An Ode to M

The essential tea lover knows his tea very well. With a spring in his step, he wakes up just before the sun struggles to come up in the horizon. Pours the vaporized fluid in his saucer and slurps it. The right ingredients in the right quantity. In a minute, the saucer is in the sink. And there is so much joy in his heart. Well, there has always been joy in his heart.

The day would pass on schedule. Lunch at 11.30 am sharp means two rotis, a spoonful of fried vegetables and a bowl of dal. News and nap the order of the afternoon. Doting on the 10 year old A, the order of the day. Night descends - dinner is scheduled at 7.30 pm and after tying the mosquito net, he is in bed by 8.30 pm. Life has to run orderly, he tells me.

I was in tears when I lifted his body over my shoulders on the way to the funeral pyre. As the smoke billowed above, his life hurried past me and how much I learnt from him. As I immersed his ashes and bones in the sea nearby, I realized the emptiness lingering my heart.

Will miss you lots, Dada.

To my Grandpa

1930 - March 19, 2009
Teacher. Gandhian. Honorable. Principled. Proud. Loving. Will-power. Respect.

Summer

Beating down, dry and bold
Smarting under attack, it ridicules

Recovery the key, evident in the archives
Prescient it is, ashes of time say so

Eons to fandom, miles to travel
Hopes don't just float, evaporate they

Stronger than the bourgeois white,
Annihilation comes calling, seeks thee