A Bridge Between Trees Whatever Rich had been before, he’d never be again. We all dreaded that. But it took years to figure out as we struggled with the aftermath.
The summer between eighth and ninth grades, Rich, Pete and I decided to build a tree house…actually Rich did most of the deciding. Our families lived on Santa Barbara’s Calle Poniente where it dead-ended into rolling hills covered with wild oats and spotted with California Live Oaks. Two massive trees stood close together along a ridgeline, silhouetted against the sky. “That’s where we’ll build her,” Rich said and pointed. “Ah, come on,” Pete whined, “we’ll hafta haul everything uphill. We’ll be pullin’ stickers outta our socks forever.” “He’s right,” I chimed in. Rich countered, “We’ll be able to see anybody coming. We’ll see everything.” “And they’ll see us.” “I want them to,” Rich said. “This is our place and nobody can take it.” Pete choked back a laugh. “That’s funny. Ya sound like you’re actin’ in some western.” Rich grinned and drawled, “That’s right, I’m the Marshal in these here parts.” We all watched Gunsmoke on TV every chance we got, lusting after Miss Kitty and making fun of poor Chester. We also knew that Rich was the Marshal and we his deputies. We’d known each other since first grade at Harding School and had tried projects before. The tree house would prove the toughest. In the late 1950’s, Calle Poniente had three mini-fiefdoms: the bottom near Valerio Street belonged to a bunch of little kids; the middle section to John the paper boy, the Mexicans, and pretty Becky; and the upper end to us Three Amigos. We were older than the others by a year or two, a vast difference when you’re young. Rich motioned us into his garage. “Look at this.” He rolled open a big sheet of paper across a workbench. “What am I looking at?” I asked. “Come on, Chet, your Pop’s a draftsman. You’ve seen blueprints.” “You do this?” Pete asked, eyes wide. “Yeah. Look, here’re the tree trunks, like you’re lookin’ down from above…the first level and the second…and the high deck in the other tree.” Rich showed us the details laid out in clear lines. “What’s this?” I pointed. Rich puffed himself up. “That’s the bridge between the trees.” “Cool. But how’re we gonna get the stuff to build this thing? I’ve got nothin’.” “Me neither,” Pete said. “There’s plenty of scrap lumber at that house project on Marquad.” “Jeez, a frickin’ block away.” Of the three of us, hulking Pete proved the most adverse to physical exertion. Rich ignored him. “We’ll pick ’em clean…take only used stuff… they won’t care.” “Yeah, but what’ll we take?” I asked. “I know what we need.” Suddenly, our lazy summer of riding bikes down State Street and watching girls bake in the sun on East Beach had been usurped by the tree house challenge, albeit an exciting one. It took a week just to drag all the materials to our construction site. The most difficult hauls were concrete-stained sheets of plywood. We stored everything under the oaks and covered it with a tarp borrowed from my Dad’s woodpile. We did a lot of borrowing. We scrounged for nails and screws and used all of our fathers’ hand tools. By the second week we’d worn a path up the hill, the annoying stickers no longer a problem. The tree house took shape slowly. We got fancy: cut up an old red carpet and lined each room; found some rolled asphalt roofing and covered our castle; nailed wire over the window openings to keep the squirrels, raccoons and birds out; and built a trapdoor in the first level floor and locked it with a padlock and hasp unscrewed from Pete’s father’s toolshed. But the bridge between the trees proved the most difficult. We didn’t have long pieces of lumber that could span the twenty-foot distance. “We’ll build it out of two or three planks,” Rich said as we stared at his sketch. “I don’ know,” Pete said, shaking his head. “I ain’t gonna trust that thing.” “What if we build it, ya know, in pieces,” I said, “a bunch of boxes nailed together?” “You mean like some sort of box beam?” Rich asked. I shrugged. “Yeah, I guess.” It took us a week to bang it together and a full afternoon to lift it with ropes into place. It rested on notches we’d cut into the oaks, maybe ten foot up. The bark proved tough to chop with a hatchet. It looked like gray alligator hide. And a blood-red layer of wood beneath the bark made me regret all the nails we’d driven into those trees. Less than a foot wide, the bridge rose at a slight angle from one tree to the other. To help keep our balance, we strung waist-high guide ropes on either side – ropes purloined from Mr. Spezack’s boat gathering dust in his backyard. When done, my Dad made me give him a tour of the place, including a stroll across the creaking bridge, and a climb to the high deck in the second tree, our very own crow’s nest. “You boys did a good job nailing this thing together,” Pop said. “You be careful up here. When the wind blows this place will really shake.” “Yeah, it’ll be cool. Don’t worry.” All through August we moved our prized possessions, the things we hid from our parents, into the tree house: dog-eared copies of Playboy and Modern Man; two packs of Cool cigarettes and a Zippo lighter; a dusty bottle of gin from Pete’s father’s liquor cabinet; and a pistol with a box of cartridges that Rich found tucked away with his Dad’s Korean War stuff. To get into the tree house Pete and I climbed a ladder, unlocked the trap door and pushed inside the first level room. But Rich usually beat us in by climbing one of the tree’s long branches that almost touched the ground. He’d move from limb to limb like a spider monkey, as if he’d been born in the treetops. We used the enclosed rooms as our smoking/drinking lounges and reading library. But the high deck in the second tree became our favorite spot. From there we could look west into the setting sun and watch soundless waves break along Hendry’s Beach and the Hope Ranch Coast. We’d shoot the bull about our dreams of the future: high school, the after-school jobs we’d get, the kind of cars we’d buy, the girls we’d date and which ones might “put out,” a term we used with great confidence but with little understanding. Through all of this Rich would get more and more restless, would break out in laughter, jump up and swing from branch to branch, dancing across the bridge and back as if powered by jet fuel. We’d give him a little sip of gin to calm him down. It didn’t help much. Rich’s imagination just wouldn’t turn off. He talked about having parties in the tree house and inviting kids from school, about rigging the place with electricity so we could watch TV and stay overnight, about putting a telescope on the high deck to gaze at the stars and do things with girls. Pete and I listened to his wild ideas and let his passion carry us along, trying to believe that anything could be done if we just had the guts to try. We’d saved the last of that God-awful gin for the final week of summer. Pete and Rich would start ninth grade at La Cumbre Junior High while my parents sent me to the four-year Catholic High School in downtown Santa Barbara. We swore that we’d all do stuff together, stay close and let Rich dream up new adventures. We sat on the upper deck, legs dangling over its side, and sipped Beefeater from chipped coffee mugs. “Hey, I know these guys–” Rich began. “Ah Jeez, here we go,” Pete said, snickering. “Shut up, lard ass. Let ’em finish.” “I know these guys that made their own surf boards. They said they’d show me how.” “Sounds cool,” I said. “But nobody I know surfs.” “Yeah, that’s why it be cool if we did.” Pete shook his head. “Come on, guys. Ya know I sink better than swim.” We stayed quiet for a few minutes. Rich countered with a new plan. “Yeah, well what about us getting after-school jobs and pooling our money. Buy a car and fix it up.” “I can dig that,” Pete said. “My Dad can show us how.” Rich started to fidget as his excitement grew. “Yeah…we could keep it in our garage and–” “–work on it on week ends. We’ve got two years ’til we get our licenses.” “Paint it competition orange,” Pete said, “dago the hell out of it, with baby moon hubcaps and blue lights in the wheel wells.” Rich grinned. “And tuck-and-roll inside. My sister’s boyfriend had it done in Tijuana, cheap.” Pete and I stared into the sunset. I dreamed about cruising State Street with some bodacious girls in our cool car. Rich couldn’t contain himself. He climbed into the treetop and swung from limb to limb. He scooted along a branch that extended toward the opposite tree, and with a shout, dropped to the bridge below. He landed like a gymnast dismounting the high bar to stick the landing. With a splintering crack, the bridge split in two and Rich fell. He tumbled end over end, arms flailing, and landed with a sickening thud on his back. Pete and I screamed and bolted to our feet. With the bridge gone, there was no easy way to get out of the tree. We shinnied down the trunk, scraping the hell out of our bare arms, and ran to Rich’s side. He lay on top of a huge oak limb that we’d cut off, his eyes rolled back in his head, drool dripping from the side of his open mouth. “Is…is he dead?” Pete whispered. “No…see, he’s breathing.” Rich moaned. His eyes seemed to focus on us for a few seconds before closing. But he kept breathing. “What’ll we do?” Pete asked. “I’ll stay here…go tell his folks…get an ambulance…he’s…he’s hurt bad.” Pete tore off down the trail and disappeared into the waning light. I put my hand lightly on Rich’s chest, felt it rise and fall. The lower part of his body lay bent at an angle. He didn’t move. It seemed like forever before the sound of adult voices engulfed us. Pete gasped for breath and looked ready to faint. “You didn’t move him did you?” Rich’s father asked. “No..no sir. He hasn’t moved since he fell.” “Okay…okay. Why don’t you stand back against the tree with Peter. The medics will need room to work.” “Yes, sir.” Rich’s mother knelt by his side, tears dripping from her eyes. She