Literary Vibes - Edition LXXXVI
(Title : Unicorn-2 - Picture courtesy Latha Prem Sakhya)
Dear Readers,
We are back again, with the 86th edition of LiteraryVibes. Hope you will enjoy the beautiful poems and interesting stories. Please share the link http://www.positivevibes.today/article/newsview/343 with your friends and contacts reminding them that the previous 85 editions of LV are available at http://www.positivevibes.today/literaryvibes
In today's edition we are happy to welcome two new writers into the family of LiteraryVibes. Dr. Gita Mathew, presently in Bangalore, has spent most of her life in Rajasthan teaching English and spreading the love for literature. Her collection of personal reminiscences in ,"Bijoli's Patchwork Quilt' is extremely popular. Her Blog http://www.geetafromtheheart.wordspeak.com/ is followed by thousands of admirers. She has promised to share precious nuggets from her Blog with the readers of LiteraryVibes in future. We look forward to her continued contribution. Dr. Avaya Mohapatra, retired Professor of Geography in the North Eastern Hill University is a versatile writer on many subjects. His story in today's edition is an example of lucid writing with simple thoughts and entertaining vibes. Hope he will continue to write many more scintillating stories for us in future.
Ms. Sangeeta Gupta, a celebrated poet whose poems have appeared in LiteraryVibes in many of our editions, has published two Books of Poems - Song of Silence, and Ekam in Amazon Kindle. The first book is a woman's dialogue with herself as she puzzles out the meaning of love and betrayal, laughter and suffering in our banal lives. In Ekam she has captured the inaccessible Dal lake of Kashmir to portray its silent elegance and sublime tranquility. Let us congratulate her and wish her plenty of accolades for the two books.
It's with a heavy heart we convey our condolences to Ms. Padmavathi Setaluri, one of our regular contributors, who lost her husband on 9th September. We pray to God to rest his soul in peace and to give courage to the family members to bear this profound loss.
Friends, today I want to pose two important matters to you.
1. LiteraryVibes was launched on 1st Februray 2019 as a weekly eMagazine to provide a platform for established writers as well as upcoming ones, particularly the young beginners. With your support and participation it has been coming out every week without a break so far. Last week we published the 85th edition. The quality of the eMagazine has improved tremendously over the weeks.
I have often received a feedback that LV is overloaded and it is difficult to go through the thirty odd poems and short stories published week after week. A few readers, when contacted personally, have confessed that they manage to read only a handful of them and miss the rest. I of course receive very little by way of comments in the LV page. I presume readers can't manage the time to post feedbacks.
I therefore propose that after the 100th weekly edition which will come out around the end of December, I will convert LIteraryVibes into a monthly eMagazine. Starting with January 2021 LV will be published on the first Friday of the month.
However I will consider publishing longish poetry, novellas, travelogues as individual articles as a part of LiteraryVibes, if I get suitable submissions. Moreover if any poet or writer wants to publish an anthology with at least twenty poems or ten short stories I will publish them any time during the month and make a mention of it in the monthly eMagazine for publicity. It will be of course free of cost, but I will reserve the right not to publish any particular poem or story from the anthology if it is obnoxious in content, vulgar, scurrilous, seditious or political in nature in the sense of attacking or eulogising any political person, party or philosophy. In the last few months I have received a few such specimens and have steadfastly refused to give them a space in the weekly editions of LV.
Please give me your views on the above proposal. I can be reached at mrutyunjays@gmail.com
2. Last week I received some wonderful poems from two exceptionally talented kids forwarded by their mothers. I was tempted to publish them but found that we had some other articles which were unsuitable for kids' perusal. So I am proposing to publish a special Junior's edition of LiteraryVibes next week. If I get enough entries on a continuous basis I may repeat such special editions in future. Please ask the young poets and writers in your family or in the families of your friends and relatives to send their writings to LV. For the purpose of some specifics, let us keep the age limit as 16. If some of you are associated with schools in any capacity, please encourage the students under the age of sixteen to write for the special editions of LV. I hope we will get a sizeable response on this initiative with your assistance.
Meanwhile let us enjoy a beautiful, soul stirring poem, very appropriately called Shubah-e-Azadi (the Dawn of Freedom) by the famed poet Faiz Ahmed Faiz written in August 1947. The poem was forwarded to me by our perceptive, sensitive poet Prof. Geetha Nair. If my personal anecdote as the last article in today's LV resonates with a sense of loss of what we have missed as a nation, I am grateful to the immortal spirit of the poem quoted below:
Shubah-e-Azadi
(Dawn of Freedom)
Faiz Ahmed Faiz
Ye daagh daagh ujaalaa ye shab-gazida sahar
vo intizar thaa jis kaa ye vo sahar to nahin
ye vo sahar to nahin jis ki aarzu le kar
chale the yaar ki mil jaaegi kahin na kahin
falak ke dasht mein taaron ki akhiri manzil
kahin to hogaa shab-e-sust-mauj kaa saahil
kahin to jaa ke rukegaa safina-e-gham dil
...................,........
This dawn that's marked and wounded,
this dawn that night has nibbled on-
It's not the dawn we expected;
it's not the dawn we were looking for.
Hoping we would find it somewhere,
friends, comrades set out thinking
somewhere in the desert of the sky
the stars would halt
somewhere the night's slow waves
would find a shore
somewhere the ship of our heartaches
come to rest.
......................................
Friends, take care, stay safe, we will meet again next week.
With warm regards,
Mrutyunjay Sarangi
Table of Contents
01) Prabhanjan K. Mishra
MITHI
02) Harapasad Das
THE HIDEOUT (ANTARAALA)
03) Geetha Nair G.
HANUMAN PANDARUM
04) Dilip Mohapatra
THE LOSS
THE BUCK STOPS HERE
05) Krupa Sagar Sahoo
MIDNIGHT UPROAR
06) Lathaprem Sakhya
KANAKA' S MUSINGS 9) : LOVE
07) Madhumathi. H
HER NAME IS NEHARIKA!
08) Dr. Geeta Mathew
SOUNDS, COLOURS AND FRAGRANCES
09) Avaya C Mohapatra
THE CART-MAN AND THE TIGER
10) Sunil Biswal
SRIKRISHNA PLAYS FLUTE
11) Dr. Molly Joseph M
THE ROAD
12) Umasree Raghunath
LOVE
13) Sheena Rath
THE GIFT OF LOVE
14) N Meera Raghavendra Rao
A DAY FOR 'APOLOGIES'
15) Prasanna Kumar Dash
PICTURE THAT SPEAKS IN ITS SILENCE
16) Ashok Kumar Ray
TUSSLE WITH TUSKER
17) Abani Udgata
OLD BICYCLE
18) Pradeep Rath
LIFE
LOVE
19) Aboo jumaila
SLEEP
20) Anand Kumar
LIMERICK POEMS
21) Sibu Kumar Das
SIX HAIKUS
22) Mihir Kumar Mishra
AN ODE TO FEAR
23) Ravi Ranganathan
LESSONS FROM 24 ‘GURUS’!
24) Mrutyunjay Sarangi
THE BROKEN PUMPSET
Mithi, my name, a river.
Powai, my mother,
got me married to Arabian Sea.
A curse of sorts,
none takes walks by me.
Hutments overhang my edge,
I mirror them, burp into them,
they block your walk. You resent
their lame excuses of roofs on heads.
The little rooms, walled, roofed
with sheets of plastic, tin and gunny;
packed with people like sardines,
humans pickling in sweat’s brine.
Rooms like pregnant women pulled down
by fetuses in bulging wombs.
The rich don’t jog on my banks,
afraid to inhale my burps, breathe
my fetid breath, choking to death.
A lie of the land, a myth,
a long dead shibboleth, look at
Teresa, and Bill Gate; she lived long,
he lives on undressing the fake,
exposing the truth at the core.
He lives just the next door, ignored.
Highrises and hutments,
live cheek by jowl, a stone throw
from each other as the crow flies.
Death here is a cursory glance,
a pinched nostril against a rot,
a headache needing a saridon.
Black spill at the daybreak,
excreta precipitates by noon,
a rotting dog floats by at dusk.
A daughter of Bombay,
a river by birth, married to a sea,
converted into a gutter in prime.
Poor man’s river, rich man’s gutter,
both pollute me, none cleanses me,
that equate me, Mithi, with Ganga,
her holiness, spilling with filth,
rotting food, flowers, human remains,
rubbing raw salt into myth’s wounds.
Bless you my children, rich and poor,
I would drink your poison,
won’t ask for your PAN or ADHAAR.
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
Translated by Prabhanjan K. Mishra
Where do I hide you,
in my heart that bleeds,
in my teary eyes?
There seems to be
no place for your
larger-than-life image,
it makes you too obvious,
a mountain in daylight,
a knight in shining armour
on an empty stage,
its curtain raised
before a houseful of audience.
Where do I find you
a hiding place?
It would sound ridiculous
to camouflage you in words,
wrap you with artificial praise
after decades of bitterness?
Wouldn’t it be a give away
in our relationship
that has lost all flavour,
is drained of all feelings,
if I store you, a bitter pill
covered with my candy floss?
But where does
vanish our fear
when we touch each other?
Does the fear hide from us?
Do we hide from the fear
behind shut eyes?
Bring your hand,
place it here, and here,
pamper my body,
fulfill its innocent hungers;
put out the lamp,
let the dark illuminate us;
this hour is short-lived,
a line drawn on water’s face,
but its truth shines
as long as it lasts.
I hide you, dissolving you
in me, leaving no traces.
Like our hide and seek
novice days of childhood,
when we were faltering
into forbidden zones
keeping eyes shut,
pretending to be in hiding.
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)”
*The Hanuman Pandarum was a professional bogeyman who was a feature of life in the southern part of Kerala till the early sixties of the last century. Such bogeymen believed that their mission was divinely ordained and methodically acted upon their mission by paying regular visits to houses. Their masquerade, wearing frightening masks, beating gongs and so on, was meant to frighten little children into being better-behaved.
Ramu had been confined to his room for weeks. Chickenpox had laid him low just after his tenth birthday. The first few days he had suffered much. Now, he was better but terribly bored. Of course he was in quarantine. He could not leave his room or meet his family. He was not allowed to read; it was believed to be bad for the eyes when one had chickenpox. His only entertainment was the view from his upstairs window. Sometimes a car would pass by. Standards, Ambassadors and once, even a Vauxhall. He would count the bullock carts and the handcarts, listen to the strange cries of the vendors who traversed the road in front of his house. It was vacation time; just the wrong time to fall ill. A few days before schools reopened, Ramu was finally permitted to come out of quarantine. But there could be no playing for a while. One evening, after tea, when the others were at play, Ramu begged his mother," Let me take a walk; just a short walk. I am so bored, Amma. Please." He tugged at the pallav of her sari.
Reluctantly, Amma let him go. Ramu pushed open the gate and stepped out onto the quiet road. He decided to walk to the railway overbridge. A short walk took him there. He hung over the parapet looking at the rails; they seemed to him like two lines of gleaming policemen moving in line. A spreading badam tree grew almost under the bridge. Close to it were two huts. A train came snorting and huffing and Ramu clutched the shuddering parapet as it rattled past.
A man came out of one of the huts.
It was the Hanuman Pandarum, the professional bogeyman, who was a regular visitor to all houses in the vicinity that had children living in them. He beckoned to the boy. Ramu clambered down the mud wall underneath the bridge. He looked at the skinny old man dressed only in a lungi.
“Is this where you live?’ Ramu asked, looking at the little hut. “Yes, little boy,” the old man replied. “For a long time I used to be terrified of you. But I am a big boy now. I know you are a fake; you have no powers. You don’t carry away naughty children in your sack. You just scare little kids with your mask and gong and stick," said Ramu with a smile.
The Bogeyman smiled back. Most of us are fakes, little boy,” he remarked. “You will find out as you grow older." A ripe guava appeared in his skinny hand. "Here; eat it," he said, stroking the boy’s head.
Ramu bit into the fruit; it tasted heavenly.
Ramu jumped down to the railways track and started playing the novel game of hopping from sleeper to sleeper. “The next train is due soon,” the Pandarum warned him. He remained standing outside his hut, watching Ramu. It was during one such hop that Ramu heard the Pandarum shout a warning. He turned around to see the badam tree near the bridge falling slowly and majestically. It landed with a crash by the side of the railway track. Several of its strong branches spread over and adorned the two tracks. The Bogeyman was now beside Ramu and the tree. It was then that they heard the rattle of the train. It was rounding the bend. The Pandarum pushed Ramu away from the track; he climbed up to safety as the one-eyed monster came thundering into view.
The Hanuman Pandarum was standing on the railway track, near the fallen branches. Ramu saw that he was facing the approaching train, his arms held out straight in front of him. He seemed to be growing, growing, growing like Vamana in the Onam tale. His face was now a monstrous red and green mask. His breastplate scattered brilliant rays of light into the air. The train slowed a little. Ramu’s eyes widened in wonder then closed tight as the train came almost up to the Bogeyman. He turned away from the scene in terror. Then he heard the screeching of the brakes. Ramu trembled. He opened his eyes only when he felt a touch on his shoulder. The Bogeyman was standing next to him asking in concern, “Are you alright?” Ramu gaped at him, then whirled around. The train had stopped just before it reached the fallen tree on the track. People were beginning to spill out of the train. A few had come running from the roads on either side. There was shouting, gesticulating, marveling.
Ramu climbed quickly to the bridge. He looked down. The Bogeyman was standing in front of his shanty.
He waved to Ramu. Ramu waved back and made for home. He went straight to his room and lay down.
When he closed his eyes, the Hanuman Pandarum appeared in front of him.
He was standing in the front yard. He was truly a frightening sight. Hiding his face completely was an enormous, hideous monkey mask painted green and red with a movable lower jaw holding teeth that clinked and clanked as he ground them. Long talons waved on the fingers of one hand. In the other hand he brandished a metal rod. On his chest shone a broad, copper plate. Hanuman Pandarum. The news of his arrival filled every child in the household with fear. The children, half-hiding behind their mothers, aunts or grandmothers, would be brought to the verandah. They would look at the fearsome figure in the front yard with thudding hearts and weakened limbs. He would approach the group slowly and menacingly, chanting his rough rhyme.
