this grisly end.
‘Didn’t the Royal family have other relatives, who could take over the palace?’ I asked.
‘Yes, a distant cousin came over to claim the palace; he lived with his family in the palace for some years, but he didn’t last long. They soon left and no one has come forward to claim it or made any attempt to restore it since.'
‘What went wrong?’’, I asked.
As the story goes, the palace was haunted. The Maharaja died by giving up food and fluid but his spirit never left the palace. Strange noises were heard coming off the inner chambers and people reported ghostly shadows roaming the palace. These sightings and sounds were occasional to start with but as they became more frequent, the cousin found it too disturbing to continue here. He consulted astrologers and exorcists for a possible remedy but eventually the palace was abandoned.
‘So, has it stood in ruins since?' I asked.
‘Yes, as a silent witness to the tragic saga of Royal might, brought to its knees by cruel Destiny.’He concluded.
Although, this tragic story was heart-breaking, I had not forgotten my primary purpose of the trip to Ram Garh.
‘You seem to know a lot about this place. Do you have any idea about the Old Post Office, which stood next to the School, not very far from the hospital, about fifty years ago?’
‘Oh yes, there was a Post Office, many years ago, over there, pointing to the road, on which we
had already driven up and down twice in our vain search of my dream house.'
He led us to stop in front a heap of stones by the roadside. The ground between the stones and the road was hardly a patch of land and a couple of cows were resting, chewing their cud. Behind the rubble, I could see remnants of a few walls with their stones exposed. But their view was largely obliterated by overgrown trees, too dense at places to block the view of the interior.
‘Is this the Old Post Office?’ I asked in utter disbelief.
‘Yes, this has been abandoned for many years and no one has lived here for a long time.’ 
He couldn’t  answer my barrage of questions on how it came to be abandoned and eventually left.
My disappointment was instant, which grew by the minute, as I peered into the face of the cattle resting in the foreground and the edge of the walls barely visible through the trees in the background. I just could not believe that my dream house was reduced to this heap of rubble. It broke my heart to see it abandoned like a discarded skeleton left by vultures, after they had had their fill.
I was devastated by the whole experience. I looked around for some clues from the people on the main road, hoping for someone to shed some light on the building’s history, with a secret wish to hear that it was all a dreadful mistake and the old Post Office was actually standing elsewhere. 
A mini-crowd had gathered in the meantime around my car.  It seems, the word had spread in the village that someone from America was visiting Ram Garh in search of an old Post Office. They were curiously chatting amongst each other, somewhat baffled by my interest in this derelict building and the sight of sadness, writ large on my face. But no one was able to offer me any more of its secret nor any consolation.
I had imagined, all along, with excitement, of my visit to this house, and a range os scenarios as to how it would unfold.
Because of the immense lapse of time, I was unsure, if I would ever see it as I had left it. All possibilities had crossed my mind: may be it would have been remodelled, or rebuilt, or, given the sheer size of the compound, developed into a block of apartments. 
But secretly I was relishing the scene of my being welcomed into the building by the present occupant, after learning that this had been my childhood home, some fifty years ago.
The scene, in front of me, was completely beyond my contemplation. 
I looked at the road and the school building next to it and closely inspected remnants of the building.  A lone broken wall with its exposed jagged edges, about waist high, wore a forlorn look. Apart from this, there was just a heap of rubble and thick vegetation, seeming completely impenetrable. It gradually dawned on to me that this was, after all, my dream house.
My dream, like the house, lay shattered in front me.
While, I was about to return to my taxi, for my trip back, I spotted a man walking towards me and approached me, saying ‘I hear you lived in this house as a child’.  His streaks of grey hair and his confident gait gave him a distinguished look.
I gleaned a ray of hope, ‘At last, I would learn something of the sad fate of my beloved house.’ I thought.
‘Did you know this house, when it was the old Post Office?’ I asked.
‘Oh yes, I remember it quite well.’
With renewed hope, I went on, ‘I lived here with my parents and my father was the Post Master, working in this building, going back fifty odd years. It has been my dream to visit it again but I never got a chance. Since migrating to America more than thirty years ago my trips back to India were usually not long enough to make this trip to Ram Garh.’
‘Ah, You left it too late’ was his sombre reply.
‘I remember this houses at its best; one of the fine buildings from the colonial era. And it was pride of Rama Garh.'
‘How did it meet this gory end?’ I asked.
’It’s a long story. Do you have the time for it.’
'Yes, my friend, I have waited fifty years for this visit; I shall spare no pains to, at least, know what happened to it.’
‘You have been out of the country so long. Do you know what happened to the Maharaja and his son?’
'I just heard of the tragic end of the Royal family. But do you know what actually happened to the young prince?’
‘Yes, his life was so sad, cut short by cruel fate.’
'But what actually happened to him.'
‘I don’t know. All I know is that, he was a desperately unhappy child’
‘Did you really know the prince?'
‘Yes, I met him a number of times. My father worked in the palace and I had access to the inner chambers where we used to meet. We talked a lot and played whenever we got a chance. But it was done secretly as his parents disapproved of any close contact with the family of the
staff.'
‘He wanted to go to the local school, like me. But his father had other ideas. Many of the children from the Maharaja’s ancestors went to Doon School. But as the royal fortunes waned, they could not afford the expensive education they were accustomed to. But the village school locally was considered below the status of Royals and the English medium school in nearby Cuttack was the best they could arrange for him.'
'I believe his disappearance is still a mystery. What do you reckon, happened to him?’, my eagerness was evident.
‘I am not sure, but why bring up his sad story?’,  He said looking away, adding in quick succession, ‘You are keen to learn of the Post Office building, I thought’.
‘Yes, but looking back, I was quite curious about him, while I lived in this house. Of course, after leaving Ram Garh, I almost forgot about him; well, until now.’
'This Post Office building was a part of the Royal estate, leased to the Postal Department as it was surplus to their needs. As their wealth dwindled, the rental income from the massive building became an important revenue stream for the Maharaja.'
'Ah, I see, I now understand how the Post Office building was so grand, and how lucky I was to
live in it’
‘Do you want to go inside the building, or whatever remains of it?’ He asked.
‘Thank you, my friend; you read my mind. I blurted, 'But can we really go inside?’
‘Yes, I have been inside, through the back of the rubbles: Not many people know of the secret path.'
‘Sure, I said, unable to contain my excitement at the thought of stepping inside the remnants of the edifice.’
He led the way, and kept talking, ‘in fact the prince often talked of this building. It was a place, he wished he could live in, away from all the restrictions and prohibitions of the Royal household.’ As I stepped inside, I could not help taking the next turn, while he turned the other way. 
I was facing a door frame broken down to bare stumps.
I could hear him talking, ‘After the disappearance of the prince and the death of the Maharaja, the building was returned to the Royal family as the Postal Department found the rent too high. And, more tenants followed. But, nobody lasted long in it as this place was haunted’
On seeing the door frame, which led to my bed room, I was lost in my own thoughts. The sight of the threshold of my room took me back to my days in this house.  Old memories came rushing into my mind.  
I remembered, while living in this house, I had the magical power to see at will, anything I wanted. I used to spend hours, lying on bed, watching scenes of my choosing, like a movie, on a screen. At first, I was bemused but it soon turned into my favourite pastime.  I took it as a gift from this house, and accepted it as a feature of my bed.  For, I could not exercise my will in this way, when I was away from this home, and after moving out of Rama Garh, I was never able to repeat this feat again.  
Alongside my friends and teachers from my school, the prince figured prominently in such movies. I saw him at his dining table, doing his home-work, in his bed room. I could turn the scenes off and on at will. I also wondered, if he could see me as well.
As I imagined myself, sitting on the bed, I could feel my heart racing .  All on a sudden, I could will to bring the house back to life.  I saw the walls built up, stone by stone.  As I looked beyond, the corridor from my room to the hall got laid.  Then came the turn of the verandah from the living quarters to my father’s office. When I glanced to my left, the corridor to the garden was spread out in front of my eyes.
I was taken aback by what was unfolding in front of me. My heart skipped a beat.  I felt dizzy and faint.  But I kept standing; totally immobile, as if glued to the ground.
The rest of the house followed, first the rooms, then the corridors, and the roof, next.  Then came the turn of the compound wall.  In no time, the house was complete, exactly like it stood, when I 
lived in it.
I wanted to pinch myself for a reality check .  I could not move or turn my head.  Even breathing became  difficult. 
‘Where is my friend now?’
By now, I was frozen; couldn’t move a finger, let alone turn my head to look back at him. With superhuman effort, I finally managed to turn round. Everything was gone; just vanished.  I broke into a cold sweat;  standing all alone in the middle of the rubble.
 