leaned forward to touch her son, crying hysterically. But her husband stopped her and they hugged each other, shaking. I moved into the shadows, feeling scared and somehow guilty that our horseplay had caused this tragedy, as if Pete and I should have kept Rich from doing that stupid stunt. We were his deputies and we let our Marshal get hurt. Pete stood next to me, trembling, his mouth clamped shut. In the distance, the sound of sirens approached. Every dog in the neighborhood howled. A new Cadillac ambulance arrived with red lights flashing. A patrol car pulled up beside it. The medics hustled a gurney up the trail, struggling in the sandy soil. With help from the cops they carefully lifted Rich onto the wheeled stretcher, strapped him down and headed off. Our friend, our leader didn’t make a sound the whole time. By then, the entire west end of Calle Poniente stood in the street, staring. Pete’s and my parents huddled at the edge of the field. They came with the police and us boys to Pete’s house. It was after ten o’clock before the cops finished asking questions. Our accounts of the accident jibed, although Pete and I failed to mention the gin. At home, Mom hugged me. I slipped into my dark bedroom, stripped off my clothes and slid between cold sheets, shivering. The image of Rich tumbling through the air flashed over and over behind my closed eyes. The sky turned gray before sleep and dreams took me away. ### I slumped on the couch, munched Fritos, and stared blankly at the flickering TV. Mom stood over me, hands on hips. “He’s been home for a week, ya know. You should go see your friend.” “Yeah, yeah, I will.” “Do it now. I won’t have you lazin’ around here all Saturday.” “Cripes. Okay, I’ll go.” Rich had came home the week after Thanksgiving. Pete and I had visited him twice in the hospital. The first time, the drugs slowed him down so much he could hardly speak. The second time, he put on a brave face until the post-surgery pain got too much and the nurses hustled us from his room. I slammed the front door of our house as I left, mad at Mom for forcing my hand, but knowing she was right, which pissed me off even more. I crossed Calle Poniente and headed toward Rich’s house. “Hey Chet, wait up,” Pete called, grinning. “Have you been over to see him?” “No, have you?” “Nah. Figured we’d do it together.” “Yeah. Ya know…I’ve been feeling guilty about what happened.” “Why?” “If we hadn’t got Rich all excited, he wouldn’t have been messin’ around.” “Yeah.” Pete went quiet for a moment. “But he got that way all the time. Wasn’t our fault.” “I guess.” I tapped on Rich’s front door and Mrs. Kirkmeyer answered. “Come in, come in. Richard is in the rumpus room watching TV. Go on back. He’ll be glad to see you.” Her smile seemed pasted on, didn’t fit with the dark circles under her eyes and the crow’s feet. We passed through their house. Mr. Kirkmeyer looked up from his magazine and nodded but said nothing. I wondered if he too blamed us for the accident, for building that unsafe bridge between the trees. Rich sat in a wheelchair before a color TV, the actors’ faces looking Martian green. A set of small barbells occupied an end table on his right, kept company with pill bottles, a pitcher of water and a glass, Kleenex, and a tiny bell. He looked at us and grinned. “Hey guys, come on in.” He picked up a small box with buttons and pointed it at the TV. With a click, the damn thing shut off. “Jeez, Rich, that thing’s great,” Pete said. “Yeah, I can change channels, make it louder or softer, turn it on and off and not have to get up…not that I can.” Pete and I collapsed into chairs on either side of him. His mother came in and laid a plate of chocolate chip cookies on the coffee table. “Thought you boys could use a snack.” “Thanks Mrs. Kirkmeyer,” Pete and I said in unison. “So…so how you feelin’,” I asked. The smile faded from Rich’s face. He looked pale, with purple patches underneath his eyes. Yellow and green bruises decorated his bare arms. “Ah, ya know. Still gettin’ used to the chair and stuff. That’s why I have the weights, to build up my muscles.” “Does it hurt?” Pete blurted. “Can’t feel nothin’ below my waist. That’s why I have the bag.” Rich pointed to a plastic sack half full of urine hooked to the side of his chair. “And yeah, I wear diapers.” “Ah jeez, man,” I muttered. “When I get stronger, I’ll be able to change myself but I need more muscle ta do that.” He tapped a bicep. “What’re the pills for?” Pete asked. “The pain from where they operated gets bad at night…can’t sleep. And it sometimes burns when I pee. Take more pills for that.” I felt relieved when Pete changed the subject. “I missed ya at school,” he said. “You’re probably flunkin’ with me not there to give ya the answers.” “Are…are ya comin’ back?” “The doctors say maybe by Easter. Mom’s been getting all the books, homework and tests from my teachers…so I shouldn’t fall too far behind. Besides, schoolwork keeps…keeps me from thinkin’ about…” The silence grew between us. But ole Rich could still draw us out. “How ’bout you, Chet? You lettin’ the priests push you around at Catholic High?” We talked about teachers, girls in our classes, my new after-school job as a box boy at the A&P, making a whopping $1.25 an hour. None of us mentioned the accident and we wouldn’t talk about it until years later. But Rich started right back in with his overactive imagination. One rainy day sometime after New Year, the three of us sat on Rich’s front porch and stared at the tree house on the ridgeline. Other kids from down the street had taken it over even though the bridge lay in pieces where we’d left it. I’d retrieved Rich’s father’s pistol and put it back in the locker where it came from, Mr. Kirkmeyer none the wiser. “Remember when we talked about poolin’ our money and fixing up a car?” Rich asked. I nodded. “Do…do ya think you can drive?” “Maybe, maybe not. But I can ride with you guys…if we buy the right thing.” Pete and I exchanged glances. “What do ya mean?” Pete asked. “Look, I’ll need something that I can wheel my chair into, tie it down, and be able to see out.” We stared at Rich blankly. “You got some ideas?” I asked, feeling that I’d invited a blizzard of words. I’d missed that. “Yeah, check this out.” Rich opened a newspaper he’d been holding on his lap and pointed to an ad. “This would work great.” Pete and I leaned forward to get a closer look, then broke into laughter. “You wanna…wanna buy a milk truck?” I asked. We laughed so hard that Pete began to choke and I had to pound him on the back to get him to stop. Rich looked indignant. “Yeah, a milk truck. It’s big enough to hold the three of us…and can haul a lot of weight.” He stared at Pete and dug him in the ribs. “But a milk truck?” Pete said, still chuckling. “Think about it. The Live Oak Dairy over on Milpas is always sellin’ their old trucks. We could buy one cheap and fix it up. They’re practically givin’ ’em away.” “But…but a milk truck? What girl is gonna wanna ride in a milk truck?” I asked. “We can paint it competition orange like Pete wants, with pinstriping. Cut holes in the sides and put in more windows so I can look out, get big fat tires with chrome rims, put glass packs on the thing, maybe even drop in a bigger engine. We’ll be the only one in town. And we can stick a sofa in the back if ya want.” We left that day shaking our heads and giggling. But as promised, Pete and I talked with our parents. At first they laughed as much as we did. Then they talked with Rich’s parents. Less than two years later and after countless hours working with our fathers, our Orange Uttermobile sat in Rich’s driveway, ready to roll. We’d added a boss AM/FM radio, red dice around the rear-view mirror, and yes, blue lights in the wheel wells. I got my license first. The look on the DMV guy’s face was priceless when I showed up for my driving test in the orange bomb. Our fathers had already put plenty of miles on the thing. They acted as juvenile as we did. The truck included extra seats and a special tie-down spot where Rich would watch the world go by, chat up the girls we took to ball games, dances, and on make-out sessions off Camino Cielo. Rich never ran out of ideas for having fun while being careful to steer around trouble. But he also learned to trust our judgment, to lay back and enjoy life without trying to control it. In two years the three of us split up: Pete to Fresno State to study Physical Education, Rich to Cal Tech on an Engineering scholarship, and me to UCSB studying Psychology, then to South Vietnam to practice survival. But we never lost touch, celebrated each of our weddings. Rich expanded his parents’ house and moved in with them, with his wife and their two adopted Vietnamese children. The west end of Calle Poniente once again had another generation of little kids, the start of a new mini-fiefdom. Rich died at 54 from renal failure and a bad ticker. We scattered his ashes under the oaks and the long-abandoned remains of the tree house. In my barn-like garage sits the Orange Uttermobile. It awaits its second life under the hopefully vivid imagination of the little boy asleep in my second wife’s womb. I start it up now and again to keep the Three Amigos alive.
1 Comment
John Ross Archer is a retired colonel from the US Army where he served for 23 years. He holds a master's degree in psychology, and, he is an active Rotarian and Gideon. He was the founder and owner of a strategic planning firm, and a vice president of a technical college. His hobbies included skydiving, SCUBA diving and motorcycling. Archer and his wife live in Thomasville, Georgia, in the middle of plantation country. The Funeral “Dick, what the hell are we doing? “We’re both exhausted, we’ve driven seven hours to get to Atlanta, and we are no longer spring chickens; I am 85 years old, and you are ten years my senior. Only two old fools would make this trip at our ages to attend a brother’s funeral. Are you even sure of the time and place of the funeral?