"Are there
Children who do not brush their teeth
Children who suck their thumbs
Children who wet their beds
Children who bite their nails
Children who shirk their studies
Children who disobey their elders…
Are there any such here?
If there are,
I shall cut off their noses and arses,
Swallow them
And drink a pitcher of cool water to wash it all down!"
After each line he would stop, clank his teeth and gesticulate terrifyingly, then deafeningly beat the metal plate on his chest with the gong in his hand.
At the end of the performance, he would come close to each child asking whether he or she would reform. The answer was of course a tearful or trembling yes.
Then the children would be herded away.
They never got to see the last part of the drama.
The Hanuman Pandarum would disappear behind the big pink hibiscus shrub with pink that grew in the corner. A little later, an old, mild-looking man would emerge. Granduncle, stretched out on the wood-and-cloth easy chair on the verandah, would incline ten degrees forward and drop a few coins onto the Pandarum’s outstretched palm.
"Come again next month," Granduncle would intone.
The professional bogeyman would bow low, then walk towards the kitchen.
Ramu awoke when he heard his mother summoning him to the evening meal. At the table, the hot topic was the miraculous stopping of the train. “The driver said he saw the tree on the track and braked. But he doesn’t understand how the train stopped so fast,” Gopalan Uncle was holding forth; he had got the details from someone who had reached the bridge soon after the event. “A train cannot stop abruptly; it is a mechanical impossibility,” he declared, helping himself to more rice gruel. Gopalan Uncle was an engineering student and held in great regard even by Granduncle on account of this awesome status.
Ramu had a disturbed night. He woke quite late. He remembered how one morning, during his quarantine days, he had walked to the window, clanked the metal rings to push back the curtain and looked down into the front yard. An old man behind the pink hibiscus shrub had looked up, startled, at the same moment. He had taken out something from his satchel. Ramu saw it was a mask, the wooden hideous face of the Hanuman Pandarum that had once filled him with fear. But now, Ramu was ten and knew a thing or two. Or three.
He had sensed for quite some time of course that the ferocious bogeyman was just an ordinary man wearing a mask. But it had been a vague feeling. Now it crystallized. So, the fearful Pandarum who had terrorized him for years and years had been this skinny old man! The same old man they had sometimes seen seated on the kitchen verandah, tucking into idlis or dosas. And the hibiscus shrub was where he had hidden his paraphernalia. How grown-ups tricked children! In relief, Ramu had waved to the old man. The old man had waved back.
Now, Ramu went to the window and looked down at the spot. The Hanuman Pandarum was right there, near the shrub, all dressed for his act. Ramu bounded down the wooden stairs and reached the verandah. Granduncle was reclining as usual, after his breakfast. “Where’s the fire, Ramu?” he smiled, showing his tobacco-stained teeth. Ramu scanned the deserted front yard. “The Hanuman Pandarum; I saw him just now.” His words tapered off as Granduncle rebuked him with, “Dreaming, as usual.” Ramu walked as far as the gate and looked to left and right. There was no Hanuman Pandarum in sight. He went back into the house and asked for breakfast.
It was during Ramu’s training at the Police Academy, more than a dozen years later, that he got the news of the Hanuman Pandarum’s death. His mother, as part of local updates, wrote that the old man had been found unconscious in his hut a week ago, been taken to the nearby hospital but had died soon afterwards.
The Hanuman Pandarum had been with Ramu that very morning as he ran the cross country race, urging him on, giving him strength as he had done in numerous other challenging situations; the time the bullies had attacked him when he moved to the new school, the time the thief had snatched his friend’s bag, the time he had almost flunked the physical fitness test, the time he had spoken to Janaki’s father about his desire to marry her. Just before each of these, the Hanuman Pandarum had appeared before him with a smile and a wave. And stayed with him throughout the ordeal.
Ramu’s new quarters is a beautiful, old colonial bungalow set in a picturesque garden. He loves every bit of it. From his window, he can see various flowering shrubs. Among them is a hibiscus with pink flowers. It is Sunday morning. Ramu has just had a hearty breakfast. He looks out of the window. The Hanuman Pandarum is there, in front of the shrub. They wave to each other. Ramu calls out, “Janaki, I have to go now, my dear. Sorry; no picnic today.” When the phone rings, he is already in full gear. “I will be there in ten minutes,” he barks. On his way out, he picks up his cap. Janaki closes the door, with a trace of a pout on her pretty face.
The Hanuman Pandarum is waiting outside.
Yet another mission. Together.
Geetha Nair G. is an award-winning author of two collections of poetry: Shored Fragments and Drawing Flame. Her work has been reviewed favourably in The Journal of the Poetry Society (India) and other notable literary periodicals. Her most recent publication is a collection of short stories titled Wine, Woman and Wrong. All the thirty three stories in this collection were written for,and first appeared in Literary Vibes.
Geetha Nair G. is a former Associate Professor of English, All Saints’ College, Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala.
Losing someone
is never easy
more difficult
when that someone
is still alive and kicking
and yet no longer lives
even in your memory
except for playing
hide and seek once a while
tormenting you
with sadistic delight.
You try hard to pick up
the broken
and brittle pieces of
porcelain promises
and clay commitments
and put them together to get
the picture
to reconstruct
the demolished dreams
but the pieces don’t hold
they just liquify
and run through your fingers
and get sucked
into the black hole
of impermanence
and falsehood
that is pretentiously
unpretentious.
And you stand on the brink
wondering
whose loss is it anyway..
yours
or the other’s ?
The COVID 19 pandemic around the world has surely impacted our life style. As they call the 'New Normal' , the new way of living, discarded many old practices and made inroads for new or modified ones. One surely misses the morning newspaper while having a cup of tea, and savouring a Marie biscuit. But now one looks for the links to the digital versions of various newspapers in stead. Many service providers like banks extend their customer care services by sending these links to your email inbox.
The cyclonic storm from the Arabian Sea was about to make its landfall in the west coast. Along with it, it brought to our city unusual spells of showers and gusty winds for couple of days. As the cool breeze brought us relief from the smouldering heat of the summer, a hot cup of tea was in order. I was sitting in my balcony sipping tea and clicking the trees in the garden swaying precariously amidst torrential rains. Then as is the new habit that I had acquired lately, I clicked on the links to the e-versions of various national newspapers. As I browsed through the news, one item that caught my attention was about a wild elephant that was fed with a pineapple filled with crackers by some miscreant. The elephant was carrying its unborn baby and both mother and baby succumbed to the man's cruelty. I sat up on the edge of my chair and was wondering to what abysmal depths the mankind could descend to. I don't know why this incident shook me up so much as against the millions of human deaths around the world due to Corona virus.
During the next few days the newspapers, the electronic media and the social media were throbbing with the news in its multiple dimensions. Statements were issued by various functionaries which in stead of throwing better light on the incident, made it more murkier. One media group which supported a particular political party gave it a communal colour. They even changed the place of occurrence to an area predominated by a particular minority community. There were news about arrests made, where the culprits were shown as from that community. Later another media group claimed these news to be fake. The wild life control bureau under the Central forest department ordered an immediate probe into the incident, while the state police launched their independent investigation. The state forest surgeon conducted a post mortem and declared that the elephant had suffered some other near fatal injuries well before the date of the incident. He was not too sure if the actual cause of death were the explosives concealed in the pineapple or it actually lost its last breath due to drowning in the waterbody where it was found. Some known celebrities from the film industry came up with sympathetic statements and expressed their anguish and agony, condemning this dastardly act. Immediately the troll army launched a counter attack on them by calling them hypocrites and termed their statements as publicity stunt.
Meanwhile some political party took out a protest march demanding assurance from the government for total protection of all the wild life and to announce a compensation for the welfare and better upkeep of the temple elephants. Another group protested against these protesters since they only talked of temples and demanded that similar compensation should also be granted to all religious institutions, whether they had in their service any elephants or not. No discrimination for any religion could be tolerated. Both the groups clashed and police had to intervene. In the pandemonium four people were lynched to death and few landed in hospitals with severe injuries.
A vegan group promoting vegetarianism took this opportunity to highlight cruelty to animals in our day to day life because of our food habits. They organised debates and discussions in social media on compassion towards animals and urged the society to shun non vegetarian foods. In a counter move the staunch meat eaters argued that humans have also been granted few incisors like the carnivores. They also pointed out that the vegans have no moral ground to preach, since the plants have life too. They wanted to know who had given them the rights to eat their fruits, flowers, leaves and roots? In a TV debate on the issue, the helpless anchor urged the scientific community to do some research and come up with some food which would neither be from animals nor from the plants. All agreed that till some such solution is found status quo would be maintained.
The tragic incident soon qualified to be debated in the famous TV show, 'The Country Wants to Know'. The topic was hash tagged , ' Is public sympathy justified?' The usual debaters were lined up, in addition to a forest department bigwig. Whatever one could hear amidst the uncontrolled cacophony was mostly the voice of the anchor. After much fatuous deliberations, based on the argument given by the expert, it was concluded that the elephant was perhaps the unsuspecting victim of the age old man-animal conflict. Stuffing of explosives in food material was a good old practice to maim or kill the wild animals , especially those who raid crops grown by man. In this case the elephant might have accidentally chewed on the explosive meant to snare the wild boars. After this debate the issue was raised in an emergency session of the parliament. The opposition put the blame squarely on the government for its apathy towards animals. The spokesperson of the government highlighted the stringent steps taken during recent years to ban beef in the country. The opposition questioned about the government's discriminatory policy which prohibited killing of the cows but permitted killing of the buffaloes. It was condemned as the worst ever racism and apartheid that the government encouraged, like all its policies which were flawed, discriminatory and anti-secular. The elephant was forgotten and the arguments went spiral. Amidst shouting, desk thumping and sloganeering the session was adjourned for the day.
All this while the dead body of the elephant continued to lie half submerged in the river. Vultures continued to circle over the carcass. The post mortem was conducted on the spot and the body was left behind. No one bothered to remove the body from the river and give it a decent burial. The villagers from the nearby village didn't want to touch it since it was a police case and they feared that they might be arrested. Then one cub reporter Bharat from The Daily Mail wrote a representation and sent it to the nearby municipal authority, with a request to arrange for its interment. The municipal authorities wrote back to the reporter that the place of the incident was beyond their municipal limits and hence not within their jurisdiction. They had forwarded the representation to the state forest department and they should initiate some action soon. Meanwhile some UNDP and WWF representatives visited the spot, clicked some photographs and interviewed some villagers and forest officials.
When the reporter saw no action from the forest department, he contacted their PRO. The PRO informed that their department is concerned with wild life protection only. That means as long as the wild life is alive, they come under their purview. Once they are dead, they become an environment issue. In this case the body now belongs to the Department of Environmental Protection.
'We have sent your representation to them with our noting. I suggest you pursue the matter with them. Here is their address and contact number,' said the PRO and handed him over a slip of paper.
Bharat was determined to take it to its legitimate end and called the number given.
The PA to the Secretary informed him that the matter was included in the agenda for the day's meeting and soon a decision would be taken.
Later in the day he learnt that, the secretary felt that a political party of a northern state uses the picture of the elephant as their election symbol. The matter should be referred to them. They have benefited a lot from this animal and they have the moral obligation to take care of its last rites. The case had been sent to the party chief through courier and it should soon be taken care of.
Chhaya Devi the firebrand leader of the said party received the file and called a meeting of her lieutenants. They decided that this incident deserves national attention. It was already discussed in the parliament. It should be dealt with the home ministry at the centre. The file with her endorsement was then dispatched to the home ministry. The Home Secretary studied the file in details. He also knew that the case was now known to WWF and UNDP. He thought for few minutes and wrote on the file, ' Forwarded to the Ministry of External Affairs for necessary action, since the issue has gone to the UN and international press.'
The Secretary of the MEA, understood the gravity of the situation. He realised that the case surely deserves the PMO's intervention and referred it to them.
The Principal Secretary of PMO called for a video conference of the Home Secretary, the Finance Secretary and the Defence Secretary and the matter was discussed. After examining all pros and cons, the Defence Secretary's suggestion to entrust the job to the Army was unanimously accepted.
A small unit from the local Army garrison was mobilised to the spot. The team dug a pit. The body was garlanded. And the bugler sounded the last post.
Note: A fictionalised version inspired by a true incident.
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
Translated from Odia by Priya Bharati
The telegram carried the message, “Grandmother expired. Come immediately.” Sadananda boarded the Utkal Express at twelve thirty and proceeded to his village.
After arranging his luggage under the seat and sitting at ease, he could not help but giggle. From the time he had received the telegram, he had tried to suppress his smile. A passenger sitting opposite his seat looked up puzzled from the magazine he was reading. This made him straighten his face. For courtesy sake, he asked a few questions to his co-passenger like “Where will you go?" "Where are you from?" And tried to make a serious face but the crease of his smile was still peeping from the edge of his lips.
After receiving the telegram, pulling a long face, Sadananda had cautiously entered his boss’s chamber with a leave application along with the telegram. His always grave looking boss looked at them when he had a respite from intermittent phone calls and said, “Oh! I am sorry. You can go.” He came out of his office as quietly he had entered and congratulated himself for the faultless act of an innocent, grieving grandson.
Sadanand’s grandmother had died when he was a baby. He could not remember her face now how much ever he tried. He had taken a long leave a month ago and had gone to his village. This telegram was the brainchild of his, his newly married wife, and his sister, lest he may be denied leave.
The leave of a month that he had taken previously was for his own marriage. Fifteen days were spent in inviting friends and relatives, buying new clothes, arranging cars, bus and band party for marriage. After the marriage was over, some more time was spent on overseeing guests and relatives leaving, returning back the things brought on rent. He finally could spend barely a week's time all for himself intimately with his bride. Being a new employee to this job, he could not extend the leave period and went back to his place of work.