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

 

 

---

 

CAT’S-PAW

Dilip Mohapatra

 

The sea is so calm now

and the bay is tranquil

the tides are full

and the moon is silent

the stars blink still

but more as a habit.

 

The keel is steady

in the comforts of the berth

the winds no longer sing

through the rigging

it’s only the soft cat’s-paw

that prods and probes

the weather beaten scars

some visible

and some hidden

behind the barnacles

which throb once a while

to remind you

of the gales that you regaled

the waves you braved

and then you long

to weigh your anchor

let go the ropes off the bollards

and set sails once again

into the unknown seas

not ventured earlier

and explore

many an uncertain shores

still unseen

and unvisited.

 

Note: Cat’s Paw:  a gentle breeze that ruffles the surface of the sea in irregular patches during a calm

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.

 

---

 

A VANITY DREAM

Dr. Nikhil M. Kurien

 

It was Christmas time. Varkey drove through the whole night so that he could reach home early in the morning and be with his family on the Christmas day, but it was only by eight in the morning that he could reach his abode. His job of being a salesman of a ceramic company made him travel much and kept him away from home most of the time. This was not the job he had dreamed of. He was quite good in his studies and he always dreamt of being a police officer in his school days and as he matured that dream slowly grew up as a crime investigating officer and by the time he finished his education he longed to become a commando officer who dealt with action and rescuing people. But his dream never got materialised. Right after his studies he was forced to start earning for his family as his father was bed ridden by that time. Thus his ambition remained a dream forever.

He had a morning tea once he parked his goods van and settled himself in the comfort of his home. After drinking the strong tea made by his wife he felt like straightaway going to bed and sleeping like a log of wood but he got hungry once he smelt the thin crispy dosas being prepared by his wife for the breakfast. So by the time Tessa, his wife prepared the breakfast he took a warm shower and made himself fresh. The warm shower relaxed him from the long, weary journey of the previous night. He had his breakfast of the ghee roast dosas even as his wife sat next to him and kept on telling him about their children's exams and the neighbour’s new car which was totally unexpected. He had three of the crispy plain dosas along with sambhar curry and he followed it with another cup of tea. Then he got up from his seat to wash his hands while Tessa picked up the plates for the kitchen.

After a refreshing shower and a full stomach, it looked as if all was set for a nice peaceful sleep he was yearning for. His eyes were burning for need of a sleep and eyelids were getting too heavy for him to keep them open. But before he went to the bedroom he just wanted to see the news in the television. He was totally out of touch with the current affairs for the last three days. He sat on the sofa for around five minutes watching television, surfing from one news channel to the other. He was feeling drowsy and he just laid down on his side on the sofa with his right arm supporting his head.  He found that position very comfortable. Later when his arm got a bit numb, he rested his head on the arm rest of the sofa. The small cushion which was there by his side, he tucked under his neck.  He had never found himself so much comfortable and he could see the television screen well. He had never laid down on the sofa like this. He always felt that sofas were for the visitors and they had to be kept tidy and clean always. His two small boys usually lay on the sofa and he used to scold them every time he saw them do that. He himself had no intention on laying on that sofa but it just so happened.

Varkey was seeing the news about the elections and he jumped to the next channel to hear some controversy about the purchase of some material  by the government. His eyes were getting drowsy. He tried to pull up his eyes to see what sort of purchase was made but his senses were not obeying. Then the news reader suddenly announced a flash news about an hijack that was reported from an East Asian country. Varkey faintly heard the news of the hijack though it was not much comprehensible as his central nervous system had already gone into a sleep mode. He fell into a deep slumber and started snoring.

It must have been two minutes into the sleep when a message came in his mobile phone kept nearby on a teapoy. The alert  tune of the incoming message reached his ears. Varkey deep in his sleep took the mobile phone and opened up the message while in reality he was fast asleep and he was just dreaming. In his dream he read the message in the Inbox. It was from the intelligence wing. A plane had been hijacked and he being a commando officer of the intelligence action wing concerned with the security of the country and its citizens, was asked to report to the airport immediately where the hijack drama was unfolding.

Navin, his seven year old younger son was helping his brother in decorating the Christmas tree in the front porch of the house. The tree was already put up few days before but some of the balloons had become deflated. So he was exhaling into a new balloon but he had lot of difficulty in inflating the rubber piece while his elder brother did it much easily.  The balloon didn’t swell up as according to his efforts but then suddenly his efforts started to give a result. But Navin’s ambition was a bit overstretched and he wanted to make the balloon larger than the one his brother had blown up.  So he blew all the more harder and harder till the layer of rubber got so much transparent and before Navin could achieve his ambition, or before his elder brother could warn him, it burst.

The burst of the balloon sounded like an explosion in Varkey’s ears when he had just arrived at the airport. The terrorists inside the plane had shot out a small missile onto the airport where the civilians and the rest of the authorities had gathered. The bursting sound of the balloon sent a shiver through Tessa who was washing the dishes after the breakfast. The jerk of her body made the plates slip out of her hand and plates on tripped down a set of tea cups which were kept on the side of the washing sink. There was a long shattering sound in the kitchen as the crockery fell down one by one onto the floor. In Varkey’s dream, he was seeing a vivid picture of the glass panes of the airport being shattered by the explosion. Tessa gave an angry loud cry at Navin for causing so much destruction. It scared the small boy Navin and he shrieked as his mother became violent with him. In his sleep Varkey could see the people shouting and scurrying after the blast and their children crying and running around in panic. The smell of fire burning up the things in the airport was there in the air, while in Varkey house the  dish which was kept on the stove was now burning.

Tessa had completely forgotten about the dish she had kept for cooking as she was busy in clearing up the mess created by her younger son. The broken dishware had to be cleared before the kids would step and injure their feet. The washing sink tap where she was washing the plates was gushing out water in full force as Tessa got a little disoriented in tackling the things in order of its preference. In her hurry to clean the mess on the floor, she had completely forgotten about the cooking and washing.

In his dream Varkey could hear the alarm in the airport going on as the pressure cooker which was placed in the stove next to the burning frying pan gave its loud whistle. The fire engines were screeching around and the water hoses had been drawn out. The water was being pumped in full force into the fire but in reality the water gushing from the sink tap was now falling like a waterfall over the sink edge  and splashing on to the floor which created a sound as if water was being expelled from the fire hose.

Jabin the elder of the boys took up his sobbing younger brother Navin in his arms. To pacify him, he slowly went up to the television and changed the channel from news to a music channel since his father was already asleep. It was a patriotic movie song which was being played and the fervour of the nation slowly went into the ears of Varkey.

The top available intelligence officers had an emergency meeting and the ransom was discussed. The demand by the terrorists was the release of their leader who was in the central prison, in exchange for the release of the passengers of the plane. Then they were to be given a safe exit in the plane itself. The go ahead signal for the deal was given in favour of the terrorists by the government to save the passengers. Varkey was assigned the job of taking the leader of the heinous organisation to the aeroplane and pave way for the release of the passengers.

The patriotic song which played in the background in the television had now increased its tempo and inside Varkey it brought up the national pride and spirit in him to the forefront.  He was not ready to surrender the nation’s pride before some petty terrorist.

Tessa had cleared up the mess. The broken plates and cups were removed and the water which overflowed onto the floor gave her a chance to wipe the floor clean.  The burnt dish was thrown out. Now she had to start again from the beginning to prepare for the lunch. She started her mixer grinder to prepare for the curry mix.

The switching on of of the mixer grinder coincided with the starting of the motorbike. Varkey kicked the starter of the bike on which he had to take the terrorist leader towards the hijacked plane in the runway. As Tessa increased the speed of the mixer grinder, the bike too sped along the tarmac of the airport towards the parked plane.  Jabin saw his father perspiring as he passed by the sofa and he increased the speed of the ceiling fan. Laying below the fan, Varkey felt the cool air blowing onto his face as the bike raced forward.

Once beside the plane, he alighted from the bike and stood with the terrorist leader handcuffed beside him. The washing machine which was kept in the corridor near the dining room had finished its job of washing and it now automatically went into the spinning and drying mode. The rumbling sound it created almost matched the opening of the aircraft door and there on the doorway he saw the three hijackers.They instructed Varkey to release their leader first before they set free the passengers. But Varkey the patriot was not just ready to release their leader. To release such a nefarious guy would be like unleashing more terror in the coming days. He had a plan, though a risky one. He was going to do a reverse ransom.