“Now settle down; yeah, I’m positive, Chester, the time for the graveside service is four o’clock, it’s only three o’clock now, and I figure we’re only ten or twelve miles away from the cemetery. At least the surroundings look fairly familiar.” Why don ‘t you stop bitching and enjoy the scenery. You know, Chester, that’s all you've done on this is trip, Bitch, Bitch, Bitch.” “Fairly familiar? Dick, have you ever been to the cemetery? Tell me the truth; don’t BS me, Dick. I’ve known you for too long to put up with your false claims—like telling me you had a driver's license when you knew damn well your license expired six years ago. “No, I have not visited this cemetery in the past six years, but I’m sure I can get us there. The cemetery is near where I used to live. Stop your worrying, Chester, I’ll get us there on time, now quit complaining, you’re worse than my wife.” “Okay, I’ll quit complaining, but it’s been over thirty years since you were in Atlanta, Dick, not six. I only want to know if your memory of this area is still correct.” Ignoring my remark, Dick moved on to his next thought. “You know, Chester, there’s no family left but me, and I‘m not acquainted with my brother’s friends anymore. I doubt I will recognize anyone at the funeral. We might even be the only ones in attendance, Chester,” said Dick, with a frightened look on his face.” “Now there’s an awful possibility. that must be an uncomfortable thought for you, Dick.” “Just up ahead, you see the cemetery on the left? Do you see it? Put your glasses on Chester; you're just trying to look younger.” “ We’ve made the cemetery on time, by golly, I told you not to worry, Chester, you see, your concern was for nothing—as usual.” We drove into the cemetery’s main entrance and looked for the site of the graveside service. “There, on the hilltop, I see a line of cars and a gathering of people. “That has to be the place,” said Dick. “Dick, sixty miles per hour, is too fast to be driving on these small, narrow cemetery lanes.” “I don’t want us to be late,” said Dick. We skid to a halt and park where a man wearing a funeral home armband directed us. We walk to the small crowd gathered around a flag-covered coffin where yet another man wearing an armband approaches us. “Are you gentlemen related to the deceased?” “Yes, he was my brother,” replied Dick. “Then please take a seat; you will be the only ones on the front row. We were not sure any family of the deceased would be in attendance.” “Dam! Exclaimed Dick; there’re more people here than I imagined. He must have had more friends than I realized, Chester.” Dick’s loud spoken remark caught everyone’s attention and prompted scornful stares. Dick was not the least bit concerned with those people, their stares, or what they might think of him. I supposed Dick’s attitude prevails among 95-year-olds. Mine would probably be the same as his. A white-collared pastor stepped up to the microphone, said a prayer, made generic remarks relevant to the deceased and invited anyone to step forward who wished to say a few last words about the deceased. I stayed seated while Dick, teary-eyed, went to casket-side to pay his last respects to his brother. Dick leaned over the casket then--with a horrifying look on his face--jumped back, and shouted: “Holy crap, that poor man is not my brother!” Dick hurried by me, taking me by the arm and pulling me out of my chair. “Dam, Chester, we got here on time, but this is the wrong dang cemetery.” “Yep, right time, wrong place, Dick.” Garment with Many Folds |
Sandi Leibowitz, author of THE BONE-COLLECTOR, EURYDICE SINGS, and GHOST-LIGHT, a quarantine journal in verse, lives in New York City with two ghost-dogs and the occasional dragon. Her speculative fiction and poetry has garnered second- and third-place Dwarf Stars, as well as nominations for the Elgin, Rhysling, Pushcart Prize, and Best of the Net awards. Her work appears in Spillwords, Sheila-Na-Gig, Trouvaille Review, Red Eft Review, Alien Buddha Press, Verse-Virtual, Newtown Literary, Frost Meadow Review, Corvid Queen, Uncanny, Liminality, and other magazines and anthologies. |
Books
After Jen Mawson’s Photograph of the Same Name
Floorboards rotten as an ogre’s teeth.
Could any haunted house be more deserted
than this derelict Victorian,
waves of dead leaves
washed onto its porch?
Like corpses from a shipwreck,
limbs akimbo, clothes immodestly askew,
a heap of books
gives testimony that someone lived here once
who’s here no more.
For who would leave their own books
so untreasured?
They may be textbooks or volumes of verse,
scriptures or engineering manuals,
who can tell?
No librarian’s hand arranges them.
No survivor stacked them neatly in a tower.
Evidence of heartache, or violence,
or leastways carelessness--
and negligence can be the cruelest thing of all--
speak in the unthumbed pages
whose marginalia goes unread,
insights no one sees, inscriptions
—For Carla, On h r sixt enth bi th ay--
worn away by wind and mildew
and indifference.
Thistles
May 27, 2020
the scaffolding stays up around my building,
the protective netting preventing
the lawn from being mowed or weeded.
So now we have a meadow.
Considering how many residents complain
about the garden committee’s new additions,
botanical largesse of English-style perennials
instead of symmetrical borders of impatiens,
I might be the meadow’s only fan.
How they must abhor the long grasses
in gradients of amber, brown, and green,
their varying, untidy lengths
like the hair of a gathering of hippies,
tassels nodding with the weight of seeds
ready to sow more unmannerly progeny,
taking the place of cropped, unanimous turf.
Shepherd’s purse or some other pink
weed or wildflower
takes central stage amidst a froth of clover
white as cappuccino foam,
lascivious come-on to the bees.
Up front, where any visitor can’t miss it,
a solitary three-foot thistle grows and glowers.
When it was shorter,
I tried to tug it out with my bare hands,
learning that even their stems
come armed to the teeth.
Now it bristles like a Doberman gone rogue,
daring, “What you gonna do about it?”
One of its flowers bursts into purple
like an ad for Scottish tourism.
I root for it,
prickles and all.
New York disdains a sissy.
You need audacity
to ride out rough times like these.
Breath
June 2, 2020
now that we obsess,
red molecules of disease and death
suspended in the air,
lingering on bags and doorknobs.
Your own breath sounds exaggerated
through your mask, wettened by each exhalation.
You strain to breathe through cotton.
Do you have trouble breathing?
doctors ask, PSAs warn.
That’s the symptom to worry about.
I can’t breathe,
you’d think, as the disease
destroyed your lungs
I can’t breathe,
you’d panic before they induced the coma
so you could endure the ventilator,
the machine breathing for you
I can’t breathe
George Floyd’s exhales those words
with his last breath
he’s killed
knee to his neck,
as if it were a crime to breathe
while being black
The righteous protest while
MAGA agents loot, deface, and burn
Police attack with tear gas,
mow them down with cars
Their rubber bullets destroy eyes,
rip holes in skulls
I can’t breathe
the President deploys armed forces
against our citizens
National Guards stand at attention
like imperial stormtroopers on the Lincoln Memorial
I can’t breathe
helicopters swoop low over D.C. crowds
like hawks preying
instead of praying, Trump evicts
peaceful protestors from a church
to pose for the press like Hitler with a Bible
a little girl can’t breathe
crying as her father pours milk down her face
to lessen the sting of pepper spray
America’s diseased,
and coronavirus isn’t the worst of it.
Hate’s gone viral.
Brutality’s gone viral.
Greed’s gone viral.
Selfishness has gone viral.
Corruption has gone viral.
But now so has outrage.
These fires can’t be dampened
by suffocating them.
There has been suffocation enough
Do you have trouble breathing?
How Jane Writes
like downed trees in the river after storm
and she annoy hims, reaching for
her nest-side cache of bamboo pens
and tablets of banana leaf.
Tarzan grunts and rolls away,
shielding the nearest ear
with a protective hand.
She searches for a word
that doesn’t rhyme exactly but sounds,
and means but doesn’t quite say,
that doesn’t stutter, stomp, but almosts.
Sometimes she must hunt them,
stealthy as Tarzan himself.
Sometimes the prey eludes her.
She curses. A chimp
(no one they know) hoots a reminder
that she’s disturbed the jungle peace.
As she squeezes the purple-black berries
to fill the pen with ink,
the color reminds her of his eyes.
She smiles, tattoos him
with silly graffiti, the ticklish pen
waking him thoroughly
and his lust, so they make love
before, glistening with sweat
in the fire’s light, he turns away again,
and there’s the word waiting for her,
or its long-lost cousin, so
she writes the poem at last
and a new one after it.
Defects
too heavy to risk flight. Instead
they pour clouds of aloe
on their rounded shoulders,
pining for skin of cream
Angels should be lean as sky,
not greedy for fat, wet plums
they suck from purpled hands;
they should not let the wind sift
their feathers with a lover’s fingers
or allow lute-strings’ silken
sound to stroke their eager ears.
My angels fail to notice
the thin-ankled girls of slender sin,
my anemic devils, who cough
and rattle loose their bones,
their scarlet watered down to fog,
too frail to raise a rumpus.