Oh! those seven memorable days. It seemed as if spring had come back out of turn. His village seemed like Vrindavan, the abode of Lord Krishna. It was as if honey dripped from the blossoms of mango buds. The crows on the drumstick tree had the sweetness of cuckoo birds. The hens and cock roaming near the fence seemed like dancing peacocks. Every moment spent was electrifying and romantic.
He felt like the loneliness of a desert after returning to his place of work. He could not concentrate on anything he did. The memory of those romantic nights made him restless. To find respite from this pain, he wrote letters to his wife. These were not exactly letters but long love poems. The memory and longing for his new bride made him feel low and disoriented at times. Her invisible hands seemed to invite him with outstretched arms like the rays of the moon and sometimes they seemed to embrace him like the grip of a python.
Just the thought that he would be released from this pain made his mood soar. The happiness of homecoming made him forget the distance that he was traversing by train, bus and hand-pulled rickshaw. The din and noise of his co-passengers could not penetrate his ears. He could not even distinguish the weather outside and types of birds sitting on the trees at the roadside.
The moment he stepped into his home, to his utter surprise, he saw it filled with relatives from far and near. As far as he could remember, these many had not gathered when his grandmother had actually passed away. The whole house bustled with activity and noise of men talking loudly, women gossiping, children laughing and crying, helpers running around with their errands. These families had occupied every room of his house including his bedroom.
The crowd had gathered here to take part in the Ram Navami festival. This occasion is celebrated for three days with pomp and show in his village. All friends and foes come together on such occasions. Sadananda realized the reason for such crowd in his house and his wrong timing of coming home to be with his new wife.
He had not found sufficient time to decide what gift he would bring for his wife but finally zeroed down on the famous Kosa silk saree of that city. Coming from Bilaspur to his village in Odisha, the train crossed three states. He had spent eighteen hours traveling time to reach here but on reaching did not get the scope to meet his wife privately to give her this first gift.
Sadananda felt irritated. The large family crowd stationed at his home seemed like a soldier clan. His mother and his wife were too busy serving them. His mother had come to him for a moment to tell him to freshen up and take his food. But besides seeing a little bit of her saree or hair or hearing the bangles and leg anklets chiming, he could not see his wife from close.
In the afternoon, he entered his younger sister Nirupama’s study room. His elder sister Anupama was taking rest with her two kids and his younger sister was sitting on a chair, reading a novel.
Seeing him, Anupama asked with a knowing smile, “Have you been able to meet your wife?”
Sadanada gave a sad smile and came out of that room. His younger sister teasingly asked, “Can I be of any help?”
He called her to the veranda with a nod and asked, “Can I have the privilege of seeing my wife today?”
His sister mischievously asked, “What work do you have with her in the daytime?”
“I doubt whether I will be able to meet her at night. Our bedroom has become a railway station waiting room.”
Suppressing her smile she said, “Maybe you are destined for this, for coming home at the wrong time!"
‘Ok’, he said releasing a deep breath and was about to leave the place.
Nirupama called him from behind and said, “Every problem has an answer, just like the false telegram sent to you. But for this, I need some special incentive.”
“You will definitely get your reward for this endeavour. I have brought a Kosa silk saree for you.”
“No, I do not want a saree.”
“Why if you do not want to wear it now, you can wear it in your marriage.”
“I have nothing to do with marriage.”
“Why after me it is your turn to get married.”
‘No, I want to do a job. I need a fine watch. I have my final exam this year also.”
“OK, I will get it for you in my next visit.”
“Sure?”
“God promise.”
In the evening, all guests became ready to go to the village fair. Sadananda had to go with them as their guide. He proposed that his wife could also come to see the fair. That was immediately turned down by his mother. ‘What will the women of the village say seeing the newly married bride wandering like this? When the chariot carrying the deity will visit each house, she will automatically have the opportunity to see it." Whatever little hope Sadananda had of meeting his wife was gone.
Nirupama, his younger sister was tempted to go to the fair but somehow restrained herself as she had to make her plans ready so that her brother and sister in law would be able to meet somewhere. She whispered her plan of action to her sister in law. Both smiled and waited for the opportune moment.
To the west of the village, on top of a hillock was a monastery(matha). It was surrounded by tall trees. In its courtyard were flower plants to cater to the need of the monastery. The main deity worshipped here was Lord Ram. Every year Ram Navami was celebrated with great pomp and show. The statues of Lord Ram with Laxman, Sita and Hanuman are taken out and kept in the outside veranda for villagers coming from far and near to pay their obeisance and prayers.
Just in front of the monastery was an even rock platform where the shopkeepers coming from far and near set up shops to sell their wares. Whole night Bondi dance and game of cards were played.
On the last day of the fair, the Lord's chariot is taken throughout the village accompanied by the priest and villagers singing, dancing and playing bells, conch etc. shouting, “Ramchandra Bhagaban ki jay, Sita Maiya ki jay, Pawan Putra Hanuman ki jay.”
The guests returned from the fair and sitting in the inner courtyard were discussing the fair. This year the circus party too had come to their village to be part of the fair. This news was revealed by Nirupama.
Children were busy showing to one another what they had purchased and told about what they had eaten at the fair.
The elderlies were discussing the state of agriculture, wage hike of daily wage workers, scarcity of labourers in village, politics etc.
The young ones who had their fill were busy playing with their nicknacks creating a din and uproar.
Sadananda felt as if the fare had shifted from the matha to his courtyard.
Nirupama taking advantage of this din called his brother near the guava tree and explained to him her plan.
The children after having their dinner went off to sleep. It was already late by the time cooking was complete. The male members were served food first. After that, the ladies were called to have their fill. They were in no mood to leave their gossip and evening snacks had not yet made them feel hungry. The lengthened gossip session made both Sadanada and Nirupama exchange uneasy glances.
Tonight it may be past midnight by the time the household chores would be over. Nirupama sighed to herself softly, “My poor dear brother.”
Two of their relatives had parked themselves in his bedroom and had decided to have a look at the things given to the new bride by her father.
Sadananda was alloted space to sleep in the study room. He was pacing there like an angry bull.
Nirupama was sending chits to her brother and his wife. The updated news was, “ I have put the ladder”.
Both his brother and his wife came out cautiously and climbed the ladder to go to the roof. The last instruction for Nirupama was, “ Be on guard.”
“Your time starts now.” "You have only one hour's time". She waved at them suppressing her smile. There was a huge guava tree in the backyard adjoining the house. It bore fruits round the year. Sadananda used to play with his friends on its branches. During Raja festival, rope swings would be tied to its branches for girls to play.
Nirupama stood leaning on this guava tree in the dark. There was silence all around. The crescent-shaped moon looked like a kite through the cumulonimbus clouds.
Sarojini, Sadananda's wife stood up on the terrace. The pallu of her saree was blowing like a flag.
Sadananda told her, “Don’t stand, someone might see you.”
“Who will be awake at this time to see me?” She asked.
"Sometimes people play cards on the adjoining terrace."
Both of them sat down touching each other.
“Where were you hiding during the day?” he asked
“Did you not see me slogging like a servant whole day?”
“Did you not find time to come near me?”
“With so many eyes were hovering? Why did you choose this time of the year to come home?"
“Staying away from you was so difficult that I forgot the time was inappropriate.”
“OK. Now tell me what have you got for me?”
“You did not have time to come and see. I have brought the famous Kosa saree from Bilaspur.”
“I have got so many new sarees for marriage. You should have brought something different.”
“OK. Next time I will bring something special for you. You will look like a beauty queen.”
Sadananda kissed her lightly on her cheek. She replied in a reproachful tone, “Do I have to stay in the village away from you?”
“Oh! You want to come with me to Bilaspur? Let me talk to my mother at the appropriate time. Last time she had refused as she wanted the new bride to stay here with her for some time.” He kissed her again. This was sufficient to make her passionate.
As the night progressed, the moon hid behind the clouds and darkness descended. The screeching of night birds added to the setting. The stars were clearly looking down witnessing the night scene of the passionate couple.
Suddenly the power supply got cut off. The night looked darker. The fans stopped moving. Anupama’s children cried out loudly. That was sufficient to wake everyone.
Just then their uncle said, “Let’s go to the terrace. The mosquitoes will not let us sleep here." "Yes" said another voice. "Let's take a mat, pillow, and bedsheet and go to the terrace.”
Nirupama, hearing this, did not know what to do. “Probably brother and sister in law are fast asleep by now. What would happen to them if my uncles go to the terrace? My brother and his wife will not be able to face anyone out of shame."
Nirupama climbed the guava tree. Two bats fluttered their wings and flew away. She plucked two guavas and threw them onto the terrace. There was no response.
Gradually the family members came out and gathered around the guava tree.
One of them asked, “Where is the ladder to the terrace? I had seen it here in the evening". One of them went to bring another ladder. Nirupama started shaking the branches. This would frighten the family members standing below and also wake up his brother.
But his uncle was not a person to back down. He said, “Bring the torch. Either there are bats or monkeys on the tree".
Nirupama had no other way. She decided to climb the tree and go to the terrace. But while doing this she came face to face with a monkey. The monkey after its day's activity was fast asleep. It had no energy to see what was going on in the terrace. They came face to face and she could see from close angle his two eyes sparkling.
Nirupama jumped down and shrieking "ghos----, ghost," fell down unconscious.
The dogs started barking loudly. Children started shrieking loudly.
This hue and cry was sufficient to wake up the whole village and they gathered outside with the choukidar blowing his whistle.
By then Nirupama had got back her senses.
The villagers started their uncalled for advice.
“Probably the ghost has entered her.”
“It must be a witch.”
Lets call the gunia (sorcerer).
There was unanimous consent for calling the village sorcerer.
Meanwhile Sadananda and his wife had woken up hearing the commotion and hustle and bustle, arranged their clothes and came down stealthily and mingled with the crowd.
Sadananda was heard shouting to the crowd to disperse, ordered the lantern to be lighted and told them to bring Niru inside.
Sarojini started fanning her. Nirupama opened her eyes and looked at her brother and his wife then closed her eyes and shook herself as if her body was having rigor. This time it was not out of fear but to give a dramatic climax to her acting.
Nirupama’s mother started wailing loudly. The other women were consoling her. The menfolk were pacing briskly waiting for the gunia (sorcerer) to come.
Buchhua Gunia was the cowherd, looking after the cows of the villagers. One day he declared that the village God had entered his body. From then on he started giving various roots and herbs to cure villagers, gave amulets to villagers to ward off evil, to ward off Goddess who may have entered any villager's body. Whether there was theft of paddy from any villager's house or a calf had gone astray or there was a snake bite, he was called.
Sadananda knew the Gunia and his tactics very well. He called him to one side, gave him a fifty rupee note and said, ”Uncle, she is just frightened, do not beat her.”
Bichhua understood the situation and was happy to get money to cater to his narcotic requirement for one week. But he had to perform his act of warding off evil in front of the family members. He ordered a few things to be brought, closed the door and started beating his broom here and there. Shouted, “Go ghost, witch, whoever has entered her, leave her and go away.” Saying this he threw water at her face.
It was almost dark inside the house. Gunia in his act of warding off the evil had kicked her two thee times. Nirupama shouted, ”Maa lo mali, maa lo mali”, (O mother, I am going to die!) and rolled on the ground. By then the electric current had resumed. Nirupama stopped shaking. Gunia while leaving announced, “She had gone near the guava tree to urinate, the Goddess had entered her then. Now she is OK".
The family members were relieved. They offered him rice, vegetables, and twenty rupees.
It was morning by then. The village crowd had still not dispersed. The villagers were still thinking of the previous night's episode and drawing different conclusions. The village lass taking bath in the pond proclaimed loudly that Nirupama had not gone out near the guava tree to urinate but to meet her lover on the terrace.
And who was her lover?
It was Bidyadhar the boy who was coming to give her tuition, said someone.
This gossip was propagated by some who was jealous of Sadananda's family.
Two boys sleeping on the adjoining terrace gave flight to their imagination and retorted that they had seen two shadows in the adjoining terrace and had heard someone jump. This had led to the dogs barking together for some time.
Some villagers wanted to find out more of this rumour. They reached Bidyadhar’s house. His mother said, he was away to Bhubaneswar to appear in some interview.
Within no time the rumour reached Niru’s mother. She fumed and cursed all those maligning her daughter’s character. She had sympathizers around her who too cursed them saying that Niru was above all this.
Nirupama was by nature a tomboy. She played with boys and did not hesitate to thrash them if necessary. It was difficult to believe that anybody could fall in love with her. But nothing was impossible, especially for grown-up girls of her age.
There was heaven and hell difference between the status of Nirupama and Bidyadhar’s family. Nirupama was the daughter of a zamindar while he was the son of a widow working as a maid servant. Though he was a good student, he had not got any job yet. After completing Bachelor’s degree in Science, he was giving tuitions to earn his living. Being the class mate of Sadananda and on his request he used to sometimes come to coach Nirupama in Maths. He was known as a good and quiet boy with high integrity. Nobody in their family could have even thought in their wildest dream that there was any other relationship between them other than a tutor and taught.
Sadananda and his wife were now thinking how to get their sister Nirupama out of this soup.
Sadananda proposed to reveal the true fact about him meeting his wife on the terrace with the help of his sister. Sarojini was feeling guilty. Nirupama assured her by telling that just like wild fire spreading, this rumour about her too will die after some time.
Sarojini stroked her hair. Nirupama unable to sleep the previous night slept like a child on her lap.
It was the final day of the festival/mela. The villagers were ready for confrontation. One side was for Bidyadhar while the other side stood for Nirupama. There seemed to be a cold war between the two parties. The procession of the lord had two groups playing drums and other accompanists. Each group tried to out beat the other. Gradually the confrontation led to a physical assault between two villagers. People had gathered outside to see the Lord's procession. Meanwhile, Sarojini and Niru were chitchatting away from the crowd.
Sarojini asked, “Niru, did you have any soft corner for Bidyadhar? Why is it that there is such a strong rumour going around?"
Nirupama answered back emotionally, ‘Even you are doubting my integrity!"
Nirupama and Bidyadhar had a tutor and taught relationship. Bidyadhar was her brother’s friend. On his request, he used to come sometimes to coach her in maths. He did not take any fee for that. Sometimes he used to eat the food served to him. He never used to look at her straight in her eyes. His gaze was always concentrated towards the maths book and the notebook. Most of the time he was busy solving problems. Nirupama had never found his behaviour anything other than a teacher.