He shouted aloud to the hooded men in the plane. “Release the passengers first and then I will set your leader free,”

Hearing it one of the hooded men caught one female passenger and held the gun to her head, "Now every minute you delay in releasing our leader, one passenger is going to be shot”

Varkey was spontaneous in his response. “I am going to slowly wound your leader with one bullet at a time for every minute you delay in releasing the passengers. I will start from his limbs one by one till I make a hole in each and every part of his body.”

For the first time the hijackers were shaken. Their resolve disintegrated before the brave officer who was ready to take up the challenge. His intent was very obvious as he made the brutal leader kneel in front of him and he pointed the revolver onto the bad guy’s thigh.

Tessa heard Varkey shouting at someone as she stood in the kitchen doing her preparations for the lunch. She wondered to whom he was talking so loud because she had already sent both their boys to the neighbour’s house so that they would not disturb their father’s sleep. So she slowly walked towards the drawing room. There she found him sleeping and he looked tensed and angry. He clearly was having a disturbed sleep.

Varkey shouted again, “My people first or the first bullet will go into his bone now.”

The three hijackers inside the plane were out of their wits and had no other choice. Any injury to their leader would not be tolerated by their organisation who saw him as an incarnation of god. To save their leader they had to release the people and then take their chances in escaping with their leader.

The hijacked passengers were released one by one and just when the last of the passenger was alighting, Varkey noted the movement of one hooded terrorist as his fingers moved to the trigger of the gun. Varkey was far more quick and in a flash his gun went berserk against the hijackers.  The crackers started firing in the neighbor’s house as Jabin and Navin along with the neighbour’s children started their Christmas celebrations. To Varkey it was a big gun fight as he shot down all the hijackers. The terrorist leader who was with him too was dead as he got shot in between the cross fire.

On the sofa, Varkey raised his right hand with two finger kept pointing to imitate the barrels of a gun and he shot everyone around. Tessa became bit worried seeing all these unusual things and she called him loudly asking what he was doing in his sleep. Varkey didn't respond. He was at the nation’s service and he had much greater things to do. Tessa tried to switch off the television so that Varkey could hear her properly but she got mixed up with the remote buttons. Instead of turning off, she accidentally inceased the volume of the television and then in her panic to reduce the volume she pressed on a channel which was not tuned to any frequency, which showed just black and white grains on the screen and created a nondescript loud sound.

The shootout was over and to Varkey’s hallucination, the sound from the empty channel in the television created a sound effect as if he was surrounded by a stadium of people who were clapping and blaring out his name, which altogether created the sound of a crashing wave. Right before him Varkey could see himself being surrounded by all the people and passengers in the airport. They were all appreciating him for the remarkable job he had accomplished for the country.  Varkey revelled in the accolades but he just could not understand why one woman alone was shaking his shoulders and scolding him for saving the country's honour.

 

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.

 

---

 

WATCH THE FIRE TILL YOU BURN

Ananya Priyadarshini

 

Did you not crush the burning cigar?

Nor did you mend your fireplace?

A piece that flew to sky from your yard

Where did the fire come from, let's trace!

 

The aroma that fills your stomach

Is it the roast in your oven space?

Or they're burning right in their homes

A paw here, some fur there- let's trace!

 

Your feet feel a little tremor

You think the plates made a mess?

Or is it a cue that millions are at stake

Those little tremors, let's trace!

 

The noise you wake up to each morning

Through the TV from a neighbor's place

Is it the law crying or the education dying?

The lyrics that make through- let's trace!

 

Or stay. And pull your blankets up

Till the fire doesn't creep

Shut your phone off so with each newsletter

It doesn't beep

Look at the bright sky till it drops on your head

Watch them burn, watch them kill till you're not dead.

Ananya Priyadarshini, Final year student, MBBS, SCB Medical College, Cuttack. Passionate about writing in English, Hindi and especially, Odia (her mother tongue).

Beginner, been recognised by Kadambini, reputed Odia magazibe. Awarded its 'Galpa Unmesha' prize for 2017. Ananya Priyadarshini, welcomes readers' feedback on her article at apriyadarshini315@gmail.com.

 

---

 

THE DUNG BEETLE

Arupanand Panigrahi

Translated by Prabhanjan K. Mishra

 

          (1)

Behind our house

by the dung-pit

mother would make

flattened dung-cakes;

 

dried ones would feed

our kitchen’s earthen stove;

the dung rolling in her hands

would be sweet music to our ears;

 

would churn stomachs

with the hope of hot meals,

our hands restive to join and hasten

her home-industry of dung-cakes.

 

How she would train us to fly

from false-starts to finish,

a rite of passage, redolent of love,

from the dung-pit to kitchen!

 

A mother bird in her nest

Brings tit bits to her babies,

puts that into their tiny mouths;

make them fit to fly and forage.

 

We eat, grow and take off;

but do we worry, what keeps

the mother alive? The mother-bird

picks and survives on dung-beetles!

                   (2)

The squelching sound of dung

in mother’s kneading hands

would make our mouths water,

churn bellies for a hot meal.

 

Every piece of dung cake,

burning in the kitchen oven,

would bear her finger marks,

aglow into a lovely ember-red;

 

and would glow there

her silver finger-ring, lost

in the dung-pit, found embedded

in a piece of gung-cake in woven;

 

only a relic of her love

and legacy, her sacrifices;

but the finger that wore it,

beyond our mortal touch.

 

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

 

---

 

THE PLOT!

Dr. Preethi Ragasudha

Those tiny nerve ends beneath your skin

Tremble in anticipation at the touch of  my icy cold fingers.

I see you blush, orange to pink…to red

You laugh and flourish with the wind

Have you  fallen for me, yet again, I wonder!

And in no time,  I leach out your colour

Your life and the soul of your very being.

You helplessly shake against the squall.

I hug you with all my might,

Your naked body wrapped within me.

You shiver and shudder as I dance around you

Flailing your arms against the mighty storm.

I sense your last breath hesitantly freeze in the air

My hold getting tighter, your struggle getting weaker.

I finally feel your life freeze within you

And then I leave you….. Cold and still.

The breeze still shake your naked branches

Just to make sure there's no more life left in you.

But I know, I have spared a little bit of you.

I need to keep the game going.

Every year, we play this trick

Every year, I do the exact same thing.

But you are helpless to avert my advance

Or…is it that you cherish the slow death that I offer, I often wonder!

You, like others are just prey to my mastery

I will see you through this season

I am winter, and I hear your silent yearn for spring!

I smile at you, and hungrily move to the next tree

To hug it closer and to take its breath away..

 

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.

 

---

 

UNWELCOME GUESTS

Sharanaya B

 

Somebody thuds on wood far below

Resultless efforts to breakthrough or carve out,

interrupted beats seeking permission growing impatient,

A faint memory of door knocks to a stubborn mind.

A sundered pigeon feather rolls in to be trapped amidst the furry rug,

the end of a smooth cruise - now an awkward guest unsure if to head back or resist as

hands in a haste throw powder to water, they brew out

scented smoke rising gently above - a ballerina spreading her limbs out to the air,

Only to be slashed down by raging blades of the ceiling fan- they're unwelcome too.

Dispersed fragments of smoke befriend lonely feathers and wooden splinters,

together they seek out home,

They morph your paper towns into timbered castles,

Embellish your tattered jackets to feathered gowns as

the smoke steals the sky's indigo to stain your windows.

 

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.

 

 

---

 

FACE BOOK: EUREKA !!!

Major Dr. Sumitra Mishra

My heart sings

“Eureka! Eureka!! Eureka!!!

Whenever I open the Face Book page,

For suddenly pops out of the cyber space

Like rabbits or ducks from a magician’s hat

The smiling faces of my children & grand children

Enjoying their happy lives with family and friends

My hands fold and my heart bursts into a thankful prayer!

 

Then I drag the page downwards

And pop come out faces,

Known-unknown with friend requests,

Glamorous photos of my virtual friends

Celebrating their birthdays, anniversary,

Flashy groups travelling around the world

Or poets, writers, dancers, receiving various awards

Or just enjoying the breeze on a beach, or delicious food

I wonder, is there anything we do not publish or update on FB?