Disruption of sun
What begun to floating in arena of sky,
Alone black shade scatter on earth,
No as drizzling as well as drops falling,
All birds and love & beloved relish,
But a one side lover drowned into his love,
Whereas, other couples rejoice such pleasance,
However, exhausted lover adhesive beloved memory,
But, No his beloved beside him,
Anyhow, he seemed her beside him,
Day being passed under shade of black clouds,
As turn of evening to come with sun rays,
Justly disrupted into his beloved memory,
All series of memory broken with intense ray,
Thus, No took rejoice whole day by one side lover,
No considerate on his one side love by nature.
Not long let allow him enjoy by sun.
Fine-tuning the Anthropic Principle
Lies about the lead mines, some intimating the mines had been maintained in secret by the U.S. government to protect important ores from radiation, like alchemists saying they could make gold from lead.
Lies about the women, saying they were wholesome, patriotic, religious, when I didn’t meet one woman who hadn’t slept with someone else already, didn’t despise the Republican and Democratic parties, and couldn’t tell you the difference between faith and religion. Except Dian Stroud, who not only knew about religious intolerance but had practiced it by burning down a small chapel on a forlorn hillside stuck in the middle of a farmer’s field, abandoned by the road and the Congregational denomination a century and a half ago.
Dian had wavy hair, the kind that looks like it might unravel into straightness but can’t quite relax all the way. That was fitting for her personality, too, because just when I’d think I had her into total and recumbent peace, she’d wiggle free, kip to her feet, and wonder what we were doing next. That said right away we weren’t doing what I wanted to be doing, not next, not ever. Illusion.
Lies about catfish, too. The stories came out of the mouths of farmers at the gristmill while I was bagging feed and fighting off chaff that stuck to my skin tighter than sweat. Everyone had a big cat tale, full of whiskers and sinister looks and a bent hook and a towed boat, sometimes a missing appendage on a coon or deer, making out as if they were some kind of Mississippi crocodile, trading swamps and straits for locks and sloughs.
One farmer swore that a cat had the same type of eyeball as an alligator, but I’d dissected a cat eye and can tell you it’s closer to any old fish than an alligator, that third clear lens that slides over keeping them from looking like an aquatic goat more than a catfish. Farmers seem to forget the purpose of eyelids is to keep the eyeball wet, to keep it clear of chaff, which is why I’m blinking all the time on the job. I’m the one that seems more like an alligator. A cat keeps its eyes open twenty-four seven, kind of like Dian does with me, making sure I don’t make a move she can’t defend.
One day Zeke Buller told me he had an eight-foot catfish lying in the bottom of his pond where his cows drank. It had taken to scaring the cows and now he had to find a different source of water out in his pasture. I told him he just needed to catch it, but he said he had attempted that.
“I’ll dive for it. Not like it’s gonna eat me,” I laughed.
“Big enough to,” he said, matter of fact like. “You’re kind of wiry though. All gristle and bone. Probably spit you right back.”
“Now you’re talking,” I smiled. “One hundred bucks.”
Zeke tipped his cap. “Deal. Come out any time you like and I’ll show the mucky bottom where that daddy cat lives.”
I got home at five, and with the evening lit up until close to eight-thirty, I figured I could get in about three hours of deep pond fishing. I was a little confused as to what to wear. I had shorts, but I didn’t want a catfish biting right through the bare skin. I didn’t want heavy pants, and I was too inland to hook up a wetsuit on short notice. I did have a pair of skintight black silk long-johns that I had used for cross-country skiing once, and decided those were my best option. I hoped that Zeke’s wife wouldn’t be near. I had gone to high school with her, all four years, had asked her out a couple of times, unsuccessfully. No man wants to be seen in underwear by a girl who rejected him in high school.
I vaguely remember driving, dust swirling behind in the rear view mirror on the county trunk shortcut, the gravel spitting against the wheel wells. But I don’t recall leaving town. I don’t recall turning off the highway onto the County Truck G and then to the paved County Truck H. I wondered if I had smoked a joint or something, but knew I had not. I couldn’t afford a joint. I was buzzed nonetheless.
I stood on the tractor behind Zeke. He didn’t speak a word the whole trip to the pond. He asked if I needed any help in the water and I confidently told him no, not that I had thought about it. It seemed like the best mood to give off to Zeke, like the perfume a woman gives when she passes by that intrigues but also tells you to back off because you can’t afford it.
The water was warmer than Lake Galena, warmer than a bath almost. It was green, gunky, mucky, algae growth from the cow shit runoff enough to wrap around your legs and pull you under. I had trouble imagining any kind of fish could live in that water. I kept my tee shirt on and the black underpants, slipped on a pair of rubber mocs, and waded in. The pond was about thirty yards wide and forty to fifty yards long, but Zeke warned me it went deep.
About four feet in, the pond’s ridge dropped off and I was in over my head. I took a breath and tipped upside down, feeling through the muck for the surface of the bottom. It was rocky, which pleased me. The cat would be easier to catch. I went back and forth, side to side, and found in the middle of the pond an old fence, complete with barbed wire. I found it with a hand ripped by a barb, and I wondered if catfish like sharks went to blood in the water, but I decided the water was so dark with muck no fish would see blood anyway, and the muck stunk, so that would also cover the smell of blood.
I tired quickly. I could hold my breath about thirty seconds, and the constant going up and down gave me the gasps.
Just when I thought I should give up, just when I had grabbed the wire one more time, the bottom fell out of the pond. The water was much cooler, and the barbed wire took me down well over ten feet under, if you can go over the under.
That’s when I felt slime in motion against my leg, whiskers against the bare ankle. It rubbed against my leg for several seconds, but I might be exaggerating how long because of how eerie it felt.
I tried to estimate how long the catfish was by guessing the speed it swam and how many seconds it took to pass, but I couldn’t remember the formula. Even if I could have, I had become too light-headed to figure it out, and maybe I didn’t know the formula in the first place, math not being my best subject in school. I had a similar problem with Dian. When she’d rub my knee, it seemed like I lost about three minutes of time. I could swear to you she rubbed my leg repeatedly, though she only squeezed my knee and rubbed it once. I could swear to you that her hand had been on my knee long enough for me to enter another dimension of time, live another life, and return. Illusion. All illusion.
I came up and attempted to triangulate the spot, but I wasn’t good in geometry either. I took off my tee shirt and went back down to tie it on the wire, and this time, with my head inverted and my hands busy, I felt the cat slide over my left leg, and then two seconds later between my legs, splitting them, forcing them to a wide angle. It had girth, as my father used to say, knew it had a sloughing jaw.
I whooped when I had gulped enough air. I smiled. The herds of cows had come and were staring with big mooneyes at me, crapping, chewing, and mooing. Hell, I felt like mooing, too.
Then I got out, toweled off, and went home.
When I got near my place, I was haggard looking, my hair still wet and my legs ferociously dirty, like I’d been chasing pigs in a pen. Dian poked her head out of a window and asked me to come over and share lemonade, but I just pointed to my body and shook my head no. She laughed, and before I could put in the key, she was standing next to me.
“You look like you’ve been in the runoff from a field of cows.”
“That’d be accurate,” I puffed. “Been chasing a mighty big catfish in a deep pond up on Buller’s farm.”
“Buller’s? You mean Zeke Buller. He’s a smiler. Doesn’t like to talk much, though. His wife complains.”
“He’s a farmer. Most farmer’s learn how not to talk. A good thing to know.”
“Yeah, suppose that’s right. Most of us have to unlearn speaking out loud all of the time. We all think our thoughts are so important.”
“I need to change.”
“Aw, baby. You just strip and shower and I’ll get out the hose and rinse off these…what are these, anyway? Looks like silk underpants. I wear them in the winter.”
“They’re a special kind of underwater leg warmer, that’s all.”
“Why’ve they’ve got a hole for you to pee out then?”
“Cuz when you got to go underwater, you got to go.”
“But can’t you just pea in the water straight away, like in a wetsuit?”
“I don’t know,” I said angrily. “I bought ‘em and used them like they said. Pee could be bad for the fabric.”
“I wouldn’t be putting my worm out underwater,” she laughed. “Specially around no catfish.”
I went into the bathroom, stripped, and showered, and heard Dian open the door and leave, then two minutes later a sudden drop of water pressure and the lack of cold water.
Dian fussed over me. Got me lemonade. Made me a turkey burger with a slice of tomato and some red onion. She rubbed my neck, and I could tell she was horny, between boyfriends, but my muscles had all smoothed out from the swimming and diving, and for sex, you need a little tension. I knew she liked cuddling, so I turned on the television to a Drew Barrymore movie, and put my arms around her, but the next thing I remember she was kissing me on the forehead and shutting off the television and the lights and closing the drapes. I heard the door click, and I was grateful to have the couch alone.