She controlled her emotions and replied, “ No I have no feeling for him other than a taught while he considers me as his younger sister."
After this incident, ten days elapsed. Relatives who had come to see the Ramnavami festival had returned. The villagers seemed to have been pacified to a large extent. Nirupama’s family tried to forget the incident of that night as a bad dream.
Villagers had gathered near the river bank to participate in the final ceremony of the festival. Just then a boat anchored there. Bidyadhar got down from it. He had qualified in the Railway recruitment board exam and looked happy. He was wearing neat clothes and was looking like a son in law.
The moment he got down, some youths caught him.
“You are the root cause of all this rumour. You have maligned Nirupama’s character.”
Bidyadhar was completely dumbfounded hearing this allegation. He stared at them and said, “I was not there in the village. I had gone away to appear in an interview."
Nobody paid any heed to his pleas. They shaved his head and carried him through the village in a procession.
“Your case will be judged in the village council. “
A child came running and shouted, “Wake up Niru Didi. The villagers have shaved the head of Bidyadhar Bhai and bringing him in a procession".
Everyone ran out to see the sight.
Nirupama was aghast seeing the condition of Bidyadhar. She felt it was her fault for which Bidyadhar had to face this in the hands of the villagers.
She ran into the house. Her brother and sister in law ran after her lest she may do something in hot haste.
Nirupama came out and shouted at the crowd, “Leave him alone.” She was holding a garland in her hand and put it around Bidyadhar’s neck and touched his feet. Bidyadhar and villagers were too shocked to see all this. Bidyadhar exclaimed, ”What are you doing Niru?
Her brother shook her and said, “What did you do, you fool?”
The images have been taken from Google and the copyright is with the owner.
Krupasagar Sahoo is a leading name in contemporary Odia literature. With twelve collection of stories and six novels to his credit he has created a niche for himself in the world of Odia fiction. Many of his works have been translated in to English and other major Indian languages. Drawing upon his experience as a senior Railway officer, he has penned several memorable railway stories. He is recipient of several literary awards including Odisha Sahitya Academy award for his novel SESHA SARAT.
Love was a subject that always tormented Kanaka. What is love as far as a woman is concerned? Is it merely a physical desire or is it more than that? She was always in love and out of love too. She was in love with everything she came into contact with, be it human or animal. Often she was hurt and misunderstood but yet she learned to survive and come to terms with unconditional love - to give only and not worry about reciprocation. It was agony for her yet she survived. She learned to pretend not to love so no one would see her hurt Often she would crawl deep into her den to lick the wound of rejection, humiliation, physical mangling all in the name of love. Then lo! She emerged, wearing a beaming smile, hiding the scars of suffering as if nothing had happened. Isn't this the lot of all women? She wondered. But like the phoenix they always rise from the ashes to survive as if nothing happened, as if nothing mattered. What is important is the act of being or rather survival.
Does anyone listen to her tortured howls which come from her innermost being? No definitely no. She is like mother nature. Who listens to the agonized screams of Mother Earth as she is killed inch by inch? No one. She is taken for granted...so is a woman.
What Am I Now?
What am I now? A haven once!
Now a shriveling wasteland
The oceans once a blue girdle
Swelling unfathomably
Swallows me, python like.
The azure sky, a diadem
Adorning my head
Now deprives me
Of life giving air.
My children the humans
Destroy my forests, trees, rivers,
Hills and vales rebelliously.
The living land - to cement jungle
And garbage pits reduced.
I don't know what I am now!
I am sick with cyclones,
Tremors, fire storms, and pandemics.
Yet the thirst for survival besets me.
Senile, losing control of body and spirit
I wonder! Do my children
My earthlings see my struggle
Will they revive me to survive
Harmoniously with them.
Prof. Latha Prem Sakhya, a poet, painter and a retired Professor of English, has published three books of poetry. MEMORY RAIN (2008), NATURE AT MY DOOR STEP (2011) - an experimental blend, of poems, reflections and paintings ,VERNAL STROKE (2015 ) a collection of? all her poems.
Her poems were published in journals like IJPCL, Quest, and in e magazines like Indian Rumination, Spark, Muse India, Enchanting Verses international, Spill words etc. She has been anthologized in Roots and Wings (2011), Ripples of Peace ( 2018), Complexion Based Discrimination ( 2018), Tranquil Muse (2018) and The Current (2019). She is member of various poetic groups like Poetry Chain, India poetry Circle and Aksharasthree - The Literary woman, World Peace and Harmony
Stirring up a cup of coffee
So pensive, so castaway
Her hand added an extra spoon of sugar
stirring on and on...
The steam left the cup
But the aroma restlessly remained
The dissolved taste of memories
Spilled from her thoughts
Arousing a sudden urge to break the fasting
But hunger never bothers a brimming mind
Filled with the recipes of myriad thoughts
Sadly, appetite too is never alive
When barrenness is in abundance
Numbing all the taste buds and
Blanching the experience of dining
''Help yourself'' said the apparition
The dishes were cold and dehydrated
shook the dwarves, salt and pepper sprinkled dignity
She is Neharika by the way
Strolling around the cafeteria, spiked by his sonnets...
In the dense silence of the magnificent library
He wrote his verses that her eyes read aloud
There began the stirring up, of jaggery-dipped emotions
While the books were left behind
she hurriedly packed his breath and shadow
And still paying the fine, deliberately not returning
At least, the book racks will be missing her, and her dreams
He, on the other hand, holds a doctorate in diplomacy
For, every time she spoke of the pages of her heart
He would ask her for a walk, but go around the library!
The unspoken diaries still have dog ears plenty, sighing...
Everything was beautiful about them, except destiny
And what a big lie, when that 'everything' is enslaved by destiny!
The words in his verse neither gave hope, nor let her down...
If ever a world she lived happily in, it was in his soulful memories...
Scooping out the aching phases, painful smiles are all that is served!
The bridge was strong and so was the crossing
Until Neharika fatefully faced the wall, and became a helpless cat
Instead of jumping eyes closed, would it have been better to just keep walking
Until the wall collapsed upon her own being, with regrets buried along?
Nah! then how can destiny smirk at the very sight of her, each day
Finding her draw tears from her dark well, with a louvred pot
Shameless tyranny of Time, to play sadistic game with mortal toys
From what mould are the crowns made of? thorns alone are visible
If, ''not meant to be'' is the anthem of experiences, then life itself is a rejection
Oh the cup of coffee! she still stirs and almost churned now
The cream of memories just stared at her, confused
She always knew what was her cup of tea, just failed to hold it
Many a slip between the cup and the lip, wish it was just a proverb...
Neharika - our dear girl, unlearned to cry years back
For every drop shed would burden the earth more
Souls departed would be obituary, while memories take birth every moment
Did I tell you he is Kiran? Ravikiran is his name?
No wonder Neharika melted away in adoration...
She the forever blossoming dewdrop and
He the dutifully dehydrating sunrays - graceful Kiran indeed!
(Neharika - Dewdrops. Ravi Kiran - Sunrays.)
Madhumathi is an ardent lover of Nature, Poetry(English and Tamil), Photography, and Music, Madhumathi believes writing is a soulful journey of weaving one's emotions and thoughts, having a kaleidoscopic view of life through poetry. She experiences Metamorphosis through writing. Nature is her eternal muse and elixir. Poetry, to Madhumathi, is a way of life, and loves to leave heartprints behind in gratitude, through her words. She strongly believes in the therapeutic power of words, that plant love, hope, and enable a deep healing. Madhumathi loves to spread mental health awareness through writing, breaking the stigma, and takes part in related activities, too.
Madhumathi's poems are published with the Poetry Society India in their AIPC anthologies 2015, 16, and 17, the multilingual anthology 'Poetic Prism' 2015(Tamil and English), Chennai Poets' Circle's 'Efflorescence' 2018, 2019, India Poetry Circle's 'Madras Hues Myriad Views'(2019) celebrating the spirit and glory of Madras, in the UGC approved e-journal Muse India, in IWJ-International Writers' Journal (2020), and e- zines Our Poetry Archive(OPA), and Storizen.
Blog for Madhumathi's Poems :https://multicoloredmoon.wordpress.com/, http://mazhaimozhimounam.blogspot.com/?m=1
SOUNDS, COLOURS AND FRAGRANCES
Oh! to be a child again! Everything is so wonderful – colours are more intense, fragrances are stronger and every new day brings with it events, each more interesting than the last. Colours, sounds and scents of childhood are like a tranquil lake, with hardly a ripple to disrupt it. We keep revisiting them again and again like an old, beloved quilt faded now, but always there to pull up and snuggle into when things get rather irksome.
Sounds form a vital part of our reminiscences. They echo in our minds – sometimes scarcely a whisper, at other times louder. I can still hear the grandfather clock ticking away the seconds in my paternal Grandfather’s house in Pattazhy, as I kept running to the living room for quick sips of water between endless games of hopscotch and blind man’s bluff. In my other grandparent’s house in Kumarakum, I remember the church bells tolling as we journeyed by boat on the blue waters of the Vembanad Lake. As the boat reached the shore, waves would gently lap against it and the wind would whisper through the leaves of the coconut trees, mingled with birdsong in the distance.
On warm, sunny afternoons there, I would sit huddled with my cousins on the verandah steps watching storm clouds gathering. There would be an eerie silence for a few minutes till suddenly the heavens opened and the water hammered down, filling the deep well right up to the top, and mossing the old stone walls near the front gates in various hues of green. The stream outside which had been peacefully slumbering in the quiet air, would gurgle in protest as fat raindrops started dropping into it with big plopping sounds. The rain would create mud coloured puddles and the wind would sing soft lullabies to quieten our wandering minds. Even after the storm had abated, it would linger on in sparkling droplets on the newly washed branches of the trees. At night, the sound of silence would descend on the house. We would be spreading our sleeping mats, when suddenly the insects, frogs and birds would hold a concert of their own, shattering the quiet of the night.
Scents, floral, woody or piquant, can trigger a craving for the past. When the rain thundered in noisily on the first rays of morning, the wind would pick up and bring with it the smell of salted sand and seaweed. The heady scent of flowering mango trees, rose and mulberry was ever present. As memories come flashing by, I go back in time to when my Kumarakum Grandmother, Mariamma would hold me close and I would inhale the jasmine scent of her long, plaited hair. As the sun rose high in the sky, I would sit with my cousin Suja and enjoy the scent of the freshly cut paddy fields, and the sun -ripened mulberries as the uninvited rain washed the dew off them. Running into the kitchen, I would dance near the glowing embers of the wood fires against spirals of smoke, as coconut oil spat and sizzled in a hot wok fragrant with onions, red chilies and curry leaves.
Memories are strange. They change as the years speed by, like a kaleidoscope of colouful moments – one merging into the other – gold and mauve and silver fragments that call up the past. The first colour my daughter Divya identified was red except that she used to call it ‘hed.’ Red was the colour of most of her hairbands, the strawberries that she loved and the roses she would take for her teacher in school. For me it was pink. Pink was the colour of the dress I liked the most. It had flouncy frills and a can-can and I wanted to wear it every day if I was allowed. Pink was the colour of the raspberry ice-cream sticks which we used to enjoy with so much happiness trying to make them last as long as possible, licking the last drops off a saucer held beneath.
Graduating from pink, teal was my granddaughter Zaara’s new favourite. I had no clear idea of that particular colour, so we consulted Alexa. We were informed that it’s a kind of blue-green and comes from a bird with wings of that colour. It can be created by mixing blue on a green surface and to make it darker, one can add grey or black. So, Zaara has shiny teal hair clips, and wants one wall of her room to be painted that colour! Teal seems exciting for her, ever since she started watching episodes of the Tic Tac Toy Family from YouTube.
Then there was green. The Vembanad lake seemed to be more green than blue especially in its deepest parts. All around it was a forest of green in different hues. Green was the colour of the neem tree just outside our Park Circus flat in Kolkata, where colourful kites, caught in its branches, would gently sway in the breeze till a big gust of wind would sweep them away. If reminiscences were colour – coded, these would be what I would choose.
During times of unhappiness, I am aware that no matter how bad things may be, a sliver of happiness is ever-present in the depths of my mind as memories, and I could always draw on them. I wonder if my daughter and granddaughter will remember me reading out stories, helping them to decorate the Xmas tree or baking chocolate chip cookies with them. Maybe, theirs will be a colourful whirl of mostly happy memories, hard to pinpoint but nevertheless present. Like me, perhaps someday their minds may suddenly get diverted by a tiny fragment of memory – a safety net in their subconscious that they can count on as they move forward in life.
Dr Geeta Mathew holds a Ph.D in English Literature and has been teaching English over the last thirty years in St Angela Sophia School, Mayo College and St Xavier’s in Rajasthan. After relocation to Bangalore, she has been taking classes for Spoken English for ladies. She is the author of a book of personal reminiscences entitled ‘Bijoli’s Patchwork Quilt’ as well as some books on the usage of English for children.
I lost my paternal grandmother at the age of 4 (Dadimaa in Hindustani and Jejemaa in Odiya, my mother tongue), the only of my grandparents waiting for my arrival, that must be in mid-1950s. However, I have some memories of her, especially some story telling sessions. These were in times when neither radio, television, internet, the cell-phone, not even electricity was available for engaging the attention of toddlers/children away from mothers in the busy hours of the morning, a task wholly left to grandparents, especially the grandmother. Frankly, I was too small but still remember the title of two stories, one ‘The cart-man and the tiger’ (tiger, here of course is the ‘Mahabal’, Pataharia, (in Odiya) the striped ones—the Royal Bengal proper and not the ordinary leopard, Chita, panther or the hyena), and the other, ‘The wood-cutter and the python’. Some of the characters I still remember, but the dusts of six and half decades have made the details, hazy. So let me get into the story, ‘The cart-man and the tiger’.