 

Then comes the ads and videos

Of the dazzling world of commerce,

Bragging, begging, offering cuts,

Discounts packages, sales gimmicks,

To lure the lazy and lousy customers

Who care not for the price but for fashion

Giants like Amazon, Flip cart, Snap deal, Myntra

Push me to load my carts or baskets with goodies

I or we may need or not need, just to enjoy the discounts!

 

Eureka!  Eureka!! Eureka!!!

My heart sings

When I find the massage form

Old college friends, students, colleagues

Long forgotten relatives whom I never meet,

Students now active as social stars or leaders

Tech giants, professionals, movie stars or politicians

Showcasing their talent or lavish office contours,

Entreating me to like or share their photos or videos  

My heart goes booommm enjoying my upgraded status!

 

My heart pays homage to Facebook

For saving me from the desperation

Of travelling to unreachable distant places

To meet some ailing/enjoying friends or relative

Or take a trip to some exotic foreign island or inland

For which I may not have the money, time or resource!

 

Eureka! Eureka!! Eureka!!!

Sings my soul

When I enter my Home page in FB

And see my three years old granddaughter’s

Ubiquitous dancing or hopping in her school uniform

Or another one holding the tiger by the tail in a zoo

Or my son looking lovingly at his beloved wife in the Taj

Or my daughters dressed for a party or function in Bollywood style

Blissful smiles enlightening their faces,

Or I share my daughter’s awesome recipes in her blog La Petit Chef

Accolades for her mind blowing food photography and food styling

Or another daughter posing on the streets of Maastricht on a tranquil road

Wrapped in cool mist and clinging to her darling hubby

A chubby smile on her lips, the dimples deepening with red.

 

Eureka! Eureka!! Eureka!!!

Sings my heart

When I open my profile page in FB

To paste my photos in Taj hotel or Tajmahal

Update details of my trip to Bangkok or Singapore

Or on the golden, ornate, archaic gates of a port in Rajasthan,

For I see the number of likes, the comments of appreciation,

My heart leaps like a child’s

When I read the wishes on occasions like Diwali, or Dussehera,

Teacher’s Day, Mother’s Day or on my Birthday,

Wonderful it feels

To know I mean something

To so many people; friends, strangers, family or foreigners,

My Face Books page is my identity to the world,

Now it floats on a Facebook Tree at Singapore airport

A pride feels my heart

That I belong to this world

Of so many wonderful people

This planet that is so beautiful,

This network that is so friendly

I connect to the world

That belongs to me and us – all—

Friends of a virtual society

On a virtual Homepage but so real and so close

Sleeping enclosed in our cellphones

Awakening at the touch of our fingertips

This makes our lives so worth living

Eureka! Eureka! Mr. Zuckerberg and his team!

 

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”.

 

---

 

THE BOATMAN (MAJHI)

Kabiratna Manorama Mohapatra

(Translated by Sumitra Mishra)

 

Oh, boatman!

Why did you leave me in the

Middle of the surging waves?

Scared I am,

By the rain and storm,

The deluging waves of the terrible flood!

 

Frightened I am

Panicked my mind

Freaking out my nerves

I may lose my way!

 

Yet I am waiting

With a lamp in hand

Though jittery and upset

I live clinging to the sacred Time.

 

Time flows ceaseless,

I am feeling spooked

Drenched through and through

Yet I am not drowned

In my hands I carry the divine lamp

God gifted, inextinguishable!

I am diving inside the fog

To meet Faith

I know, You; the Supreme; is my savior

How can I go astray?

 

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.

 

 

---

 

WEAVES OF TIME

Sangeeta Gupta

XXIX

Love is self attrition
it comes with a package—
of hurt and pain

when love does happen
hurt and pain
are not far away.

Fully aware,
one still craves
that one sheer magic,
it that gives each a heady feel

Its fire, as singes
a passion
as destroys completely—
makes of one a poet
of another a painter, or anything you 
name thus devastated, and destroyed,
one still Becomes . . . . a 
being enriched and entranced. 
And this is no paradox.

If you have not yet
suffered love
how could you
have lived?
 

XXX

I die each day
and yet am reborn again
come day.

All hurts, shames,
all humiliations, all sorrows
die with me come morn.

In my reincarnations
I have a selective, knife-keen memory!

But forget not
I only remember love
and its blessings.
 

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.

 

 

---

 

DETERMINATION

Sheena Rath

 

Everything and anything to see your sporadic smile

You have to traverse miles

Keep pacing and dreaming for a while

Show the world your unique, sophisticated, iconic style.

In my heart a new carol I sing

Feel free and soar high with your wings

The world will have to change

For unknown speculation strange

Let life unfold

It's beauty tenfold

This world is zilch

Without you my cherubic innocence

You are a lesson

A new unread chapter

In every season

With profound inspiration

One day they will adulate you

For the smallest of things you can do.

In all hues of Blue

Devoid of any clue

Look forward to a new tomorrow

Where there will be no sorrow.

Sending positive vibes to every special needs family

For love forever they will be hungry.

We shall not be alone in the vicinity

Will live our lives with dignity

Reminiscing countless days of awareness

In all its fairness.

Abandon your fears

As we wipe away our tears

To be a stalwart fighter

Like any other gladiator.

To carry forward God's mission

And that will be our ambition.

 

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).

 

---

 

LOST AND FOUND

Narayanan Ramakrishnan

 

I was searching for a name in the Facebook. Fortunately for me, I did not have to spend my time searching for that and it was right on the table. It rarely happens. In our life we would have wasted a major chunk of productive time, in search of misplaced articles, robbing ourselves of our leisure and pleasure, giving in its place lot of pressure. I always regret why I do not place things at appropriate places to obviate this ordeal again and again

Actually I had already undergone this exercise in the morning itself. But it had given me another pleasure, I found so many things I had missed out on my earlier hunt. Yesterday, I bought two small batteries to activate a bat-like mosquito terminator. Having removed the batteries from the polythene cover, I confidently put my hand on the top of cupboard where I usually kept the terminator. It was missing. I searched, evading my gimlet-eyed wife, as searching articles hidden due to my carelessness unnecessarily invited unwanted and humiliating comments from her. I found out very much to my delight, a valuable find which I had thought, as bad as lost -  the cover page of the first edition print (Feb.1966) of Richard J Whallen’s ‘The Founding Father: The story of Joseph P Kennedy’, which had got peeled off the from the rest of the book. That  was a source of great relief to me.  This has happened so many times, that I prepare myself for such serendipitous findings.

Today, at my wits end, I yelled to son, daughter and wife. Nobody responded but my wife charged me in the usual fashion. "You have no fixed place for anything, you take one thing from here and throw it elsewhere and start shouting the next time you need it, create so much turmoil with your short-temper and I have put up with all these for the last twenty nine years. If you are badly in need, search yourself, I don't care". Familiarity breeds contempt. That is what was happening now. I have to live with it. Shortly we will be celebrating the Pearl Jubilee of our marriage.  Luckily I found the terminator before the advent of evening when the mosquitoes began their hunt for blood. 

In one instance, However, I could not but praise the alacrity of my wife.  Some days back, my wife went to her native place for two days, a hundred kilometres away, leaving us to fend for ourselves. These were the days when I felt exactly like the character John Perkins in the short story, 'The Pendulum' of O Henri. I missed her a lot during this period and back to square one, once she returned. But this incident is one I could not wish away from my mind.

It was about 8'O clock in the night. My daughter, after her coaching class, would be waiting for me. I was about to leave. Oh! My ignition key was nowhere to be found. I searched my pant and shirt pocket, inside, on and underneath the table and furniture, no where...I was feeling the pressure. At any time she may call. I had a duplicate. I had no idea about its whereabouts. By 'providence' my mobile phone was in my pocket and as a last ditch effort, I called my wife. Two or three times, she did not respond. I called her sister. There also it elicited no response. I called in the land line, again in vain. Time was ticking away. I ran out to check if I had left the key in the bike itself and once more, to check if it was left somewhere nearby and also checked the passage in the dim light, everything in vain. Thoughts running wild, I imagined I would have dropped the key inside the space under the seat, pressed it and locked it forever.

Rainy season and a flash-flood prone area where you will find yourself immersed in neck deep water, in no time, kept my anxiety unchecked.  All of a sudden my mobile started ringing. I thought my waiting daughter was  calling me. No, it was my wife. Raging with anger for her failure to respond, but controlling myself, I grudgingly but calmly asked whether she had any idea about the duplicate ignition key. I urged her to be quick. After a few seconds, my wife calmly replied, "It is in the kitchen cupboard, on the right side of the third rack, inside the fifth Horlicks bottle." I ran in, it was right there as she told.