The next day I came to the pond prepared. I had borrowed some chain link fence that belonged to my uncle, enough to make a square eight foot by eight foot. I had two inflatable rafts to tow the pieces out to the area above the cold canyon where the catfish lived. I was going to plant the chain link around the upwelling of cold water, forcing the catfish either into the caged area, or out of it. I knew I could probably plant the fence in the muck, and I knew I could square it up with the clamps.
The first two sides went in the muck easily and I clamped them together, but they kept falling over. I had to keep my foot on one to get the third one off the raft, and in taking the third one from the raft the fourth piece fell off and sunk, and on the way down pierced the raft and the raft half-deflated like a balloon whizzing around helter-skelter over the water.
I persevered. I got the third piece in the muck and clamped it to the second one, and this time it stood. I had to dive to find the fourth piece, and then had to bring it up into a position to place it. It took all of my breath, so I scrambled aboard one raft, then paddled to the other and hung my legs over it. I thought I would stop for the day when a sudden commotion in the center of the chain link drew my attention.
The water boiled.
The catfish rippled the water like a breaching submarine, straight for the raft with my legs on it.
I lay transfixed. The ripples were so large I knew the catfish, yet to be seen was huge, ugly, and too big for me to grapple.
It did not hit the raft. Like a great white shark, it submerged, went to deeper, darker waters, and I could trace where it went by the massive roiling of the water.
I didn’t need a fence. I needed to get it toward the shore. I retrieved a rope and pulled the chain link back to shore, and then made a little chute out of three sides near the shore, and let the fourth stand near the opening.
I would bait the catfish to the chute, and then like a cowboy does with a wild horse, close the chute behind him.
On the third evening, I came with a present, a batch of crappies in a steel cage that would make a terrible racket and draw the cat naturally. Clouds and a little lightning appeared to the north, and the sky to the west was a beautiful orange as the sun started to set.
The catfish hit quickly. The cage came up out of the water. The catfish was roiling mud like a storm drain. I ran into the water and slid the fourth side of the fence over. I had my prize.
I ran up the hill, down the hill, and about another half-a-mile to Zeke’s. He took his ATV out, and his wife followed in the tractor. I was ecstatic except for the black underwear, but was too excited to be embarrassed.
Some Holsteins had beaten us to the pond, an audience.
Zeke dropped his boots and rolled up his pants. I stood like a cow, dazed at my success, as if I was ready for milking.
Zeke waded to the back and then stepped inside. He kicked around a few times, then plunged both of his arms deeply in the water, and drew out a three-foot wide snapping turtle dragging six feet of nylon netting trapped over its shell and wrapped around it’s left back foot.
“Son of a bitch,” Zeke said, laughing.
“Son of a bitch,” I said, depressed.
“Well, it’s not worth a hundred dollars. Can see why it scares the cows. What a hideous thing. I’ll pay you half, but you have to take this fencing out of here. You can keep the turtle.”
I nodded, speechless. I drove my uncle’s truck near the pond, and as the sun set and clouds turned from orange to red and gray, and as the lightning to the north moved to the east, I loaded up the fencing and carefully unraveled the netting from the turtle and placed him in the bed of the truck.
I thought I’d take him to the Mississippi the next day. After I had closed the tailgate and stood at the door, I looked back at the pond. It looked so still, like a gleaming black floor I could walk on, and in a flash of lightning, looked like flint or obsidian that the Native Americans used for arrowheads. Dian would be waiting for me back at my apartment. She’d be wondering how the catfish hunting had gone. I knew the turtle story would be public after the next visit Zeke made at the gristmill, so the snapping turtle had to grow, maybe double in size, maybe have a bite that could break the leg of a cow.
Illusion. This time I would have to create it.
I was bone tired. I needed to tell Dian that I didn’t want to be a rebound fling, that I honored her too much just to fulfill myself and prey upon her in her time of need. That would be wrong. That I loved her too much, like a sister. I would appear pure, idealistic. Fake. An illusion.
It might work.
#
Vaishnavi is a 20 year old University student pursuing her bachelors degree in English Literature and Political Science. She describes herself with 4 words POLITICS, POETRY, PHILANTHROPY and PUBLIC SPEAKING. She wishes to bridge the gap between Politics, Activism and the philanthropic aspects that Literature posses. She has been an orator for past 11 years now and has served as a youth ambassador working for equality and education among underprivileged youth. She aspires to become a lecturer of Human Rights and International Relations. "Rest in Reason, Move in Passion" is the line she swears by. Attached is a photo of mine. |
FORBIDDEN CHILD
Young boys feeling the death of an action figure, crying and being clingy.
Girls draping dupattas on frocks, swirling freely and breaking their mother's lipsticks.
Infants grew into teenagers;
Reading poetry
Raising banners
Smoking weed
Questioning life
And struggling to breathe between expectations.
Boys grew into men;
Emotionally numb
Squeezed in the Subway crowd
Bruising their fingers with dollar bills
Falling in love
Burning photos of past lovers
And left dead by masculinity
Girls grew into women;
Wearing shapewear
Taking acne treatment
Speaking low
Partying loud
Working nightshifts
Justifying their political opinions
And carrying pepper spray in their handbags.
Teenagers imprisoned the innocent infants in cupboards.
Men abandoned boys behind closed bathroom doors that hear silent cries.
Women sacrificed the girls for an hourglass body and a picture perfect life.
06.20.13
Printed on my fingers is his last message screaming his vulnerability?
The sun now conspires with the darkness to intoxicate me of my guilt
On the confluence of every dusk and dawn I’ve resisted to type down his history
I blinded myself to that Saree, liquor and forgotten birthday that now grips my spine injecting fear
He is creeping down my gut making me nauseate and puke his unsaid words and buried tears
I scribbled out not just June but that year and burnt my calendars
I walked his path, felt the dust, bruised my feet, collected his hidden agony
I visited the room where his body was hanging from the ceiling
He stopped breathing that day but my ignorance suffocated his soul long back
June 20
Half burnt birthday candles from my mother’s birthday smelled fresh of icing
My glare was caught by a message from my uncle
Tottered sentences and a cry for help masked under some habit of pretending
Blame on my memory negligence escaped the crime scene
It must have killed him enough to see his niece being casual for all the feelings
Within a week my phone vibrated again but on a different frequency
It wasn’t alarming but quiet embarking some storm’s conclusive passing
“He killed himself” my senses were numb I didn’t cry
I was rather stressed to take a leave and go to the place that held forbidden goodbyes
He went out, he sneaked in
His mother’s Saree that once protected him from the world dutifully did its job
It went around his neck and freed him from his existence that rejected his odds
His body hung still for two days
Everyone looked out for him assuming it to be one of his attention seeking plays
The dog kept quiet and didn’t move from the door
That’s when they opened the room that hugged his dead body and lost hopes
Gravity failed to ground his other worldly soul without his will
It succeeded in elongating his body that hung there lifeless and still
His feet touched the ground
His footprints are still visible
I never allowed them to carpet the sign of something that unleashed the bound
I didn’t see his body for I carry his living image
Wondering he just went to some long escapade
I went to the room locked the door sat there inhaling all that he might have thought
I placed my feet on his footprints
I touched the Saree that absorbed his last breaths
I drank the liquor that often delayed his desired mélange
I cleaned the fan that became the door of his death
Years later on the same day
I lost sense of time and space
My life was concluding
I was willing to abort the mission and leave this complex maze
I tried and tried and tried
My soul clung to my body indicated me not to add another unsaid goodbye
His death then crossed my mind
I cried how he died to give me life
I don’t mourn I celebrate his liberation
For I am living through him correcting what led to his immolation.
AFFECTIONATE EXECUTION
A stranger he was, smoking insouciantly in the dark
Spilling his hands out in the rain he allows callow raindrops to read his fortune lines
I fell for an emotionally consumed friend
He was collapsing and I inhaled every bit of his tottering demeanor
Love didn’t bloom but dried up
Between me and my alter ego like associate
We stopped leaning in while laughing
I still cherish the warmth of his handshakes
I still wear those reckless raindrops on my bruised wrist
I still prefer his insecurities and arguments over country music
I still hold that moat like distance close to my chest
I often have rendezvous with haunting solitude
I wear his evil love on my sleeve
My animosity absurdity gullibility
It’s a tattoo engraved on my throbbing heart and its bleeding
Put this to an end
Heal my wounds with your seraphic love
Tame my demons and I’ll surrender my deceptions
GLORY
For it was a bond that we cherished but now it holds me down to chronic grudges
I met a man who had tasted freedom
His shirt had the smell of mountain air and rebellion
His chest was bruised with the open air he breathed
But like mine his body was not made to be free
His arms were diaries embedded with souvenirs of wars
This man never slept and used to sing to the water on shores
He wished to narrate a story
But he was a vagabond when I was seeking glory
I walked through days, months and years in search of legendary allegory
I felt hands caressing my thighs and rejecting to tell their stories
I met many in search of love but they didn’t know of any
Serving their lust on my chest they scratched my injury
My heart was beating fast I misunderstood it to agree
Their drunk kisses tinted my lips and fueled me of animosity
I received letters that felt like music
Alas I played harp and the letters weren’t Irish
I ran from one doomed town to another in search of history
All I found was broken walls and tales of lovers dying in misery
I was in a town of grand forts and open skies
But I never fell for the stars they reminded me of forced goodbyes
I wrote epics I wrote poems and stories
But I never wrote an end I was a medley of rhapsodies
With the ashes of my rhymes I searched for a sea
Ashes in the water I lost the hope to love and be free
There I saw that same man building castles out of my burnt stories
He touched my crude epics and created a melody
I felt my heartbeat it was slow enough to kill me
I didn’t fear death as his heart was in sync with me
He looked into my eyes and found a lullaby to his lost sleep
His hands held my face and like a dove my spirit was set free
I never treasured malice for all who didn’t love me
They helped me seek this man and allowed him to kiss my poisoned lips with fidelity.