This was of course, a long long time ago, when my grandma was not so old—to safely put close to a century back--may be towards the end of 1920s. The forests stretched to our doorsteps, not like today the doorsteps of the humans have pushed the forests to the back of the beyond. The humankinds were ruled by the British Gora Sahebs, riding horses and wherever better road exited and in towns, the Mem-sahebs, in horse-drawn coaches. There were of course, the sundry kings and princes whom nobody had ever seen, especially after the British came in. They remained indoors or migrated to Calcutta, the Capital of Hindoostan. Villages had dual rulers, daytime the Zamindars and the night time, Tigers, none of them less ferocious, i.e. speaking from the perspective of the common villager of the day, who had no respite from either.
In those times and circumstances, our cart-man Bala (short for Balakrushna) who was a recent returnee from World War I in the British Iraq and having spent nearly 3 years at Basra, was a strong man like the bullocks he drove and was also full of stories of the War days, where he was an indentured porter for the British Indian Army and lucky to have returned 100 percent without losing even a nail He was from an adjacent village, two/three furlongs away, where he stayed with his widowed mother, three sons and a daughter and of course, his wife. The eldest son Baiya (short for Bairagi) was 17/18 and was already a strong and muscular lad and helping his father in cart-driving and farm work. They were landless but worked as share-croppers and wage labour practically on permanent basis in our household and farms. It is another matter, even after 70 years of Independence, Bala’s great-grandsons still continue with sharecropping and wage labour—education and formal employment has been a touch and go affair for them. They have and had always lived at the edge of the society, and now on the fringes of a free nation.
So the day Bala was detailed to go with the cart to a place somewhere beyond Darpani on the edge of the boundary of the old Cuttack district and Dhenkanal, he decided to opt his eldest Baiya too, it being a whole two/three-day affair and the last five miles of onward journey was deep into the tiger infested jungles. From our village the crow-fly distance to Darpani behind the Mahavinayak Hills will be around 12 miles (about 20 km) but that is not how the ox-cart moves. It was early December, the rice harvests are just about to commence, but in the upland areas towards the hills the harvests have already commenced. The sun is getting milder and rather pleasant on the bareback of the cart man, Bala. Early in the morning, Bala along with his son and two sturdy and tall bullocks and the cart loaded and after fording the river Birupa at Jasorajpur and Champapur (a place as legend has it, Gandhi visited recently, during his Bharat Pada-Yatra), they reached Chhatia before the mid-day and rested near the Jagannath Temple (Bata). Bala, had no more than an hour and half to cook for two of them and eat, feed the oxen with bundles of rice straws carried along. They must depart towards Dhanmandal and Mahavinayak before the sun is high over head, hoping to reach there an hour and half before the sundown. They left after the meal and crossed the wooden bridge across the High Level canal at Dhanmandal and turned west towards Mahavinayak.
Our cart man Bala was keen to cross these forested tracts and hoped to reach the destination beyond Darpani and Shia before 7, and it gets pitch dark. He drove hard. They carried with them a lathi, a bhala (spear), machete and axes, normally carried into forest tracts either for protection from the Tiger or the Khantas (decoits). Bala was a daredevil and fearless with a whole World War behind him. The ride was not easy with post rain undergrowth of lantana and tall bushes along the cart track—twenty yards away the forests of sal, asana, wild mangoes abound intertwined with weeds, reeds and canes growing to the crowns of the trees, interspersed with last season’s clearings by wood cutters and the short dense bushes of spine-bamboos (kantabainsi) abounded. Two/ three hundred yards away were patches of rice paddies already cleared after harvesting. The empty shrub-lands and the harvested paddies are ideal for the Chital (Spotted deers), Barasingha, Sambhar and bucks (kutura/ khuranti in Odiya) and herds of rampaging wild boar. By about sundown, they had crossed the old Darpani road, leaving Darpani half a mile to left and were progressing towards Shia a mile ahead and the final destination another mile further. They hoped to hit it by around by early evening, well before the Tiger times.
Once they crossed Shia, a sleepy hamlet, a few kerosene lamps were visible from the cart track. The fences are high with fresh cut bamboos and bushes with cane spines to deter tiger ingression. The dogs are all inside or indoors barking at the slightest provocation, not venturing outside, easy prey for the leopards. Tigers hate them because of their distraction of the deer herds. Bala lighted his lantern with his old wartime jhakmaki (striker stone) lighter and tied it to the underbelly of the cart in the middle that helps in lighting up the area they pass through and giving some visibility to 20/30 feet around. Half a mile ahead they came to a stream, Kuanria, less than a hundred yards wide and already half dry with just about knee deep water in the middle with sand banks on either side, easily fordable. But, by now the bullocks were tired and sensing danger, refused to budge forward with all the coaxing and threats. They were big animals—they were young 3 and half year olds with sharp long horns, white, five and half feet at shoulder, 15 to 20 mounds each. One with a slight narrow neck was called Ghoda (horse) and the other with a mark on the head, was Shiva, more sedate and composed. The destination was a mile and half ahead but with the stream in the middle and pitch dark night having already descended, they decided to camp for the night and make a dash early in the morning. They looked for a clearing on the riverbank with sand and gravel bed and a clear view around for fifty yards for any impending danger. They unhinged the bullocks, took them to the stream for a hearty drink of crystal clear water and brought them back on the bank and tied them somewhat loose, on an exposed roots of a Mohula tree, tall, standing isolate on the bank with a large canopy of broad leaves. The flowing was on and large fruit bats are already getting into its canopy for a feast of the succulent flower and fruits. They took the lantern out and an iron bucket tied to the underbelly of the cart and took out a small brass vessel to cook some rice for the night. Baiya got down to the river to get the water while Bala took out the machete and the spear tied to the under belly of the cart and a solid well oiled bamboo lathi, usually measured four cubits, from the carriage top. He quickly collected enough of dry sticks and chopped dry pieces of wood from a driftwood log on the shore that should suffice for cooking as well as a night long campfire. Tigers and other wild animals are never happy with the ‘red flower’, the fire. Baiya, the young boy found the water not too cold yet and decided for a quick wash and quickly came up some fishes which abounded in the shallow waters receding into pools. They took out a cloth sack containing some rice, salt, onion and green chillies and some rice flakes (Chira) and some rice snacks (Bura Chakuli) with a piece of Gur (Jaggery), packed by Baiya’s grandmother for the journey. The river banks are empty now with two hours into the night. These are usually busy around sundown with wild beasts descending to the stream for a mouthful of water before the king of jungle comes calling. But often these hours are tricky too—a hungry tiger could be on the prowl and lurking in ambush.
Bala quickly lit up a fire with the lantern and a few pieces of twigs. The oxen were left munching on rice straws at a short distance, a few bundles were carried along for them. When the fire was lit with the dry twigs and wood, the trapped air inside the twigs expand with the heat and burst, making a constant crackle and the surroundings, at least a hundred feet around was lit up with the yellow-red lights of the fire putting a paint of amber on the bullocks fifteen twenty steps away. Bala put the vessel with rice and water on the fire and the fresh caught fish on to one side of the fire with an onion wrapped in a couple of Mahula leaves not to over burn. By the time, the rice was cooked, a couple of jackals called on the far side of the stream. Bala knew it was end of the first prahara, may be around 9 in the evening. Baiya could locate some wild banana plants along the river bank, hacked a couple of leaves and both pounced on the hot rice, with the smoked fish with onion and the green chillies and some salt now added on top. Gosh! They were famished and the food tasted delicious. Now being stuck in the forest reputed for tigers, in the middle of the night with his young son and the prized bullocks to guard, Bala was worried and decided to spend the night guarding the other three. They both were strong men, muscular and not scared of the tiger or anyone. Bala asked Baiya to take a nap for a few hours, took out the worn out blankets from the cart and gave one to Baiya to go near the bullocks and carry the machete along. The oxen will be comforted with human presence and will warn them if they smell things from a distance--at least they can hear and smell from a couple of hundred yards. Bala sat down on the gravel bed strewn with some straw near the fire leaning back on the pile of wood and twigs with a blanket over his bare body and the spear (bhala) ready at hand. He faced the fire and the waterline was visible behind the fire about 20 feet away. Time to time he would put a few twigs or a piece of wood on to the fire, keep it burning—providing light, safety as well as some relief from the insects and the glare felt good on his face in a wintery night. In the forest and on the river bank with Mahavinayak Hill behind them and many smaller hillocks to left, after the mid-night the chill will descend near the stream, bringing down the fragrance of the wild flowers on the hills as well as the sounds of the forest all mixed with the chilly air.
He got up and took a few steps to the bullocks. Shiva looked at him as if asking him to touch and reassure him about the night, the forest and the dangers it might hide in its womb. And he did caress him to his delight, said a few soothing words. They have been together on many errands for the past two years and had a great understanding between them. Ghoda was more nervous and needed further assurances and touches. His son was already asleep, being tired for a whole days travel, since four in the morning. He turned back to the fire and sat down to watching the fire and putting in between a few twigs on the fire. The bats on the Mahula tree were already making a racket and they do while feeding, chasing each other to dislodge from more fruity branches. The jackal pair across the far-bank of the stream howled and a couple of more called from a distance and one from a nearby bush. Bala knew his bullocks were too big and strong for the hyena or the leopard—he has been in forest many times on errands and hunting with friends (with a spear and bows). He knew from experience only tigers or elephant herds are true threats to be avoided. Normally, the tiger is as much afraid of man, as the man of the tiger. Only an old, incapacitated/ injured or a female with cubs will be aggressive, otherwise they avoid the humans. The king too walks ten kosas (roughly 20 miles) in a night, from one hill to the other, not just hunting but guarding his territory and marking the boundaries for intruders—he needs as much land as the Chota Raja.
When the night became quiet, the fire burning steadily scattering its warmth in the night around, the sky above lighted up by lakhs of stars, like Cuttack town in the evening with the gas lamps lighted-up along the main roads, where he had been with his cart a couple of times--the show he can hardly forget. The half moon has risen in the sky, somewhat lighting up the forest. The Kuanria river was on a constant song, rippling through the shallow stretches of the bed. And he flashed back a decade and his days on a ship of the Gora Saheb from Cuttack by train to Calcutta and then herded on to a steamer for a month long ordeal through Madras, Colombo, Bombay, Bandar Abbas and then to Basra where the Gora Saheb was fighting the Khalifa, the Arab King and learnt, defeated him. They were half dead by the time they were taken to the coolie camps. The soldiers were mostly Sikhs, Pathans, Gorkhas with Gora Captains and poor Bala and all the porters, Bihari, Odiya, Nepali and many of mixed race, were detailed for carrying the tents or cooking or carrying the Rashad (supplies) for the army. He hardly saw the fighting, except occasional sound of the cannon from a distance like the thunderclap during the rainy season. Most of the transport was on the river, on boats and they were lucky, no shortage of water—you go 5 miles away from the river and there was no water. He remembered seeing Arabs on camel back travelling 10 miles to get water, filling the camel-hide bags and returning to their villages. And look, there is a tiger there, sitting quietly near the river’s edge away from the fire—but the Captain Saheb had told there are no tigers in Basra! He reached out for his Bhala, in case! He put a few twigs back on to the fire.
Now the tiger, looked bit older, looked more like a beggar than the king, resting on the ground made a soft growl and appeared to be saying something to him. Bala listened with care, his hand firmly on the spear. The tiger told, “Look Bala, I know who you are. May be we have met earlier in the jungle--from a distance, of course. Can see you are a war veteran and soldier and you are scared of no one. But I am hungry and it has been four days I ate some small kutura.”
Bala said, “What happened, the forest is full of animals. I have seen deer herds and Barasinghas in the evening not very far from here. Why do you come to bother me?”
The tiger told, “That’s the problem. While chasing a boar herd, the herd master, a big male with foot long teeth, as big as me, gored my left leg and nearly killed me. But for the fact I climbed up a tree nearby and he could not, that I live till now. Now barely can I walk, what to talk of hunt.”
“So, what can I do? It’s your business. If you failed to kill the boar and instead got gored by him, then what king will you make? You are a loser and you are destined to die. Feel fortunate, I am not raising my bhala yet on you.”
“Hey, look, look. You appear to be a generous man. See, you have two bullocks, you can give one to me that will help me survive and get well, to become the king again. And when next time you visit these areas, you will have to fear nothing. Don’t forget I rule the whole Darpani at night, not that Chota Raja, who is getting smaller and smaller, every passing day.”
“If I give the bullock to you, who is going to pull the cart tomorrow? You are not going to get well overnight and help me drive the cart. In any case, you have neither the height nor the hump to tie to the cart. The only thing you have is your teeth, good for no work except killing your prey. Moreover, those bullocks belong to my Malik (boss) and they cost Rs 10 each, as much as a tola of gold. What is your value? You die tonight, by tomorrow morning the hyenas, jackals will clean you up. They will have a big yawn after a full meal and that’s the end of the king.”
“Now, wait, wait. I am not that useless after all. These days, I hear all kinds of noises. I see tall Sal trees, whole lots of them cut by contractors on orders of the Govt. of the Gora Sahebs. I have heard the contractor’s coolies talking about, the Gora Saheb have become your king and your kings are hiding in their Janana Mahal and you have been all made coolies. So, we are better off in the forests. At least, we are free in the jungle.”
Bala retorted, “The Gora Sahebs are like the Rahu, the monster that gobbles up the beautiful moon, but after a few hours throws up the moon, because he cannot digest it. It is not about eating alone, but digestion is the thing. Now, I hear they have eaten off half the world and the sun never goes down in their riyasat. Ten years back, I was fighting a Gora Saheb’s War, in a place a month’s journey by a big ship in the sea. ‘Was told they are fighting everywhere with small guns, big cannons, in the oceans and someone told they have now guns on machine birds, big ones and a man sitting there flying the bird and like my driving the cart! They tell, thousands and lakhs of men have died. Even women and children are not spared. So many men die in a single day, all you tigers will count to nothing. The world turned red with human blood.”