I never go out anywhere without a pen in my pocket. Therefore, I pulled the table drawer.  Beneath a folded sheet of paper was my ignition key, unperturbed. The adage applicable to me stood the test of time. Search for one and you will get the one you searched earlier. A lifeless thing that can only ignite a two-wheeler flared me up and kept me on tenterhooks for nearly half an hour. This event made me very disciplined, at least in this respect and I immediately pasted a hook near that cupboard where the duplicate dangles permanently.

I reflected over this after return from the coaching centre along with my daughter. My son was happily waiting in front of the house after enjoying his evening fills in the nearby hotel. Had this searching of the key happened some twenty years ago, I would have been all at sea because of my wife’s regional slang. She was more used to Central Travancore slang those days, she would have told me “...... in the cupboard on the west and on the south of chilly powder tin and east of fourth of Horlicks bottle, to the south of sugar jar."

The easiest one and the one you never have to indulge in searching is the modern ubiquitous object - the mobile phone. Either you lose it forever or you blame yourself for leaving it on the switched off mode.

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.

 

 

---

 

THE SWEET DISH

Biswa Prakash Sarangi

Raman was very happy today. It seemed like a new breath of life had been given to him. Though he was sick and in bed for the last twenty days, today he was completely spirited; and the cause of his happiness was not just that he was feeling better, but because his mother had promised that she would make his favourite sweet dish, gulabjamun, when he got well. The very thought of gulabjamuns was enough to get a smile from Raman on even the gloomiest day. He was very attached to his mom. She not only made a mountain of big gulabjamuns, she also fed them to him with her own loving hands.

 

He got up from his bed early in the morning, and started shouting with joy and danced about carelessly. He was ecstatic. He felt very energetic which was unusual, since for the last few days he was completely drained of all energy. He thanked God for his health and went to the kitchen to see if all the ingredients for gulabjamuns were present. Whenever he got a chance he used to sit on a chair in the kitchen and see his mother make gulabjamuns. Though earlier he was unable to even pronounce the name gulabjamun which he always called as gubbujubbu, he always observed with close attention how his mother would make the raw ingredients into something so magical that to get a mouthful he was ready to do whatever he was told. He would always try to taste the raw ingredients and try to figure how such a tasty dish was made from such tasteless raw materials like maida or oil. He used to ask “Mama, how do you make such a tasty dish from these?’’ His mama would smile and simply say, Love & Magic!!! He couldn’t understand what she said but he really liked to hear the way his mother would say it in her sweet and mesmerising voice.

 

He noticed that maida was missing. (He took pride that he could pronounce it properly now). He decided to go to the market himself and get it. Although he was small he could easily get the door open. He was about to leave when he remembered that to buy it he had to get some money. He called his dog Sheru to get up and go with him. “Get up Sheru. Let’s go to the market. I want to eat gulabjamun.” Sheru woke up, jumped and barked in delight on seeing Raman. Sheru always waited for Raman to come back from school. Together they started playing the moment Armaan got down from the rickshaw.

 

They went out into the street and started walking towards the market. It was still early in the morning and very few people were on the street. A few sweepers were cleaning the streets. The sun was just above the horizon. Even the streetlights were still on. Raman dashed into a heap of dry leaves stacked by one of the sweepers and kicked it and squealed in joy. Sheru followed him and jumped into the heap, sending leaves here & there. The sweeper moaned and shouted at the dog for making a mess. Raman shouted “Run Sheru, run.” Both of them ran as fast as they could. Raman had a hearty laugh.

 

After fifteen more minutes of walking, Raman finally reached the market. Though usually the long distance would wear him down, but not today. He didn’t even break a sweat. It seemed that gulabjamuns were giving him some extraordinary power. He wondered if this was the magic and love his mother talked about.

 

He remembered the way to Lalaji’s grocery store as he had come here countless times with his mama & papa. The market was just opening. Many vendors were selling fresh vegetables, fruits and fish. People were beginning to come to the market. He saw Ramesh uncle at the fish stall buying himself a big bag of crabs. Though Ramesh uncle was good to him, he was always in the habit of eating Raman’s gulabjamun before he could eat even a single one. Raman would often cry at this, and try to beat him with his little soft hands. Only when his mother would come back with more gulabjamuns, would Ramesh uncle be spared of Raman’s fury. On seeing Ramesh uncle, Raman hid behind the big gunny bags. He whispered “Sheru, come here quick. Uncle will see you.” But Sheru was busy watching a cat pass and started barking. As it was early in the morning with very little noise, everyone’s attention turned towards the dog. Ramesh uncle came forward and said “What on earth are you doing here, Sheru? Aren’t you supposed to guard Raman while he is ill?” Raman felt that he should jump in front of Ramesh uncle and surprise him. He knew Ramesh uncle would be very happy to see him. He might even give him a chocolate and a ride back home. But Raman also worried that if uncle found Raman he would know about the gulabjamuns. He decided to keep hiding and see how the events unfolded. The other people asked Mr. Ramesh if the dog was his. He explained that it was his friend Alok’s. Ramesh uncle looked around to check if Raman’s parents were there. On not finding them he decided to take Sheru back to Raman’s house, thinking it might have wandered off.

 

Raman realised that now even without him Sheru can reach back home safely with his uncle. Raman decided to keep hiding till uncle left with the dog. Though Sheru barked a few times in the direction of Raman, uncle didn’t take any notice and pulled Sheru to go with him. Raman thought “a great comrade is lost, but the mission is still on.” He checked once more to be sure that uncle had left the area. On being sure that the area was clear, Raman resumed his walk to Lalaji’s store. With gulabjamuns rolling on his mind and his tummy giving the signal that it also wants some, Raman somehow focussed on his objective. After a few turns he reached Lalaji’s store. But he was surprised to see that the store was closed. He couldn’t understand what had happened there. He was definitely sure that Lalaji would be there to greet him with a smiling face and bring him inside the store and play with his hair & tickle him. He was completely out of ideas as to what to do now. It seemed that all the gulabjamuns were flying out of the reach of his tiny little hands. He had the same feelings as when Ramesh uncle would eat up Raman’s share, except this time there will be no more gulabjamuns to come to his rescue. Sad and disappointed he walked back home hoping for some miracle to take place.

 

Due to this sadness the road back to his home felt like ages. One heavy step after another, he somehow managed to keep walking despite the sadness in his heart. The streetlights were off by now. He kicked one pile of dry leaves after another. Raman didn’t even notice the screaming of the sweepers behind. He simply walked on, with the cruel smile of fate on him.

 

As he neared his home, he saw his parents were sitting out on the veranda. Raman quickly hid behind the nearest bushes he could find. He wondered if his parents had seen him. And if they have, then if they were angry. He went closer to his home using the series of bushes along the road. When he came close enough to his home he peeked through one of the bushes to see if his parents were still sitting there. He noticed that there were two other persons also standing at the verandah. He could identify one of them as uncle Ramesh. He could also hear the barking of Sheru from within the house. He was thankful that Sheru had reached home safely. He couldn’t identify the other person at first, though he looked familiar. After some time Raman realised it was none other than Lalaji. He was standing there with two small polythene bags. Raman strained to check the contents of the bags. One of them had prasad in it while the other had, some sorts of a white powder in it. Raman wondered what it could be.

 

Then suddenly it struck to him. Of course, what else could it be? Lalaji must have brought maida with him. And why wouldn’t he! After all Raman was not only the darling of his parents, but also of the entire colony and market. While others would be referred by names like Chhotu, every person knew Raman by name. The sweet little kid of Mr. Alok, with the freshness and innocence of a flower. Nobody ever said no to any of Raman’s demands. Raman’s parents were often embarrassed with the amount of presents Raman received from people, both known and strangers. But it didn’t matter as people often saw their childhood whenever they encounterd a hale and hearty child such as Raman.

 

He remembered that Lalaji had come to his home during his sickness, and Raman’s mother often told how he loved gulabjamuns and only maida was missing. Raman’s mother had said she couldn’t go out to bring maida herself since she had to stay with Raman to take care of him. ‘”Brilliant”, Raman thought. Lalaji must have brought it himself. He thought of playing with Lalaji’s hair for a change and thank him. He was Raman’s hero today.