Anoucheka Gangabissoon is a Primary School Educator in Mauritius. She writes poetry and short stories as hobby. She considers writing to be the meaning of her life as she has always been influenced by all the great writers and wishes to be, like them, immortalized in her words. Her works can be read on poetrysoup.com and she had also appeared in various literary magazines like SETU, Different Truths, Dissident Voice, In Between Hangovers Press, WISH Press, Tuck’s Magazine, Blue Mountain Review, among others. She has also been published in Duane’s Poetree and also in two anthologies for the Immagine and Poesia group. Her poems are often placed in free online contests. She has been selected to be among the Most Influential Women in Mauritius for the 2017 category Arts and Culture and she has also been awarded as a Promising Indian for the year 2017 for the same category. In 2018 and 2019, she was again selected to be among the Most Influential Women of the island for her contribution to the literary field and in 2019, she was one of the three nominees for the National Awards organized by the Ministry of Arts and Culture of Mauritius. In 2020, she was shortlisted to be among the Most Impactful Women of the year for the Women of the Year awards. |
Destiny's drum beats
Loud and clear beats
Bidding me to get into a trance
And start dancing
As awkwardly as would
A broken doll,
With one eye missing
And with my hair, partly burnt!
The children of the world
Can help not but
Look at me with disdain
Written upon their faces
And cannot understand
My moves
Since they cannot hear
Those beats
And since they live their lives
As would empty robots,
Automatically going on the way
Their senses push them to!
Minding not their confusing,
I keep on dancing
As I am confident that
Someday
I shall be made into
Those drum beats as well
And I shall be played
By Destiny's hands
For the sake of some
Awakened soul,
Treading aimlessly
In a meaningless world!
The Ignorant Ones and I
Boasted the ignorant ones
And,
Satisfying them
Remains our sole intent
Whereas you,
Lamenting poet
Seeking the skies' opening,
Remain dumb and dull,
Always waiting for a miracle
To happen so as to
Imbibe in you
Some positive vibes!
I could not help but look
At them with pity in my eyes
As,
Their fate has already been
Sculpted for them:
A fall back into a vicious cycle
Laden with punishment
And rewards
As they shall deserve!
If I be a lamenting poet,
Then, the world
Just be for me,
A blank sheet of paper
Upon which I keep writing
Of what shall remain as
My living memory here
As
Unlike the ignorant ones
My departure from this world shall not
Be tagged with a return ticket!
Muse, for you
It's been so long since I wrote for you,
It's been so long
That the zeal that burns in me
Just by the hope that somehow
Someday,
We shall meet in the skies
Is powerful enough as to
Turn the whole cosmos
Into ashes within seconds!
When we shall meet,
I hope to be adorned
With a flowery dress,
A golden crown
And my magic wand!
Yes, I hope to see you run to me,
Panting, breathless, handsome
And so needy
That one look into your eyes
Would have me forget
About the hurt and the pain
That accompanied me always
While I tried to stay afloat
In the murky waters of the world
That I could never like,
However much it gave to me!
I hope to dive into your chest,
And release tears of joy,
While creepers would flow
From our hearts
And intertwine with each other,
By writing,
For us both,
A poem
About our love,
That survived the hurdle
Of existing
In worlds separated by blue skies
And expanses of dark matter!
Muse,
I hope to see you being
Over possessive
And macho
To the extent
Of denying me the right
To ever leave your side again,
As,
Muse,
You probably have no idea
Of how pain pulsates proudly
In me
In every breath that I take
In a world
Which shall never belong to me!
A cup of healing tea
By sipping a cup
Of fragrant tea,
Wouldn't life have music
Running in its river waters
And blowing in its winds?
More, wouldn't it have poems
Shining towards us in its sunlight
And sprouting as flowers,
Fragranced with the hues
Of the romance as it is
Associated with the moon each night?
Wouldn't we be that which we
Were expected to be:
Beings made of higher consciousness,
Fully aware that we refuse to hanker
After that which this world gives
Because,
It remains elusive!
Why,
If only life could have healed itself
By sipping a cup of fragrant tea,
The blinded humans would
Have realised
That running after and trying
To chase thunderstorms
Would only lead them to being
Struck by lightning,
Unable to even understand
At what is it that has hit them!
Life's Purpose
I shouted out to the mirror,
I seek to understand about
The purpose of life,
Since,
Everything that we do
Does eventually
End up being for nothing!
Bodies get worn out
And even disintegrate into nothingness
So,
Is there any specific purpose in living?
My reflection dissipated with my tears
And the light of my room flickered on and off,
While the windows burst open with the raging winds
Which whispered to me,
You already know the answer,
The energy has already given it to you,
Yet,
You keep choosing to hurt yourself
By reacting to what
The material and perishable body
Is attracted to!
And in the mystery of the mythical night,
There appeared in my hands,
A book, with empty pages, titled,
"The Essence of Life!"
Write it,
Whispered the winds,
Write of life
As you have experienced it
And you shall realise of its purpose!
Nothing Matters
Because I am skilled
At painting a smiling mask
On the tragedy that adorns me!
My hurt matters not
Because my sensibility
Seems to be like a diseased rose
Invaded by lice and looking like
It seeks solely to be uprooted
To make way for fresher ones!
My broken heart matters not
Because I know how to level it
With my obligations upon a scale;
And these compel me
To show my strength
As would a fir tree upon a snowy land!
My dreams matter not
For they are probably the products
Of madness as it has been tattooed
Upon my forehead
And since madness has never been
Resolved, then,
Why should dreams be fretted for?
My spiritual path matters not
Why should it, after all?
No one knows what awaits us
After death
And promises of an eternal afterlife
In an evergreen and shielded realm
Uttered forth in a voice barely audible
Are simply meant to be used
As the foundations for a good joke!
Why, nothing about me matters at all
More so
Since the body that carries me
Shall turn into ashes someday
And thrown, if lucky enough,
In the open seas!
Nothing matters at all,
Since yesterdays cannot be changed
And tomorrows are not promised
Nothing matters,
Not even the fact that
Nothing matters about me!
Phoolpali
My sweetheart was in my arms offering me to kiss her hibiscus blossom like lips. She had come to me after fifteen years when I had met her. The phone rang breaking my sleep. The shrill note had robbed me off my cherished longing to kiss her, leaving me viciously upset.
“Hello my friend! Good morning. Let us have coffee together”, I heard Annabel telling me in phone from the other end. She had spoken softy but I was in foul mood. Had it been someone else I would have screamed at her. But Annabel was a friend from England and was researching on Amrapali— the legendry courtesan of Vaishali-- the first republic of the world.
Annabel had engaged me to guide her with her project and we had travelled from Delhi to Vaishali in Indian state of Bihar. We had stayed in a motel. The motel had red bougainvilleas blooming on the walls in front of it and water lilies smiling in a small pond in the backyard. The balmy breeze coming from the river Ganga--a kilometre in south—had cooled the ambience.
Perhaps, the sylvan surroundings around the motel, located in the tranquil landscape away from the hullabaloo of the cities—Patna across the Ganga in South and Hajipur along it in the East—had lured Annabel to stay at the facility. It was quite normal for the researcher to fall for the place.
For my own personal reason I was against staying there. She prevailed upon me citing its apt setting and necessary comfort to do the work. It was, by all accounts, the best location for the purpose she had travelled that far for. I had no solid reason to back my objection. With heavy heart I had stayed at that motel. The manager had allotted us two separate rooms on the first floor.
The venue haunted me. It had come up on my shattered dreams. The emergence of the motel had snapped my link with my sweetheart forever and I hated the place. Had I known that it would attract Annabel, I would not have come with her. The six fit well carved and glossy marble statue of Amrapali ornately put up in front of the motel had attracted Annabel when we were driving on the highway. She had got down staying there.
I had said, “We should stay in Patna and travel to Vaishali to visit Amrapali related archaeological sites as planned earlier”.
Annabel countered, “But why? We can travel to the ruins where the sage Gautam Buddha got the eternally beautiful Amrapali in his order from here more easily. The best preserved pillar of Asoka—the Magadha king and Buddhist—is also close by. Its location is apt for our work”.