“Yah, ‘have heard they have ordered to cut all big trees and make them sleep on the ground and a huge monster cart rides on top of these dead trees. These carts are so big that half the mountain it can carry. Not very far from here, I have heard these iron carts running like mad on those poor dead trees and making a deafening sound. Even I stop calling, when they come calling—my girls and animals in the jungle will forget I am alive. Huh! Worst, these Goras don’t spare us. The contractor’s coolies were talking; they come with guns on elephants to kill tigers and not to eat, like we do. They only skin us and take the skin and throwing rest of our body to jackals and hyenas. Just imagine, so much disrespect for the king of the jungle! What do you do with a skin? You can’t eat it. You can’t wear it like olden times, Lord Mahadev Shiva used to, but he too has given up—after all he is our King, Pasupati. It appears, the Gora Mem-sahebs like our skins more than their own kind! Huh!”
Bala joined in, “I heard that our people have invented one Gandhi Baba to fight the Gora Sahebs. They tell he can kill without raising his hand but he does not and there is the talk of freedom from the Gora Sahebs by Satyagraha. He is going to defeat the Gora Sahebs and we will become free again, like you.”
The tiger was curious, “Now wait. This is the most dangerous thing I have ever heard, killing without raising a hand, men don’t bite like us. What about us?—must be a very dangerous man! And what is this Satyagraha?-some new gun or machine?”
“No, that’s easy and simple. Satyagraha is exactly like your condition, remain hungry for days together and put pressure on your enemy to feed you, like you ask for my bullock. The difference is, you want to eat but you cannot hunt and remain hungry. Gandhi Baba does just the opposite, he stops eating and the Gora Saheb is scared. If he dies, they will be in great trouble.”
“What trouble? If he dies, even his skin is useless. In any case, human beings as you told kill many of their own kind, but don’t eat them—even we don’t. We only fight for a purpose, either to eat or win the mate. You men kill for nothing or just for fun!”
Bala told, “Look, we are both alike. You think you are free, but you are not. The forest will be gone after a few years and with that, all the Barasinghas and Chitals and all the boars. You will be dead in no time, unless you learn to eat rice like us and learn to pull a cart. Or one day the Gora Saheb or the Chota Raja will come with his gun and in no time your skin will be hanging in front room of the Saheb or the Raja to terrify all the natives (servants) in the house. Either way you are dead. Better learn to eat some rice—some leftover is there in the vessel and some fish too. I have nothing else for you, unless you want a fight and I am ready for that too.”
The tiger hesitated a bit and with a whimper, “I can see that. I am not well enough for a fight now. And I can see my days are numbered. But what is your problem? You appear to be healthy strong and free and not scared of a tiger, even!”
“What free? Three years I was forcefully taken away from home, beyond the seven seas to fight the Gora Saheb’s war. I had no hope of seeing my boys and family. I was lucky I returned. Many were buried in the sands of Baghdad and Basra. I have no land and the rice I eat is by toiling day and night at Malik’s fields. If you take my bullock, my hide also will be hanging at my Malik’s doors. And much like the tigers, we are at the bottom our kind, like the hyenas and the jackals, we get only the leftovers. Like you, the human world is divided into the high, the king like you and others like the leopards or the panthers in the middle and then the lesser beings like us. Freedom is a good idea, but for you and me, it is romantic and the very thought excites one—the reality, too painful to say. If you still want that rice, it’s there for you. Better learn eating rice.”
Bala, heard his son calling from a distance, “Bapa, Bapa get up—the tiger is calling”. He held on to his bhala and saw the tiger quietly turning to go, along the edge of water. Then he looked up, Baiya was standing above him and calling. The bullocks are uneasy and Baiya is up with his machete. He heard the tiger calling, but that must be five miles away, may be closer to Mahavinayak. Oh, he could not possibly go that far in five minutes! The jackals called from the far-bank, must be end of the third prahara. The fire was dying and he put some twigs back and it lightened up the area around again. Day break is not far away, may be an hour for the morning lights. He stood up with the spear in hand like the Roman gladiator, undeterred by the adversary or circumstances. Time to see another day, another task to finish and life must go on.
September 12, 2020, Shillong
(The story is dedicated to my late grandma, who departed in 1956 for her heavenly abode. This story was inspired by an actual journey across the Kuanria Nayi (stream) when I was, perhaps 5, and the river crossing was in a pitch dark evening on a bullock cart.)
N.B.: The old British time and Indian measures were given on purpose. Furlong: roughly 200 metres; Kosa: about two miles; Mile: 1.6 Km; Cubit: length of hand, a foot and half; mound: roughly 40 Kg. and a prahara: 3 hours.
Avaya C Mohapatra is a Retired Professor, Served North Eastern Hill University, Shillong (July 1976- September, 2017). He is a freelancer in academic writing and a blogger (acmohapatra.blogspot.com). He can be reached via email: acmohapatradr@gmail.com.
After three calls in normal tone and two shrill calls loud enough to peel off a coat of paint from the walls by our son, our daughter appeared at the dining table, annoyance writ large on her face. It was lunch hour on a Sunday afternoon and we all had settled down at the dining table waiting for her.
“Don't you know any manners you idiot. I was in an online class” She blasted at her younger brother while washing her hands.
“Don't teach me manners, you are keeping all of us waiting for you, how could you keep papa waiting? Is that good manners?” My son protested as he specialized in policy of quid pro quo, at least while dealing with his sister. And he tried clubbing me on his side as a preemptive strike against his sister to disarm from retorting back.
Used to regular enactment of numerous such sibling rivalries, often called in as a mediator, an arbitrator to resolve the dispute of the day, the hour or the minute, I tried playing it safe and before it escalated to a full scale war, I put in a dampener by a diplomatic query to distract my daughter.
“What online class was that?” my question caught her at the right moment as she was just about to deliver her hyper active salvo and more potent expletive at her brother, a notch higher than the earlier one - “Idiot”.
“Oh papa, was I not telling you the other day? Content writing, creative writing and stuff like that”, my daughter made the statement with a clear hangover of toxicity towards her brother and also laced with tone of reprimand for my forgetfulness.
All the while the food was being served by their mother who was little less affected by such ever happening spats and she was kind of supreme court, the final adjudicator. Cases rarely landed at her domain and when it landed, the judgment was delivered in a voluminous format that contained indexes of references from my past seven generations, my known and unknown forefathers and the current dispute was always successfully traced to some deep tectonic fault in the family history.
“Ok ok, no harm in telling again, let’s do justice to the food and we can surely discuss once we are through with the food”. I said while noticing that my daughter had become normal and happy that she took few pieces of okra fry from her plate and deposited them on his brother’s plate. Okra fry was a favorite of my son.
“Tell me about what they teach in that online class on creative writing”, I asked my daughter.
And she set about telling between mouthfuls of foods, how the course on creative writing was focused on nuances of describing scenes in such a manner that the reader gets transported to the scene while reading the narrative. She went on to explain that their teacher used many references from famous works of some western literature to explain them about skills required to write captivating stories.
My wife was not very amused at the ongoing discussion and she tried to put a stop to it by quipping in with caution words, about how it is not good practice to talk while eating, about how one Mr. So and So had almost knocked on doors of Yamalok due to his habit of talking while eating food. Her attempts were successful only temporarily and lasted one good munch or two and we reverted back to our discussion.
“Did they ever draw any example from any Indian scriptures?” I asked my daughter.
“Papa, we are discussing creative writing, not religion”, was the reply from my daughter.
“But religious texts are only a form of creative writing, how else they are still being read, followed and spread?”, I tried to reason with my daughter who survived on a staple diet of English literature.
“But creative writing and examples from scriptures?”, her eyebrows were raised questioningly.
“Here, let me give you an example, have you heard about Srikrishna’s Flute ?” I asked.
She shook her head to say no and then I went on. "Srikrishna played his flute on the banks of Jamuna. And see, how the narration proceeds to create a feeling in the reader’s mind as if he was sitting there by the side of Krishna and witnessing it himself."
Hearing the tune of flute played by Krishna
Waters of Yamuna seemed to stop in flow.
Grazing deers straightened their necks
And looked intently at Krishna playing flute
O Shyamghana, do not, do not play that flute.
The fish from depth of Yamuna swam to the river bank
Trees shed their leaves on feet of Krishna
Dried wood stocks became green with leaves
The young ladies of Gopa pura shed their inhibition and converged at Brindaban
O Shyamghana, do not, do not play that flute.
All the gopis liberated from their worries, fears;
O Shyamghana, do not, do not play that flute.
The young ladies who crowded around Krishna
Kept looking at him as if they were idols of wood.
O Shyamghana, do not, do not play that flute.
My daughter was listening intently at me narrating the heavenly composition in my crude translation.
‘That’s a nice way to describe a situation, in fact our teacher was more or less telling the same thing, drawing examples from The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn’, she said.
“That’s the problem, you must keep a balance of reading our own literary works, and there are gems of such writings which probably one can’t read in one lifetime”, I said.
“Ok, I am interested; give me few more such books to read.” My daughter said.
Er.Sunil Kumar Biswal is a graduate Electrical Engineer and an entrepreneur. He is based in Sunabeda in Koraput District of Odisha. His other interests are HAM Radio (an active HAM with call sign VU2MBS) , Amateur Astronomy (he conducts sky watching programs for interested persons/groups) , Photography and a little bit of writing on diverse topics. He has a passion for communicating science to common man in a simple terms and often gives talks in Electronic media including All India Radio, Radio Koraput. He can be reached at sunilbiswal@hotmail.com
The road
extends..
walk
we must...
sunny or
rainy...
what is it
in the air
that come
as whispers
in the ear..
sing of the
times
with a
gallant
whistle
of the times
you carried
much in
your
mind shell,
packed up...
plans
compulsions,
dreams..
looking back,
connecting
dots,
they gather
meaning...
they helped
you grow..
pollen
fallen
moments...
only
the pathway
lies same..
as ever.
the sky
the trees
the wind
the same..
in silent
communion
with you.
walk we
must
till the
sky descends
on horizons
dim...
Dr. Molly Joseph, (M.A., M.Phil., PGDTE, EFLU,Hyderabad) had her Doctorate in post war American poetry. She retired as the H.O.D., Department of English, St.Xavier's College, Aluva, Kerala, and now works as Professor, Communicative English at FISAT, Kerala. She is an active member of GIEWEC (Guild of English writers Editors and Critics) She writes travelogues, poems and short stories. She has published five books of poems - Aching Melodies, December Dews, and Autumn Leaves, Myna's Musings and Firefly Flickers and a translation of a Malayalam novel Hidumbi. She is a poet columnist in Spill Words, the international Online Journal.
She has been awarded Pratibha Samarppanam by Kerala State Pensioners Union, Kala Prathibha by Chithrasala Film Society, Kerala and Prathibha Puraskaram by Aksharasthree, Malayalam group of poets, Kerala, in 2018. Dr.Molly Joseph has been conferred Poiesis Award of Honour as one of the International Juries in the international award ceremonies conducted by Poiesis Online.com at Bangalore on May 20th, 2018. Her two new books were released at the reputed KISTRECH international Festival of Poetry in Kenya conducted at KISII University by the Deputy Ambassador of Israel His Excellency Eyal David. Dr. Molly Joseph has been honoured at various literary fest held at Guntur, Amaravathi, Mumbai and Chennai. Her latest books of 2018 are “Pokkuveyil Vettangal” (Malayalam Poems), The Bird With Wings of Fire (English), It Rains (English).
Hidden behind the beaming smiles
Are the life’s darkest moments in miles
Silently winning the battles
Transforming myself in your love
Proud of every step I take
Holding onto your arms tight
Been a many woman in this lifetime
As a protector and provider
I have been the fighter and the lover
The woman within that I value
The most is the one of being a survivor
Truly as I have found proud strength in your love
Despite the Karma playing its cards
Pushing me into unending tears and tards
I still believe in your love
Look for healing at the feet
Of that broke me apart
For I know for sure
If it stays, it is love
If it ends, it’s a love story
And if it never begins
It becomes my poetry
Umasree Raghunath is a Senior IT Professional with IBM / Author/ Blogger/ Poet/ Lawyer/ Diversity & Inclusion Social Activist/ Motivational Speaker, Past President - Inner Wheel Club of Madras South, Vice-President-eWIT (Empowering Women in IT), Chennai, India. . Umasree has close to 400 poems across various themes, 800+ blog posts, several short 2 stories, 2 published books – ‘Simply Being Sidds’ and ‘After the Floods’ and several articles on various subjects, situations and emotions and been writing since she was 13 years old. She is also having a live blog in her own name.
This was two years ago when I visited my childhood friend and a school classmate, who now happens to be my sisters neighbour in Delhi.
Childhood friends are God's gift and close to heart even if you are not on the phone with the person frequently.
Our parents knew each other well and we would visit each other during holidays.
When I visited my friend way back in 2018,Aunty was all glowing and her vibrant self. Uncle had passed away couple of years ago,but melancholy was never her friend. She was always full of energy and enthusiasm and I still remember her parading from her room into the kitchen, she had just finished cooking you could sense that with the aroma that filled the room with the fragrance of mixed herbs. On asking her what she was busy with, she replied... "Beta I'm preparing my hair mask with henna".I have always loved the smell of henna having spent the first half of my life in Delhi where henna is a much preferred substitute for hair dye amongst women.
I was enjoying chatting up with my dear friend after a long long time. Remembering and sharing our thrilling moments at school. She was my tiffin companion and I would precariously steal away her hajmola digestives which i loved chewing on.
Aunty would always be dressed to kill, bright colours hugged her skin with matching accessories and nails painted as if there was no tomorrow.
As we continued with our endless stories, aunty suddenly walked up to the cupboard nearby in the hall and pulled out a small box from the shelf and handed it over to me. "This is for you!! she said, lovingly and placed it on my lap, before I could say no. I held it tight and said to myself.. "This is the Gift Of Love ",I will accept it. On opening the box later, when I got back home, I found these beautiful peach tea cups, self designed with golden rim lines . My lips broke into a smile something that I had not expected and my thoughts went back to aunty.... she was strong after Uncle had left, she lived her life to the fullest setting an example for others. Life must have been tough but she always found solace in her children.
A complete women, cheerful to the core,and preoccupied with her endless tasks at home.