 

Excited at the turn of evets he simply leaped onto the street and ran straight to his home. He couldn’t care less about Ramesh Uncle as he decided that he would tell his mother that today gulabjamuns were only for him.

But when he reached the veranda he stopped. What he saw was pretty unusual. He saw his mother smile at him but there were also tears in her eyes. He then realised that everyone was looking at his mother seriously. Nobody was smiling the way they used to. He said “Mama. What’s the matter? Why are there tears in your eyes?”, but his mother didn’t reply. She just kept looking. Raman was silent. He didn’t know what to do. Everyone was so silent. Then finally Raman’s father spoke up “Aarti, you know we did whatever we could. Dr. Prakash and his team left no stones unturned. See even Lalaji went with the colony and market people to the temple to do an all night aarti. If something good had to happen, then it would have happened by now." But  Raman’s mother was still silent. It seemed as if she were a statue with a life-like smile and tears. “For Raman’s sake Aarti, say something please. I can't bear this silence from you. It make things more unbearable.” Raman’s mother suddenly moved. As if the name Raman was a key to her locked body. She breathed in deeply and whispered “I finally feel happy that Raman is liberated from all the worldly difficulties. I know that wherever he is, he must be in much more comfort than he was here. It seems that the worst is over for him. Heaven itself would open its gates for an angel like our Raman. But only one thing eats me from the inside. I had promised him to make as many gulabjamuns as he wanted when all this is over.” Raman was speechless. He couldn’t understand what his mother was saying. He was standing in front of his mother at arms length. His mother sighed “Look at the cruel fate of our son. His pain is over. Lalaji has come with the only missing ingredient.  Rameshji is also here to tease and have fun with our son. Today is Sunday and you are also at home. Even Sheru had somehow gone to Lalji's store in the market. But this wretched ...wretched thing....leukemia... couldn’t give us a few more moments to make our child smile. It couldn’t allow me to hold my son for one more day and try to keep life from going away from him. Hell, it couldn’t even simply exchange my life for his. Oh god! Why, why, WHY??????” Raman’s mother screamed at the top of her voice “Raman, come back to me, my child. Please come back to me. Mama will make you as many gulabjamuns as you want every day.” She collapsed into Alok’s arms sobbing. Alok, Ramesh uncle and Lalaji tried to console her while they themselves tried to stop their own tears. Raman was stunned on seeing all this. He then saw a man coming out in the whitest coat he had ever seen, with a tube on his shoulder. He put his hand on Alok’s shoulder and said something, trying to console him, which Raman couldn’t hear. All he could do was scream “Mama, I am here, Mama. Can’t you see me? I am right here. Please listen to me.” But his words fell to deaf ears. Everyone was in mourning.

 

Biswa Prakash Sarangi is a doctor currently undergoing Post Graduation in Surgery at Cuttack. He is a prolific writer of short stories and is also a sensitive poet.

 

---

 

THE DEVIL

Dr. (Major) B.C. Nayak

 

 

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

 

 

---

 

CHOICES

Shruthy S. Menon

 

Sometimes, when you think, you realise it's not you, but the society that decides your likes or dislikes.

Isn't it true, that even your own name was bestowed upon you, the very moment you were born to this world, to struggle for an identity of your own, to be unique and to be desensitized?

And then, you wake up, to be that person the society demands you to be. A masked face, with  hidden emotions, and fighting your own demons.

And if the society comments: ‘this the right choice’, and disapproves all your choices, the dilemma is: whether it's you that decides your life, or is it under the control of others, like a slave chained, paralysed and immobile.

As for a girl, if she has ever been given a choice, she will choose to be with her own ‘self’ than sacrifice, to spend the rest of her life, may be with regrets, with an unknown person. But that's how life is! You are supposed to be, what the society expects you to be!

Can a girl alone raise her voice and change the society and its people or can you initiate yourself for the betterment of the society, where it's you, and your choices, that need to be prioritized?

Try if you can, and not fail.

 

SRUTHY S. MENON is an Assistant Professor of English at Swamy Saswathikananda College, Poothotta. She resides in Kerala, India.She is the Co-Author of '16 Anthologies' of poems and quotes titled "100 Best Poems", "Wildflowers Rising", "Colours of Dream","1000 Women's Quotes" etc. She is passionate about Art and Literature. Her writing voices her deepest emotions and innermost dilemmas of life. She has published her poems and articles in 'Kerala Deccan Chronicle'. 

Readers can reach her in Instagram@alluring_poetess.

 

---

SON OF MAN, MERCY
Reena Naushad

Opened my eyes
Tightly shut for years
Years of waiting and tossing.
The cold drops pulled
My strings, here I am
My thick skin splits 
Heavy crown lifted, 
To reveal
The blue sky above.
Two wings surprised me
The mother held me tight,
She smelled earth
The warm bosom 
Spread my horizons 
My wings, my wings
I grew more of them.
Lovely day and days 
Night and nights
I held my Earth
Tight, hugged her right,
I grew tall, in hope
To bridge the sky 
and my mom.
I forked and split
Grew more and more
Saw more of me,
Growing strong. I heard
Songs of love
Under my boughs
I flowered with fragrance 
Bringing me the buzz. 
Lullabies made me sleep
Dance and giggle.
The sweet breeze touched me,
And the wind swayed me,
The rain washed me.
Holy....the place I live in
So beautiful, wet, cold,
 sunny and green 
My arms spread wide 
held bird and vervet 
Spider and squirrel 
Redtail and barbet 
Fiddle faddle up and down
Holy....I'm wet and green
Silhouetted onto the sky
Saw my shadows dance
Growing large everyday
I smelt the wet flowers 
Saw fruits ripen, heard 
The grumbling of dry leaves 
A feast at sunrise and
A fallback after sunset
My venture to sky 
Never stopped
Nothing bothered me,
I am happy, the
Lovely days, and nights
The sweet symphony and 
the everlasting 
Love  that entwined 
Me to Earth and sky.
Alas! I felt something 
Pinching me, tremors
Tears, cries, shrieks 
Rising protest
 from my nests,
Helpless fowles taking off
Looking back for their 
Featherless balls of flesh,
Panicking at the sudden shivers
What's happening?
Why I'm I being tied?
My mother's crying,
She held me tight
I heard her shout 
Oh no, not this time
My baby, too young 
To be sawed down,
I saw my father
With tears touching
Down on me, and 
my branches
And my mother
All the life in me
Flew, the buzz and chirp
Left me for nothing.
I shook and shivered
 was pulled and dragged 
The saw went right 
Through my heart,
I held to life, to the 
Last leaf I had...
No mercy, no mercy
I fell, then green wet and 
Golden, Now barren,
 mother still smelt Earth
Cried for her spilt breast milk
I fell still, no life and lives
In me anymore...
Ruthless End for life so green...

Reena C M, is an Assistant professor of English,  at KAHM Unity Women's  College, Manjeri, Malappurm,  Kerala. Writing poetry is a personal passion with her.

 

---

 