Annabel had painstakingly collected materials on Amrapali by visiting the archives in Delhi and London. She had come to visit the place related to her project. She was driven by the ambition to throw new light on the life of Amrapali and make her mark as a scholar in the study of the legendry courtesan.
To me my sweetheart was above Amrapali. She was not a historical figure. She didn’t figure in any literature and couldn’t have been a topic of research. She lived in my heart and I—a failure in life—couldn’t have flaunted my love for her. The beauty of Amrapali had impelled the powerful Magadha king, Bimbisara to invade and ravage Vaishali for her. My sweetheart was no less than her but I was not a Bimbisara. She was a poor gardener’s daughter and I, as an ordinary person, as ordinary can be. I had fallen in love with the gardener’s daughter when I was eighteen years old.
After getting admission at a Patna University’s college, I was allotted a room at its hostel right on the bank of the river Ganga. The hostel had fifty residents but I had Indra and Kamal as my close friends.
We had befriended a middle aged boatman—almost forty years old—who ferried us in his skiff in the river. He sang songs to propitiate the river when he worked with his oars. He accepted whatever we offered him for wage. He anchored his boat and joined us lighting bonfire and cooking litti-chokha—baked lump of rounded dough and mashed potato on the sand.
We also had a hermit for our company. We called him as ‘Sanyasi ji’ who lived in a small Shiva temple on the bank near our hostel. He had the bun of his matted hairs on his head and his flowing jet black beards came down to his hairy chest. He was neither young nor old. It was hard to tell his exact age but he appeared to be in his mid thirties. He swam like a flying fish in the river and helped us learn swimming. He had a cow that gave milk and he cooked pudding of milk and jaggery every morning to offer to Lord Shiva and shared with us. What enticed us most was he smoked marijuana in chillum and shared with us. When he inhaled through his feast with chillum tucked in it, red flame leaped up from the top of the pot and cloud of ash colour smoke came out from his lips and nose-holes when he detached it with jerk.
The hermit had rectangular slab and round pestle of stone with which he crushed and pasted cannabis buds and leaves, plucked from the bushes along the river bank. He mixed the paste with jaggery and dissolved the mixture in water and milk in his big brass tumbler which had arch like handle.
Indra and Kamal who had joined the college, a year ago had cemented their bond with the hermit and enjoyed smoking marijuana and drinking ‘thandai—solution of cannabis leaves, jaggery and milk. They acquainted me to the hermit and he began loving me. I knew swimming but I had tasted the marijuana and cannabis for the first time. I felt like flying and my thoughts wandering wildly when I smoked marijuana for the first time. Indra and Kamal helped me sleep in my bed. I was normal only when I got up after eight hours or so. “It was your first experience. You will be used to it if you smoke twice or thrice”, the hermit told me next day. He, however, warned, “You should drink thandai and smoke marijuana on holidays. You are a student; you should focus on studies”.
I said, “You smoke and drink regularly”.
He said, “I am a sanyasi; I have shunned the worldly life. You are a student and I would like you to do well”. The hermit would say similar words to Indra and Kamal. He would tell us the stories about how the Ganga had emerged from the head of Lord Shiva and how Parvati got married to him. He would tell many stories about how the lion which had Parvati riding it, the ox that had Siva riding it, the rat that had his elder son Ganesha riding it, the peacock that had his younger son, Kartikeya riding it and the serpent that Shiva garlanded lived together in a family. He would tell how Shiva drank poison, controlled the monstrous ghosts and demons and drank thandai and smoked marijuana had survived through the ages. He was repository of enchanting stories which we rejoiced listening from him.
On a Sunday we boarded the skiff to go for picnic across the river.
“I have got wheat flour, potato, salt, dried cow dung cakes and woods. We would light the bonfire and cook food on the sands”, the boatman said, working with his oars in the river.
“We will procure tomato, green chillies and green ginger leaves from the farm fields across the river to spice up our food”, Indra said. My friends were used to picnicking in the river but it was my first experience with them. Indra belonged to a priests’ family whereas Kamal was the son of a judicial officer.
The boatman had chillum with him and Indra and Kamal had marijuana leaves plucked from the bank. “We will stay there all through the sun. We will cook, eat, smoke marijuana and leave the place before the sunset”, the boatman said. It was March—neither too hot nor too cold. The river was calm and pleasant. We reached the northern bank in two hours. The bank opened to vast swathe of plains with the fields of glossy green heart shaped betel leaves, golden wheat and yellow-green mustard and maize plants swaying in the breeze. There were thatched houses and huts at distance.
“You are here for the first time. Go out and explore the landscape”, said the boatman. Indra, Kamal and the boatman got busy arranging the fire woods to cook litti-chokha.
I walked down the jig-jag lanes capped with mustard, wheat and maize plants. The travel beyond the two fields of tall maize plants and a banana grove took me to a garden full with hibiscus, calendula, red and pink roses, dahlia and marigold blooming majestically. The bougainvillea blossoms and its green creepers had spread on the bamboo sticks that had cordoned off the garden.
A young girl with a straw basket coloured in red, green and pink in her hands was moving in the garden. I walked close to the flowers. The basket looked like a blossom. The girl wore ordinary blue top and a white pyjama covering her from neck to ankles. She had a yellow scarf wrapped across the mango shaped mounds on her chest but she was dignified in her movement. She had bumblebees like big dark eyes. Her lips were as fresh as hibiscus blossoms washed by the rain. She had pink cheeks and her shining tresses snaked down to her slender waist.
I stood on the edge of the garden. She pretended not to notice me and was busy plucking calendula and marigold flowers. She looked a little younger to me.
She had a few freshly plucked blossoms of hibiscus and dahlia in her basket. She hopped on her nimble feet to catch a dragon fly that had perched on the bougainvillea creepers where I stood. Her smouldering eyes met mine.
“Are you looking for flowers? I will give you basket-full of flowers at a rupee”, she said.
I said, “I can buy if you give your basket to carry the flowers”.
She said, “No! I can’t give you the basket”.
“Can you give me the basket if I pay extra money?”
“No, the basket is not for sale”.
She turned away, sprucing the leaves with a small scissor but I stood there.
After a minute, she came back to me with a pink rose blossom, its green twig delicately held between her thumb and index finger.
“You can take this flower. If you put it in a water filled bottle, it will not dry till the morning”, she said, stretching out her hands towards to me.
I took out a one rupee note from my pocket and offered it to her.
“No, I won’t accept money for this. You can take it for free”, she said, kindly.
I was tempted to touch her fingers but couldn’t dare to do it.
I took the flower and said, “Thank you very much”.
“It is not a big thing. You have come from far away. I haven’t seen you around earlier”, she said.
“Is it your field? Do you come here every day?”
“The field belongs to the landlord. My father has planted flowers on it as a sharecropper. I come here to spruce the plants and pluck a few flowers to sell at the Ambadevi temple”, she said.
“I will like to meet you again”, I said.
“You can come over here at this time. You will find me”, she said.
I was happy that she didn’t spurn me. I didn’t make too much enquiry about her parents for I thought that she might get suspicious about my intentions.
“Thank you very much, I will come again”, I said and gently walked away holding flower twig between my thumb and index finger in front of my eyes. I turned twice to look at her; she also looked at me.
“Where did you get this beautiful flower from?” Indra asked when he saw me.
“There is a garden at a kilometre from here. The girl who was working in the garden gave me”, I said.
“Yes, yes. There is a flower garden beyond two maize fields and a banana grove. I have seen it many times”, Kamal said.
“The litti-chokha is ready. We were waiting for you”, the boatman extricating littis from the mound of fire and mopping the ashes on them said. Indra and Kamal had swam and bathed in the clean waters in the Gagna. We together ate litti-chokha in our cupped palms and drank water from the river.
The boatman filled the chillum and lighted it sharing with Indra and Kamal. When he offered it to me I said, “I will take it next time. When I took it last week with the Sanyasi ji, it had tanked me”.
“Okay! No problem”, the boatman said, respecting my wish.
I kept looking at the rose flower held between my fingers as the boat moved back with the boatman working his oars. The girl had entered in my thought and I felt certain responsibility for her. “She was like a blossom freshly washed by the rains. She gave me flower and offered to meet me again. She was kind to me. I will do something for her”, I thought. Indra and Kamal had dangled their feet in the waters and enjoyed the fishes stroking their skin. Terns and storks were flying up in the sky.
As the skiff reached the midstream, the boatman broke into a song:
“O Mother Ganga
I Will Make You Offering of Yellow Attire
Bless Me Meet My Husband”
It was an old folksong in which a woman prayed Mother Ganga to unite her husband with her and promised to worship the river with yellow cloth when her prayer was responded. The boatman didn’t seem to have such a wish; he loved its rhyme that it suited to his way of singing. The burble of the river stream served as music to his dulcet voice.
But I, somehow, felt connected with the song.