Given the opportunity she loved to travel accompanied by her children and grandchildren. She forever carried a positive aura around her and one could feel it every time you met her. Needless to say such women brighten up your spirits.
Today both are parents are not around, but happy this moment of uncertainty, the Covid 19 pandemic, did not touch their lives. We know where ever they are we shall be showered by their blessings.
These cups shall remind us of her love with the powerful message that..... whatever challenges you face in Life --"The show must go on. "!!
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)
How did you spend the day, asked my husband who had returned from his tour late in the evening.
To be honest, I didn't like the way I spent the day. In fact, it's the first time I did something I hated, I rued.
Well, what did you do, he asked with concern.
Apologise, apologise and apologise, I lamented.
Apologised to whom and for what, he said, lowering his voice, probably expecting me to confess something unpleasant that had occurred.
You know, I was having a long chat on the phone with three of our relatives today, I said.
Did you say something to offend them which required you to apologise, he said.
Certainly not! And I had to apologise to all the three for no fault of mine, I said.
Why did you have to do that, he asked.
You see all of them were past 80 and quite hard of hearing. They couldn't understand exactly what I was saying and what is worse, they came to their own conclusions and began accusing me of things I haven't said or meant.
But you could have repeated or explained what you had actually meant, he suggested.
When I tried doing that, they asserted they heard me right. I couldn't take their accusations lying down. I said I give them the benefit of the doubt considering their age but it boomeranged with the result I had to profusely apologise to each one of them, I said.
Well, it's high time we have an 'Apologies Day' as well, he suggested, because when we reach "their" age we also will be in their shoes, he said.
An 'Apologies Day' with a 'difference', I added.
What does that mean, he said raising an eyebrow.
I mean even then "we" would be apologising, the only difference perhaps is, we would be apologising to "our juniors" for "their" commissions and omissions, I quipped.
May be you are right, he stated.
N. Meera Raghavendra Rao, a postgraduate in English literature, with a diploma in Journalism and Public Relations is a prolific writer having published more than 2000 contributions in various genres: interviews, humorous essays, travelogues, children’s stories, book reviews and letters to the editor in mainstream newspapers and magazines like The Hindu, Indian Express, Femina, Eve’s Weekly, Woman’s Era, Alive, Ability Foundation etc. Her poems have appeared in Anthologies. She particularly enjoys writing features revolving around life’s experiences and writing in a lighter vein, looking at the lighter side of life which makes us laugh at our own little foibles.
Interviews: Meera has interviewed several leading personalities over AIR and Television and was interviewed by a television channel and various mainstream newspapers and magazines. A write up about her appeared in Tiger Tales, an in house magazine of Tiger Airways ( jan -feb. issue 2012).
Travel: Meera travelled widely both in India and abroad.
Publication of Books: Meera has published ten books, both fiction and non-fiction so far which received a good press. She addressed students of Semester on Sea on a few occasions.
Meera’s husband, Dr. N. Raghavendra Rao writes for I GI GLOBAL , U.S.A.
PICTURE THAT SPEAKS IN ITS SILENCE
Prasanna Kumar Dash
Sweet memories
of the days gone by, you have brought them alive,
when life was easy, and all eyes bubbling with promise.
Relationship was real and days hard,
moustache bushy and dropping down,
and to pose on rooftop for a shot in a lazy afternoon,
with shyness and fear in mind.
Can we reverse the wheel, reverse it really,
and go back in the sands of time,
when one had endless promise,
And you all on the laps, assuaging my eternal wound’s last ooze.
If not, let’s preserve fondly the days,
with utmost care and love,
as the sweetest days,
For times when hair is ripe, heart restless,
moustache gone and mind lost in a maze.
Shri Prasanna Kumar Dash is Member CBDT, the apex body of Direct Taxes in India. A good painter, he is also passionate about reading and writing poetry.
I was going from Kuala Lumpur to Sydney by Air Asia flight. My Raksha Kabach was hanging from my neck. It was a Metal Locket though I did not know its components. It was detected by the metal detector at Kuala Lumpur Airport, lest it might contain some harmful explosives. After checking, nothing was found out. It was returned to me. I was delayed for sometime.
My Australian co-passenger, sitting beside me with her little son, had seen my Raksha Kabach or Metal Locket at the time of checking. She was curious about it, because she was unfamiliar with such a thing. She asked me -'What is it ? Is it a blind belief?'
I told the story behind it - 'I was a baby of around 4 years. Our village Astrologer-cum- tantrik told my parents - life of the boy is risky and full of dangers. Take this Raksha Kabach and put it around his neck with a strong string. Risk is unforeseen. He should wear it all the time. Since then it has been hanging from my neck. Whether it is a blind belief or not - I do not know. But it gives me confidence. It is believed to have saved me at difficult times. Regarding its efficacy, I told her the following stories.
I was a boy of around 8 years of age. I did not know swimming at the time and was going to the other side of the river by a small boat in my village. My elder brother was swimming in standing position and said - the water level was up to his tummy. Trusting his lies I dived to the river. The depth of river water was around 15 feet. I was about to die from drowning. My uncle saved me, though I was unconscious and my belly was full of water. After treatment I was ok. My mother said - 'The Raksha Kabach saved my life'.
Another time, I was playing 'Marble'( Guli) with my friends. The 'marble' (guli) went into a hole. I inserted my hand into the hole to bring it. The snake inside it bit me. Immediately my parents took me to the Astrologer-cum- tantrik. He saw the Rakshya Kabach on my neck and said - 'No harm will happen since the Metal Locket is on his neck. Give him a glass of milk and allow him to sleep peacefully.' We did as per his advice. The snake bite could not kill me.
She smiled to say - ' Of course, you didn't die from the snake bite. Rather, you are very much alive with greater vigour & vitality.The snake poison might have increased your immunity'.
Her little son said - 'We are fed up with the kangaroo. We don't have wild elephants in Australia. We see them in the zoo and TV. We know - thousands of elephants roam around in India. You have got a savior locket. Did you ever encounter any elephant?'
I said -'Yes, I had a faceoff with an elephant'.
The air hostess (standing there) amazingly said - 'Tussle with Tusker !'.
Attention of the nearby co-passengers was drawn to our story. The naughty boy requested me with much enthusiasm to tell the story.
I told him - ' More than a decade ago, I was working in a Government Department and going by a vehicle (Bolero) from Jajpur to Barbil in the deep forests of Odisha to collect intelligence on rampant stealing of minerals and fraudulent activities of industries. On the way, we worshiped Maa Tarini ( Goddess) at Ghatagaon to get her blessings so as to avoid any dangerous incidents and took coconuts, apples, bananas as her prasad. The narrow jungle road meandered like a snake. The woods were lovely, dark and deep. But the condition of the road was not at all good. Curves and pot holes were plenty. One couldn't see the road ahead. Our vehicle was moving slowly. After some time, it was difficult to move ahead. There was a traffic jam. Trucks were standing one after the other making a queue on both sides of the road. Our vehicle stopped. After one hour, our driver told me - our vehicle is small. If you allow me, I can drive it on the side of the road overtaking the trucks. Waiting was boring. I allowed him. Accordingly, our Bolero moved at a speed of 10 kilometers per hour with much difficulty. A stream and culvert came on the way. Going on the side was also impossible now. The driver found a hair pin curve of trucks on the road. A curved space of around 10 -15 feet was left open. But all the trucks were in a standstill position and their drivers were absent. No information could be gathered. Our daring driver pushed ahead on the hair pin curve and halted suddenly. To our misfortune a wild tusker was standing there and put one of its front legs gently on the bonnet of our vehicle. No going back nor ahead ! The road was heading only to Hell ! In the twinkling of an eye, the elephant's trunk touched the window glass on the driver's side. Except surrendering, there was no other go. As per my intuition I told the driver to open the glass and he did it. But the tusker put its trunk around the driver's neck. He was about to collapse. My semi-conscious fingers touched my Metal Locket hanging from my neck and in fear my subconscious mind called - 'Maa Tarini save us'.
To our utter surprise and amazement, the tusker's ferocity vanished and its trunk left the neck of the driver. Its leg came to the ground from the bonnet of our vehicle.Then its trunk touched my cheeks and did not do any harm. It brought its trunk out of our vehicle. The driver, two officials sitting on the back seat and me on the front seat were saved by the grace of Goddess Tarini and miracle of my Metal Locket (Raksha Kabach).
The naughty boy told- 'The wild elephant kissed you, Uncle. You are lucky ! You are great ! Then what happened?'
I gave the tusker all the coconuts, apples and bananas brought from Maa Tarini Temple and touched its tusk in devotion. The tusker put its auspicious trunk on my head and went into the deep forest. The driver told- 'Sir, the elephant is associated with Maa Laxmi, the Goddess of wealth. Something good may happen in our favour '.
The clever boy asked- 'What did you get from the auspicious touching of the elephant's trunk on your head?'
I told him - 'We detected frauds in the mines and industries operating in the deep forest of Barbil. Government got millions of rupees as taxes. So our dangerous journey was successful.'
The Australian lady told me - ' Your tussle with the tusker was a boon in disguise. Your auspicious Metal Locket proved its efficacy. Really, it's a strange coincidence.Thanks to your blind belief that gives you confidence in difficult times.'
Her little son said - 'It's a fantastic story. I will tell the story to my friends who have never seen wild elephants in Australia.'
With a smile I told the boy - 'The story, 'TUSSLE WITH TUSKER' is finished now and it is a gift of the Indian Tusker to you and your friends in Australia.'
We reached Sydney. I thanked the little boy and his mother for sharing their company. Moni, my niece received me at the Airport.
Sri Ashok Kumar Ray a retired official from Govt of Odisha, resides in Bhubaneswar. Currently he is busy fulfilling a lifetime desire of visiting as many countries as possible on the planet. He mostly writes travelogues on social media.
The bazar in our school days was
a simple affair: the bulls, drunk men
roamed in sleepy midday .
The bazar took a siesta. Flies ruled
the oily, deep-fried leftover snacks.
Even snakes in bulbous eyes stared.
Small dusty town curled inwards.
Only the classroom under tin- roof
teemed with cherubic laughter
promptly drowned by the scruffy frown
of the teacher.
My sixty year old bicycle
meanders through the fallen leaves,
stirring a flock of geese to
a startled explosion scattering
in all directions.
Newly sprouted leaves spread
like a whisper. The collage
of drunk bull, ogling snakes,
languorous daylight freezes.
A white sheet of vaporous cloud,
the childhood hour, looms ahead.
Giggling, frolicking kids run to me.
But I can tell them only stories of
the pestilence and the uneven days.
How difficult it is to bridge the distance
that you never wished for !
As the mist lifted I saw a figure
lean against the old bicycle.
Was it my father?
Abani Udgata ( b. 1956) completed Masters in Political Science from Utkal University in 1979. He joined SAIL as an Executive Trainee for two years. From SAIL he moved on to Reserve Bank of India in 1982. For nearly 34 years. he served in RBI in various capacities as a bank supervisor and regulator and retired as a Principal Chief General Manager in December 2016. During this period, inter alia, he also served as a Member Secretary to important Committees set up by RBI, represented the Bank in international fora, framed policies for bank regulations etc.
Though he had a lifelong passion for literature, post- retirement he has concentrated on writing poetry. He has been awarded Special Commendation Prizes twice in 2017 and 2019 by the Poetry Society of India in all India poetry competitions and the prize winning poems have been anthologised. At present, he is engaged in translating some satirical Odia poems into English.
Life,
a beautiful stream
meanders through rocks and soft earth,
receives continuous mud and slime,
shrinks and overflows, bestows gifts and laurels,
marches on singing soft tunes
to meet its paramour and moans.
A throbbing passion measures it,
can't take a nap in its course of journey
nor simply drift,
it never heeds our words of praise or curse,
flows unconcerned and shyly meets its spouse.
Life is a pigeon unchained,
sleek and soft,
lives on love and water,
chants all the rhymes it is taught and yearns for more,
while it tries
to scale the skies and flies over lakes and hills,
caress it's tender feathers and let it fly high
so that as it returns it finds all the worthwhile tunes and then lies in peace.
Love is a fine fragrance,
pierces the heart and one's entire being,
taste it once for all your worth,
and it's heady music will constantly ring.
Love is a bright moon that gleams every hour and never fades,
drowns you in a river you never dreamed,
slices your soul with a passion when least prepared,
with infatuation and lust it seldom rhymed.
Love is a blissful wind from heavens which caresses soft,
it takes courage to feel its warmth,
it singes, sometimes leads to unknown plights, yet
'tis God's boon, never fear it's wrath.
Pradeep Rath, poet, dramatist, essayist, critic, travelogue writer and editor was born on 20th March 1957 and educated at S. K. C. G. College, Paralakhemundi and Khallikote College, Berhampur, Ganjam, Odisha. Author of ten books of drama, one book of poetry, two books of criticism, two books of travelogues and two edited works, Pradeep Rath was a bureaucrat and retired from IAS in 2017. His compendium of critical essays on trends of modernism and post modernism on modern Odia literature and Coffee Table book on Raj Bhavans of Odisha have received wide acclaim.He divides his time in reading, writing and travels..
I am afraid of
Sleeping, and
I am afraid of
The night
Between
My sleep and
Awakening;
Whether I will not
Wake up
Once more.
I am afraid of
Awakening and
I am afraid of
The day,
Between
My awakening
And my sleeping;
Whether I will not
Sleep
Once more.
Aboo Jumaila is an upcoming and prolific writer in Malayalam. She is a bank employee from Alapuzha, Kerala.
(A Limerick is a five-line humorous poem. First two lines and last line have 7 to 10 syllables; middle two lines have 5 to 7 syllables. All lines ending in AABBA rhyming.)
Writing Limerick, I love every much
It is like eating ice cream after lunch
Lot of ideas in head
Come and go without end
Sometimes sans ideas, hair comes in bunch.
In this world, our life is like a drama
where everything happens as per karma.
Don`t be ever sad,
Don’t become ever mad.
Enjoy life eating chappathi khurma.
There was a lady called Victoria,
who wanted to visit Australia.
She arrived at the airport
along with her passport.
Missed her flight eating at cafeteria.