SOFT FOOTSTEPS

Mrutyunjay Sarangi

It was a pleasantly cool January morning in Cuttack. I woke up to an enchanting world of soft, smiling sunshine. Birds were twittering their happy songs with careless abandon and washed by the overnight dew, the flowers were radiant with a rare beauty. I felt like taking a long walk, down memory lane, right up to my old high school. After a leisurely breakfast I was getting ready to leave, when my brother called out,
“Where are you going? You arrived only last night, take some rest.”
“It is so beautiful outside. Let me take a walk up to our old neighborhood and to my high school and see how much they have changed in the past eight years.”
My brother was shocked.
“You want to walk all the way to the old school? It’s more than three miles from here! Why don’t you engage a rickshaw?”
My Bhabhi joined in a teasing banter,
“No, no, let him take a walk. In the U.S. he must be going by car everywhere. Here at least the soil of Cuttack town will be sanctified by the footprints of the American citizen!”
Coming out of my brother’s home in Ranihat, I smiled and muttered to myself,
“You are wrong Bhabhi. It is not Cuttack’s soil, but my own soul which will be sanctified by the sweet, loving touch of this beautiful town, the abode of my childhood, and the repository of a million fragments of priceless memories.”
Having roamed around the world and seen dozens of cities in the U.S., Europe and Asia, the place that still stirs the depth of my soul is this small town, teeming with a million people, bound by the rivers Mahanadi on one side and Kathjodi on the other. Every time I wake up to a foggy, winter morning anywhere, I remember my childhood days, shivering hands thrust in the pockets, walking half asleep to the tuition teacher’s house at the break of dawn. The street lights would be still on, creating a make-believe world of semi-light and semi-darkness.
On some afternoons in my office at the University of Texas, an eerie melancholy jabs me in the ribs, bringing the taste of sweet lassi from my favorite shop in Buxi Bazaar. Evenings on the Champs de Elysees in Paris remind me of the walk down the main street of Cuttack, captivated by the colourful lights in the shops, dazzling the expansive corners of a young boy’s mind.
Sitting on the banks of the river Volga with its dimly lighted promenade takes me back to the memory of river Mahanadi, and to the autumn mornings when we used to go to the Gadagadia Ghat to float small bamboo-stick boats, to commemorate the historic journey of a past generation of sailors to unknown islands of promised prosperity.
And the nights? Nights of Cuttack of the sixties were filled with the curiosity of a town welcoming new pastures of pleasure, the giant wheels, merry-go-rounds at the Barabati fair site, the restaurants, the movie halls and the circus. For children like us it was a voyage of discovery, holding the hands of the elders and walking down unknown territories with a new sense of awe and wonder. And the rare occasions when one could pass through the posh Cantonment Road under the canopy of the huge, gulmohar trees on a full moon night, drenched in the magical illusion of a hide-and-seek game of light and shadow! Ah, what divine, pristine beauty! One can never see it again, lost in the bright display of dazzling lights in our cities.    
At my home in College Station, Texas, the shadow that suddenly wakes me up with a start in the dead of night, is the memory of the famed ghosts of Gora Kabar, the Whitemen’s Cemetery in Cuttack. And the sound that appears from nowhere and leaves a painful echo in the mind, is the music of the small flute bought in the Baliyatra fair when I was in the second grade.
The winter afternoons in my childhood would be filled with the excitement of flying kites in the clear, blue sky. The kite competitions, the defeat of the unknown rival, the crazy, breathless running after the dismembered kites, and the joy of grabbing one ahead of the others, as if a booty of gold has fallen into the hand! What innocent, inexpensive pleasure! Where do our children get it now, with their video games, Nintendos and Internet? How many times in my life my eyes have scanned the sky of Paris, Shanghai and Berlin in vain, waiting for a mere glimpse of a kite!
Flashes of memory ran through my mind, filling me with a rare joy and pure bliss. In the past eight years I must have taken this walk in my mind a hundred times, trying to visualize every stone on the way, every tree and the unforgettable landmarks! This time I have come to my favorite town after a long gap of eight years. This trip to India is for a mere ten days, of which only two days are meant for Cuttack. When one comes on a trip to India from the U.S., everything has to be planned, every hour accounted for. Even a slight disruption or deviation would upset the whole schedule, leading to tension!
I could feel how Cuttack has changed in the past eight years. So many new shops, so many cars and so much crowd! Yet, in the jingling bells of the bicycles, the shout of the street hawkers, in the bargaining banter of the shopkeepers, there is a flavour of familiarity, a nostalgia. And with it, comes the assurance of the town, that no matter where you go, you still belong to me, as I belong to you. Cuttack is like a beloved who never ages, one whom ravages of time leave untouched; it is the ever-green beauty thatgrows lovelier with every passing year, radiating with the smiling brightness of the sunduring the day and drenched by the soft serenity of the moon in the night.
I just crossed Machhua bazaar. A few steps ahead will be the Patnaik Motors. At the next turn will be Manisahu Chhak, where we had spent so many summer nights watching street plays under the open sky. The minor excitement of fights for space, the dozing off during the plays and sudden waking up to find one’s sandals stolen! The numerous cups of tea, the struggle to keep awake in the night, the deep sleep in the day and then getting ready again for another night of street plays! Ah! How blissful were those adolescent days!
There, at the corner of the Manisahu Chhak, I see the famous street shop, whose owner used to claim that any time during the day if the shop is seen without a customer, he will give away all the snacks free for that day. The variety of snacks at his shop wasincredible! And what unbelievable, out-of-the-world taste! The sizzling baraa, aloochap, pakudi, goolgula, baigini, and piaji coming out of the huge cauldron on the fire! Where can one get such mouth-watering taste in the U.S.? Certainly not in the burgers and french-fries in McDonalds or Wimpy’s!
I see the Amareswar temple from a distance, its white dome proudly displaying the red and yellow flag of the God Shiva. Ah, the temple and its numerous festivals! The elaborate rituals, the loud music, the frenzied dance by devotees. And the sweetmeats in different shapes! What great excitement! Hey, here is the spot where I had once dropped a packet of sweets and had got a scolding from my dad at home.
And right there at the corner, one December evening I had to stand, holding the hand of the neighbour’s daughter, when her mother went inside to worship and got trapped in the crowd for half an hour. Considering that I was nine and she was around seven. the situation had some romantic possibilities, except that she was incredibly clever and calculating. She made me spend each and every penny I had in my pocket, on tid-bits for her. Just as I was getting ready to tell her what beautiful eyes she had, the mother came back and took her away!
I smiled at that sweet memory and started walking again, when suddenly a motorbike cut across the street and stopped before me. A middle-aged, bald, portly man got down, shouting smilingly at me,
“Hey Anupam, how are you?”
I was surprised. Who is this man? Is he a classmate? If so, it must be from the high-school in Cuttack, because my college education was at the Engineering College at Rourkela, two hundred miles away. What is the name of this gentleman? I kept racking my brain, but couldn’t place him.
He continued,
“Anupam, don’t you remember me? Of course, you have become a big shot now.Why will you have time for small fries like me?”
I felt embarrassed. I could have asked my friend his name, but he was so effusive and sounded so familiar, I didn’t have the heart to tell him that I have forgotten his name.With as much confidence as I could muster, I smiled at him.
“Of course, I remember you! Where are you these days?”
I thought it was safer to ask him some neutral questions, to hide my embarrassment of forgetting his name.
“Where else can I go? ‘Born in Cuttack, die in Cuttack’, that is my motto. You are the brilliant one, to have flown away to America! Our Sanskrit teacher in the school used to call you the jewel of the class! Remember Bikash, the joker of the class? Whenever we meet, he laughs and tells everyone, look at Anupam, went to America, now he must be the jewel in the crown of America!  Once a jewel, always a jewel!”
I tried to unfold the thick pages of memory to locate Bikash. A few faces flashed before me. But I was not sure if Bikash was one of them. I tried to continue the thread of our conversation.
“You are the lucky one. Whoever lives in Cuttack is lucky. It is the best place in the world”
“Where in America do you live, Anupam? In Cheecago?’
Only if I could remember his name, I could have told my friend that the city is pronounced as ‘Sicago’ and not ‘Cheecago’! I was still terribly troubled by my inability to recall his name.
“No no, I live in a small place called College Station.”
“College? You are still in college, after all these years? Are you still a student? Not doing a job yet?”
“I teach at the University of Texas.”
“Anupam! You are a teacher? You mean a mere master? What a fall for you? You were the topper of the class. All of us thought you will become an I.A.S, phai-A.S. But finally you have landed up as a mere master! And that too in America! What a fall! Arrey, compared to you I have done much better! After B.A. I joined my uncle’s business as a petty contractor. Today I am an A class contractor, with a fat bank balance!”
I wanted to correct my friend, to tell him that I am not a mere master, but an internationally renowned Professor of Industrial Engineering, I teach university students, guide the research of Ph.D. scholars and I have more than eighty research papers published in reputed journals. But he was so happy about being better off than me, that I didn’t have the heart to burst his bubble of joy.
“If you are living in a College are you in a hostel? Don’t you have a house of your own?”