Twinkle twinkle bright little star
Take me to a nearby bar
Give me a cup of wine
That will be very much fine
But don’t tell my wife who is in my car.
I am very fond of eating curd rice,
With mango pickle it tastes very nice
My wife is an expert,
who makes it very perfect
We eat sitting in the open terrace.
There lived a princess called Cinderella,
who had a colourful umbrella.
She looked very much cool
and made everybody fool.
But loved playing with a gorilla.
(Anand Kumar)
Once there was a girl by name llama,
who had a colourful pyjama.
She went to a nearby town
and fell in love with a clown,
who was an old man from Yokohama.
Anand Kumar is a Retire Bank Manager who has thirty years of service in Banking Industry. He is an ardent lover of reading and writing. His is a regular contributor to a magazine "Dignity Dialogue" published by an NGO from Mumbai. He regularly writes in Muse India and Poemhunters.com. He lives in Chennai.
The squirrels scurry
Grains lay scattered on the ground
Come, nimble and go.
The blue sky above
The drop of dew on grass rests
Grass catches the sky.
Ant carries a grain
Pied cuckoo raises a strain
It is time for rain.
Police blows whistle
A ragpicker runs away
So, where is the thief?
The oldman is dead
No sooner a tree is felled
Cremation, ready !
Flower blooms on stone
Leaf comes out of a dried bough
Life is possible.
Sibu Kumar Das has a post graduate degree in English Literature from Utkal University (1976-78) and after a few years' teaching job in degree colleges in Odisha, joined a Public Sector Bank in 1983 and remained a career banker till retirement in 2016 as head of one of its training establishments. Occasional writings have been published in Odia newspapers and journals.
Fear lurks like a wild leopard
Escaped from the nearby zoo
To my colony; maybe to my yard.
Rustle of trees, flutter of birds
Shades shrouding the lone Deodar
A sudden fall of the birthday card
Tucked at the gate, on angular locking rod
Bring beads of sweat on the forehead
With electrifying occasional shiver
Running down my cold spinal cord
That gathered strength under a thatched roof
Abundance of love locked within walls of mud.
I have trained myself not to fear,
Taken a heavy dose of motivational
Confidence building lessons from a broker
On youtube and from shared videos
Of my all too busy cordial team
Comprising mostly my friends and well wishers
On my restless Android, a surrogate mother
To all forms and class of rumor.
Still I ponder over my immunity against
So to say a congenital disorder
My susceptibility to the intoxicating circuit
Or the alluring price tag with hefty discount
For a gift wrapped, liberated fear,
Familiar with me for six decades
In an orthodox ridden rural hamlet
Flanked by Grandmas and Grandpas dear
Where a doomsday sayer gets a benevolent
Share of alms, sitting cross legged
On the heart of the dusty village road
On the fishing net of his spread blanket
Surcharging the dusky timid atmosphere
Amidst splattered cow dung, contemplating elders,
Crying children, and consoling mothers
With tales of Kalki , 12 feet long sword
Painting a graphic picture of death and war
Shattering hearts by his solo theater.
Grandma calls him Dhurba , I remember
But what did she really refer!
A name or a title; not at all clear.
But still Dhruba taps my subconscious
As an object of perennial fear; packaged
Maybe fed and nourished of late
By COVID19, its continuing spell of untold disaster.
Born on 14th August 1960, Shri Mishra is a post-graduate in English Literature and has a good number of published poems/articles both in Odiya and English. He was a regular contributor of articles and poems to the English daily, 'Sun Times' published from Bhubaneswar during '90s. As the associate editor of the Odiya literary magazine Sparsha, Mishra's poems, shared mostly now in his facebook account are liked by many.
On this year’s Teacher’s day, some of my friends wrote in social media about the lessons they have learnt from so many people like teachers, relatives and friends. I was reminded about a very interesting narrative in Srimad Bhagavatham.
Srimad Bhagavatham we all know is one of the 18 revered Mahapuranas written by Sage Vyasa inculcating in the devotees a deep bhakti towards Lord Krishna and at the same time integrating themes from all Hindu philosophies.
The incident under reference comes while Shri Krishna is advocating his final teaching to his dear friend and relative Uddhava and is well known as Uddhava Gita which is as powerful a document as Bhagavad Gita.
In the narrative, King Yadu once found Lord Dattareya wandering blissfully in the forest , totally free from any worries and asked him what is the secret of his Ananda!. Lord Dattareya is an Avadhuta and considered as one of Lord Vishnu’s avataras and is said to have got enlightenment from observing from his environment and he says he has learnt lessons from the following 24 Gurus!
Lord Dattareya chronicles his 24 gurus thus( given as briefly as possible) :
1. Earth (Prithvi)… Taught him tolerance, patience and forgiveness…and also how to dedicate self to the welfare of other living beings.
2. Air (Vaayu)… Taught him to move freely among others and yet remain pure and unaffected and staying clear of disturbances.
3. Sky (Aakash)… Having no boundaries, infinite in nature and not affected by anything.
4. Water (Jal) … Taught him to be gentle in nature, free from impurities and serve all beings without feeling proud..
5. Fire (Agni)… Taught him austerity. It has no extra storage space, can eat anything. The sage’s glory is like fire, made brighter by austerities.
6. Moon ( Chandrama)… Waxing and waning doesn’t affect it. Similarly, change of body from birth to death, including various stages of age doesn’t affect the sage.
7. Sun ( Surya)… Taught him that Supreme Soul is one though reflected in various bodies, just as the reflection of the sun can be seen in many objects but the Sun is one.
8. Pigeon (a bird)… Taught him against deep attachment in an impermanent, material world which prevents one from seeking Moksha. There’s a story of a devoted pigeon couple with their off springs. Once when they went out to get food for their children, a hunter trapped them in a net and on seeing this, the pigeon couple also threw themselves in the net.
9. Python ( Asghar snake)… Does not seek food but eats whatever comes its way. One should accept whatever one comes across in life and be contented.
10. Honey Bee ( Madhu makhi)… Collects honey without hurting the flowers…
11. Honey thief ( Honey gatherer)… The bees collect honey and store it without giving it away. The Honey gatherer comes and collects the honey easily. The sage should not store anything for the future.
12. Hawk ( Bird of Prey)… Stores food in its big beak and is often attacked by other birds who are deprived of their share. To get rid of the attack, the Hawk drops its food. Similarly, worldly possessions are always a source of trouble.
13. Sea ( Samudra)… Undisturbed, it maintains its level and always remains in its boundaries. Like wise the sage learns to be calm and equipoised, his depth containing hidden pearls!.
14. Moth ( Patanga)… Moth yields to the temptation of fire and it jumps and gets burnt in it. It taught him to control the sense of sight and avoid being greedy.
15. Elephant ( Haathi)… The male elephant out of lust gets attracted to the scent of the female elephant and falls into the pit trap covered with grass laid for it. It teaches the seeker of truth not to be tempted and to fall into a trap.
16. Deer (Hiran)… Music is employed by the hunter to lure the deer. It taught the sage not to get attracted sensuously by sound of music.
17. Fish (Machali)… Due to its uncontrolled tongue, it yields to the food bait in the hook. Taught him tongue control. Also, fish never leaves its home, the water. Likewise, saint should never lose sight of his true self.
18. Pingala (dancing girl)… A dancing girl named Pingala who used to derive physical pleasure out of satisfying her customers decides one day to give up her expectations of pleasure and money and she could sleep very well that night. Taught him to give up expectation and money and cultivate vairagya.
19. Child… A child is always joyful, has no jealousy, hatred and ego. His happiness is his ignorance and innocence. Taught him to be carefree, full of joy and be a child at heart.
20. Maiden (unmarried girl)… a suitor with relatives is coming to see the maiden when her parents are not at home and she has to entertain them. She goes inside the kitchen to beat rice and the shell bangles she is wearing is creating much noise to disturb her and so she breaks them all except one bangle in each hand and thus the noise is eliminated. Sage is taught a lesson that he should live in solitude, without creating unwanted noise.
21. Serpent ( saamp)… Snake prefers to live alone and avoids other creatures. It also shed its skin for a new skin. So too, a sage for self-realization should abide in the cave of his heart…and be not afraid of death.
22. Arrow (Maker of arrow)… Was so busy making the tip of the arrow that he did not notice a procession with King passing past him. Taught the sage concentration and focus.
23. Spider (Makadi)… Creates a beautiful web of its own, plays and later swallows the very same web. God too creates a web of Maya and later draws it back to the Self.
24. Caterpillar ( Bhringee)…Wasp catches hold of a worm (caterpillar) and buzzes so much that the worm thinks only of the wasp and eventually becomes a wasp itself in its next life. It taught the sage how one attains in the next life what one’s mind is fixed upon during dying days.
Lord Dattatreya concludes by mentioning what he has learned from his own body… that it teaches him Gyaan and detachment and thus he is always happy for he neither loves anything or proud of anything!..
Ravi Ranganathan is a retired banker turned poet settled in Chennai. He has to his credit three books of poems entitled “Lyrics of Life” and “Blade of green grass” and “Of Cloudless Climes”. He revels in writing his thought provoking short poems called ‘ Myku’. Loves to write on nature, Life and human mind. His poems are featured regularly in many anthologies. Has won many awards for his poetry including , Sahitya Gaurav award by Literati Cosmos Society, Mathura and Master of creative Impulse award by Philosophyque Poetica.
In the evening of life, as one sits down to ruminate over the many experiences of life, one thing that stands out as a sore thumb is the lost opportunities of our great country to live up to its potential. Otherwise how does one explain our medias's obsession with Rhea Chakravorty's alleged drug procurement for her live-in partner or the timing of Baby Taimur Khan's princely burp, when China is building up its aramamnets pile, snooping on India's who's who or strengthening its communication network in Ladakh preparing for a royal backstabbing while pretending to go through the motion of peace talks. And to make matters worse, the spectre of unemployment, lack of income, hunger and poverty is likely to cripple the country like never before! We talk of minimum governance and ease of doing business, yet ask anyone, who has to visit a government office and he would tell you nothing has changed.
Every time I think in these lines I remember an anecdote narrated to me by a senior colleague from one of the big states of Northern India.
It was sometime in the year 2010. I was working in Cabinet Secretariat. This senior colleague was a Secretary to Government of India and used to drop in for a chat once in a while. We used to discuss issues of governance and he narrated to me an interesting experience of his. He told me, his family owned some sizeable agricultural land in his ancestral village in the state where he had served as a senior IAS officer before coming to the Government of India on deputation. He used to visit his village once in three months to check on the land. During one such visit, the villagers complained that they were not getting water for the past three months from the overhead tank since the motor in the pump set had burnt out. They had approached the local authorities, but had got no relief.
The Officer took out his mobile phone promptly and called the DM of the district in the presence of the villagers.
"DM Saab, I am xxxx, visting my village xxxx in xxxx Tehsil. People here are complaining that the pump set for the overhead tank is not working for the past three months. Can you please get it fixed?"
"Yes Sir, such a small matter, and you had to take the trouble of calling! Consider it done sir. I will give instructions today itself!"
The villagers were thrilled. However nothing happened, the pump set remained in a daze without a motor to bring it to life. One of the villagers called the Officer in Delhi. He contacted the DM again, was again assured that the work would be done. Still nothing happened! The Officer then called the Divisional Commissioner who was respectful, but the respect did not translate into action. Finally the Chief Secretary, the Officer's batchmate in IAS and a close friend, assured action after giving a mouthful for being disturbed on such a trivial issue. But the pump set still remained in hibernation, soaked in the memory of its past glory. No one from the village called again, so the Officer assumed that the pump set had returned to life and was doing what it was meant to do, namely, pumping water to the overhead tank.
When the Officer visited the village after a few months he was shocked to learn that nothing had happened, no one from the Sarkar Bahadur had visited the village to take a look at the forlorn pump set, lying abandoned in a corner like a terminally ill patient. The Officer was at his wits' end, wondering what to do next, when in the market of the nearby town he came across the Mukhiya of another big village. This humble servant of the people was actually a Don and quite high in the hierarchy of Dons because of the twenty odd murder cases pending against him. He greeted our Officer and asked about his haalchaal (goings on). The Officer, by a sudden inspiration, narrated the ordeals of the villagers. The Mukhiya raised his surprised eyebrows and mocked at the Officer's naïveté in assuming that in his exalted state works get done by approaching DMs and Chief Secretaries.
The Don went on to demonstrate the true modus operandi of governance. He got down from his jeep and sent his two gunmen "to go and lift the JE (Junior Engineer) from wherever he is and bring him to Saab's village". He got into the Officer's car and they went to the over head tank where the pump set was languishing. He asked some of the villagers to bring a charpai (a string cot), clean bed sheet and a pillow. In about an hour the gunmen produced the JE of the Block office. The Don greeted him and gave the necessary instructions to the trembling official with the following words,
"JE Saab, welcome to this humble village. You are going to be the guest of the village for sometime. I have made arrangements for you to stay in this pump house till the pump set is repaired. Look at the bed, this is where you will sit and work, don't even think of escaping. I am leaving my two gunmen here, they will shoot you if you try that. I will personally ensure that your dead body will be buried at a place where no one will find it. Now get busy, call whoever you want to and get the necessary stuff to repair the pump set. But remember you are not leaving this room till the villagers get water from the overhead tank."
The Officer cut the story short and with a big smirk told me that by evening the pump set was replaced with a new one and the JE went home. Over our humble cup of tea we had learnt a good lesson in governance.
Although difficult to believe, I have reproduced the story exactly as told to me by my senior colleague. If true, there are many takeaways from it, the most important being the indifference in the response system of officials at the helm of affairs. And as the officer told me, imagine, if this could happen to him what would be the plight of a common man seeking some relief from the mighty government?
I still wonder if we have found the answer to this simple question.
Dr. Mrutyunjay Sarangi is a retired civil servant and a former Judge in a Tribunal. Currently his time is divided between writing short stories and managing the website PositiveVibes.Today. He has published eight books of short stories in Odiya and has won a couple of awards, notably the Fakir Mohan Senapati Award for Short Stories from the Utkal Sahitya Samaj.
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