“I have a second-hand three bed-room house.”
“Second-hand! Why second-hand? And that too only three bed-rooms? Look at me. I have eight bedrooms in my house, ground floor and first floor put together!”
“My house is ok. It has a beautiful lawn. My wife and I mow the lawn every week and keep it trim.”
The friend screamed at me,
“Mow the lawns! You mean you cut grass? Anupam, you have gone all the way to America to cut grass? What does your wife do? Is she doing a regular job or only cutting grass at home?”
I was taken aback by my friend’s unexpected aggressiveness.
“She works at the University as a Technical Assistant in a Laboratory” I bleated.
“But that looks like a small job! Look at my wife. She had joined as an accountant in a bank and now she is an officer drawing a six-figure salary. I have bought a car for her, a Maruti Esteem. After leaving the three children at school the driver drops her at the bank and picks all of them up in the evening.”
“You are really lucky to have a driver. In the U.S. we can’t afford a driver. So we drive our own cars, drop the kids at school, go to work and do groceries.”
“Groceries? You mean you don’t have a servant to buy vegetables and groceries for you?”
I almost fainted. Servants? In U.S.? What a crazy thought!
“No, in U.S. no one can afford a servant. We do everything on our own.”
“Anupam, Anupam, the topper of the class! What a fall for you! I have two servants at home, one for doing outdoor work and one exclusively to take care of my personal needs. If the fellow doesn’t give a massage to me in the night I can’t get sleep. And I have a full-time cook and a part-time gardener.”
My friend took a breather, wallowing in the self-satisfaction of his successful life.
He continued the attack, trying to rub it in.
“So, you must be sweeping the rooms and cleaning the utensils?”
Before I could reply, he added,
“And you wash your clothes also?”
I felt like telling him that we have a dish-washer, a vacuum-cleaner and a washing machine at home, but somehow I was a bit disoriented with his non-stop questioning. I just nodded my head.
“Who does the daily cooking, you or your wife?”
“We help each other in cooking, but there is no time to cook daily. We cook during the weekends, prepare packets of food and put them in the freezer. Every day we take out a few packets, heat the food and eat.”
My friends let out a piercing scream.
“What? What are you saying? Can any decent human being eat food like that? What kind of life are you leading Anupam? What a great fall for you – the topper of the class! No wonder you are looking so thin and emaciated. Like a starvedgoat! Look at me, I must have added fifty kilos to my weight in the past ten years. See my healthy body, my smooth face and my round tummy. Anupam, pleasecome to my house tomorrow evening. I will invite Bikash, Biju, Sushil, Ajay and Lokaa – all of them were in school with us. They will be happy to see you. We will have imported whisky and continental food from Akbari Hotel. I will show you what good food means.”
I was still desperately trying to remember his name and feeling disturbed about it. Cutting short his enthusiasm, I told him,
“Sorry, I can’t come tomorrow evening. I have to leave for Delhi to catch the night flight to U.S. I have been away from my family for ten days, they are waiting for me to return. But I promise, next time when we come, we will visit you and enjoy your hospitality.”
“Your family is not here with you? Why have you come alone?”
“It is too expensive for all four of us to come together. Anyway we are now planning a trip for the year after next. We will come…..
Before I could finish, my friend burst out,
“What! You don’t have enough money to buy flight tickets for the family! Anupam! What a great fall! What a miserable fall! I can’t believe this! Topper of the class! And you don’t have money to build a new house, to eat properly, to engage a servant, and even to pay for tickets to visit India! Anupam, it’s all a cruel game of fate. Otherwise how could you land in such a mess! Anyway, everyone to his fate! Let me leave, I am getting late for my site. Next time when you come don’t forget to give me a call.”
The friend shook hands with me and left. I could see a new spring in his gait, a buoyant spirit in his manners. The fact that he was a hugely successful contractor in Cuttack leading a life of luxury whereas the topper of his class is leading a miserable life in far-off U.S. as a mere master, gave him a tremendous boost.  I looked at him wistfully. If only I could remember his name, this unexpected meeting would not have been so disappointing for me.
The friend went near his bike, looked at his face in the mirror, combed his hair and turned his leg to sit on the motorcycle. Seeing the way he turned his right leg, I got a jolt. Somehow it looked familiar. And then it came as a bang! His name! My God, this is Shorty! Yes, yes, this is Shorty, no doubt about it. He is almost my height now, and is so portly, but during our school days he was the shortest and skinniest boy in our class. Because of his short height he had a peculiar way of turning his leg to get onto the bicycle. Even today, the style has remained with him! Troubled by the discomfort of the past half an hour, I suddenly felt as if I have won a lottery. In ecstatic joy, I shouted, “Shorty!”
Shorty had started the motorbike. He looked back, flashed a cute smile – it was the same smile of the school days – and waving at me, he rolled away.
I couldn’t control my excitement. So this was Shorty! He has changed so much! He was exceptionally short, almost a foot shorter than others in our class and very thin. He desperately wished to join our gang of the ‘adults’, but we used to shoo him away with taunts like “get lost, you mouse’ or ‘keep drinking Complan and apply next year’! In those heady days of our adolescence, endless hours were spent on talking about the girls in the school, and weaving colourful dreams around them. Often our mind was carried away by the wings of fantasy, reaching the sweet peaks of limitless bliss and melancholic desire. Hearts ached for love and pined for togetherness. Needless to say, those peaks of sweet ecstasy were terribly crowded and immature juveniles like Shorty had no place there.
But we often wondered if Shorty will ever grow up, and lead a normal life! Will Shorty get married? And if he gets married will this emaciated weakling be able to fulfill the conjugal obligations that the marital life demands? On a fading afternoon with the sun hiding behind a maze of clouds, a member of our gang raised a crucial issue. 
“Abey, how do you know Shorty will not bring dishonour to our class? If he gets married and fails in his conjugal duties, there will be mud on the face of the entire class!”
Someone spotted Shorty at a distance and shouted,
“Abey Shorty, will you get mud on our face?”
Shorty didn’t understand and ran away, afraid to face the collective taunt of the gang. Later one of the gang members took him aside and explained the cause of our concern. After that, every time we shouted at him, “Shorty, will you get mud on our face?” Shorty used to flash a broad smile and shake his head to assure us that he isperfectly capable of carrying out his conjugal obligations!
Thinking of Shorty’s assertions of those days, I was suddenly seized with a panic. Has Shorty let us down? Has he got mud on our face? Then I remembered him talking about his Maruti Esteem and the driver dropping his three kids at school. I was happy that Shorty has not brought dishonor to our class.
Buoyed by that reassurance, I resumed my walk. Many of the landmarks of my childhood had disappeared, the bakery shop with its effusive aroma of cakes and pastries, the bangle shop displaying an astounding range of colours, the shop with huge calendars and photo-binding facilities, were all gone. But the Prabhat Talkies appeared at a distance. This is where my dad used to take the whole family once in three months to watch movies. I felt as if it was only yesterday that we had all trooped in there to enjoy the patriotic film Jis Desh Mein Ganga Behti Hai.
With Shorty’s name, floodgates of the past opened up. The thick layer of dust was swept away from memory, and like rays of sunshine lighting up a dark room with the opening of a window, a thousand pictures flashed before my eyes in rapid succession. The faces of Bikash, Bijay, Sushil and many others appeared like pieces of glitteringdiamond. So did the lovely and enchanting faces of Dipti, Aparna, Sulekha, Latika and other girls who used to fill our days with the happy colours of Holi and the evenings with the dazzle of Diwali. Suddenly my mind flooded with memories of the past, its many fantasies and pangs of desire.
I was seized with an intense bout of nostalgia. In my life’s eventful journey, each year was like a storey of a building. From the top storeys the past looked like a golden dream, built on the infinite sweetness of a life gone by, leaving a whiff of soft memories. 
In a swift transformation, I ceased to be the Professor of Industrial Engineering at the University of Texas and became a sixteen-year-old adolescent walking to the school with dreams in my eyes and hope in my heart.
I knew, with the radiance of blessed memories, I would now enter the premises of my school. The air will fill up with the soft giggles of the vibrant girls of my school days, with their glowing cheeks and twinkling eyes. Like a man walking in sleep, I will reach the staircase near the eighth grade classroom and scratch the wall with trembling fingers, to reveal the three magic words of ‘I Love You’, written by a love-lorn Pramod for the doe-eyed Binodini.  Quietly prodded by an invisible force, I will slowly drift towards the playground. From the far corner, out of an old crack in the wall covered with mildew, a torn piece of paper will come floating. I will open it with shaking hands – the cute letter written by the shy Sushil for the ever-giggling Renuka, will smile at me innocently. Mesmerized, I will walk back and enter the tenth grade class room. With soft, gentle footsteps, I, Anupam, the sixteen-year-old dream-struck adolescent, will quietly go and sit at a corner of the first row. Madhavi didi, my petite, ever-smiling English teacher will be reciting the lyrics of ‘The Solitary Reaper’ in her lilting voice. I will sit there, eyes unblinking, lost in a haze of sweet solitude. In that sublime moment of my life, memory will stand still, the sub-conscious mind frozen as a tiny speck in the universe of time.
 

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. 

 

 

---

 

Literary Vibes - Edition L ( Courtesy: Dr. (Major) B.C. Nayak )