I gathered a Coca-Cola bottle from a bush behind our hostel and washed it with clean water; put the twig in it and the blossom perched on its top. I kept it at the table in my room. The mud stuck bottle was lying there for some days. I had not given thought to it. Now, it was a precious thing for me. Under the influence of marijuana, Indra and Kamal had slept in their rooms but I had fixed my graze on the bloom. “Is the blossom more beautiful than the girl’s lips? Are its petals prettier than her fingers?” I mused.
--2--
Next Sunday, the superintendent of the hostel offered to take us to the site of the longest road bridge coming up on the Ganga, four kilometres east from our hostel in his car. The Superintendent’s daughter Zara, doing her post graduation in Economics and four years senior to us, was fond of driving. She was friendly to Indra and Kamal who had had introduced me to her. She loved when Indra and Kamal approached her for getting their confusion cleared on certain topics. She relished when the junior students praised her for her knowledge on her face.
We could see the tall pillars of the upcoming bridge from the edge of the river bank near our hostel. Indra, Kamal and I sat in the backseat, Zara in driver’s seat and her father beside her—we reached the site within half an hour.
The site had several trucks and trolleys loaded with iron rods, stone chips, and cement bags. The whir of the stone crushers hit the ears. Hundreds of workers carried muddied materials in oval iron trays on their heads. Dozens of machines were digging the earth and work was going on in full swing.
There was a bustling bazaar on the streets beneath the construction site at a little distance. Over with walking in the chaos of the whirring machines and workers, the Professor guided us to the bazaar which had cauliflowers, egg plants, potato, bottle gourds, onion and yellow banana, litchis—special to Hajipur—unripe mangoes and ripe guavas on sale in makeshift huts and carts strewn on the earth. There were black polythene canopied shacks selling thin towels, vests, glass bangles, and lipsticks, talcum powder in round cases of tin and nail paints.
The bazaar had a food outlet selling tea, samosa, loafs and vegetables cooked on charcoal fire. It was roofed with corrugated clay sheets and saccharum munja grass. The Professor guided us in the stall. We sat on the wooden benches and he ordered loafs and curry of cauliflower for us. It was about 1 pm and we were hungry. We got engrossed in eating.
“The food is fresh and tasty”, Zara said.
The Professor said, “The Bridge when completed will be the biggest revolution. It will be 5.575 kilometres in length connecting Patna and Hajipur and will serve as the lifeline between north Bihar and South Bihar”.
Zara asked, “When will it be completed? I am happy that I can drive our car from Patna to our home in Muazaffarpur. I can’t wait for its completion”.
The Professor said, “It will be completed within six months. Prime Minister, Indira Gandhi will inaugurate it. It’s her pet project. The people of the region will never forget her for building the bridge”.
The stall owner who was wearing a greasy vest and pyjama joined the conversation and said, “We have been asked to remove our shops. My village has been acquired for widening the road. If you come next time you may not find my shop. We are destroyed”.
I had a gush of pity for the stall owner. Zara, Indra, Kamal too got sympathetic to the vendor serving us food with so much love.
A boatman, thin towel on his shoulder, entered the shop and ordered a tea. “We are destroyed. Who will ride our boats, once the bridge comes up? The policemen have asked us to remove our huts and boats from the river bank. I was born on this bank and grew rowing boat which I had learnt from my forefathers. What we will do after the bridge is built”.
Zara asked her father, “What will happen to these vendors and boatmen?”
The Professor said, “These illiterate people are unable to see beyond their nose. The bridge—the biggest development project in post Independent India—will open many scopes of employment and earning. Moreover, the government will rehabilitate them. It’s not that they will be dumped in the river”.
The food seller was not convinced.
“Saheb! The policemen are breaking our houses without telling us where we have to go. We have so far not received a penny and are being asked to shut our shops. We have lost our sleep”, he said.
A group of vegetable sellers raised slogans outside the shop and the policemen caned them. “This is the problem in India. The people are backward and illiterate; they create hurdle in development work and there are certain political leaders who encourage anarchy”, the Professor said.
Zara was excited that she would get to drive her car from Patna to Muzaffarpur when the bridge was completed. The Professor said, “Zara! The small hurdles will not stop the bridge. You will drive us together in the car to Muzaffarpur through this bridge in our next trip”.
I was getting bored with all these talks. Indra and Kamal who belonged to Buxar which was connected to Patna with rail and road were not excited about it. They came to the hostel in train or bus and the bridge was of no use to them. I came from Siwan district of north Bihar and the bridge would have made my life easier. I could ride a bus in Siwan which could straightway bring me to Patna through the bridge. But I enjoyed travelling in steamer and boat. I loved seeing the river in flow and dolphins jumping on the surface. The bridge would shorten the travel distance and save time but I didn’t care for time.
Zara discussed about the economics of the bridge with her father sitting by her side as she drove back. We were whispering about smoking chillum and listening to the stories of the Ganga, Shiva, gods and ghosts with the hermit.
It was examination time. Indra and Kamal were in the second year and I was in the first year of Intermediate in Science --known as I. Sc in the curriculum. We were supposed to clear all the papers to get promoted. Indra and Kamal were quite studious. In their free time, they smoked chillum but studied hard for the examinations. They were conscious of their grades and marks. I was interested in just passing the examinations.
I enjoyed the company of the hermit more. Apart from the stories of Shiva, Parvati, Gods and ghosts, the hermit knew how the lion got to serve as the vehicle of Parvati, how Ganesha and Kartikeya chose rat and peacock to ride on and why lion which was Parvati’s vehicle didn’t eat the ox which was her husband’s vehicle. He knew about all gods, demons and ghosts who participated in the Shiva’s wedding procession at the door of Himanchal—Parvaty’s father. He also knew about Gautam Buddha and his several years of penance to attain enlightenment at Bodhgaya –100 kilometres south of Patna. I loved the sing song manner in which the hermit told the stories.
--3--
The examinations were over by May and summer vacation was declared. We planned to go for the boat ride ahead of leaving for our homes.
The University would re-open in July—middle of the monsoon when the Ganga was in full flow. It was risky to ride boat in heavy rains and swollen river. During the rainy seasons, the river submerged the fields across it. There was a long wall along its course in our side that protected us from the floods.
I was longing to meet the girl.
“What should I give her when I meet her?” I thought over and over.
I thought of two things: a book with picture of flowers or a colourful umbrella.
A day ahead of going for picnic I discussed with Indra and Kamal about the gift.
“I want to buy a gift for the girl who had given me rose”, I said to my friends.
Indra smiled and said, “Is she very beautiful? Does she love you?”
“I don’t know if she loves me but she is beautiful and I love her”.
Kamal said, “We should go to Patna market to buy something worth giving”.
Patna market which was at walking distance from us was known as the Piccadilly of India for its shops in fashion wears.
They rejected my idea of gifting book or umbrella.
“The umbrella will be of no use to her. It can’t save her against heavy rain or the harsh sun.”, Kamal said.
Wiser and more practical Indra said, “What will be the use of the book with picture of flowers for the girl who lives in real flowers? Moreover, a village girl, she might not be reading books”.
Kamal suggested that I should by buy a necklace like the one that Zara wears. Indra objected, “Zara wears a costly gold necklace that we can’t afford. If we buy an ordinary necklace it will lose its glaze and look dirty after sometime”.
Indra saw a watch shop and said, “We can buy a wrist watch for her. The wrist watch is a useful as well as fashionable. You can make her learn how to read time in the watch if she doesn’t know. It will be cheap and best”.
I liked Indra’s idea and we entered the shop. Indra asked for the complexion of the girl and when I said she was fair and had pink skin in her palm and fingers, he picked up a gold colour dial with black strap. It cost fifty rupees. I had thirty rupees in my pocket. Indra and Kamal contributed ten rupees each and helped me buy the watch that the shopkeeper gave me in a dainty case.
The sun was harsh when the boat proceeded next day. The boatman asked us to dangle our feet in the river and sprinkled water on us. He anchored the boat near a Peepal tree with thick foliage. Indra and Kamal got into their shorts and dived in the river. “You can go to the girl. We will swim for two hours”, Indra said. The boatman got busy arranging the fire woods in the tree shade. “It’s 11 am. You can return in two hours. By that time, litti-chokha will be ready. I will cook litti-chokha and will let Indra and Kamal swim their heart out”, he said.
I climbed up the bank and walked in the vast swathe of undulating sand. The wheat, mustard and maize crops had been harvested but the clusters of wet shrub huts nestling the betel leaves were there on the way to the flower field. The flower garden was two patches of betel leaves and a banana grove away. With a white cap on my head and the wrist watch held in my right hand I took to brisk walking in the prickly fields. Two cowherds, long bamboo batons across their shoulders and untidy turbans in their head escorting a herd of cows and buffalos, crossed my path.
“Will she be there in the garden?” I asked to myself, praying Lord Shiva which the hermit worshipped to get me meet her. The garden emerged as I walked beyond the banana grove.
I could see the creepers and flowers but the girl was missing. The garden was still two ploughed fields away and I had my heart in my mouth when I didn’t see her.
But she emerged from behind the trunk of oleander tree covered in pink and red blooms of bougainvillea as I walked closure. I sprinted my way to her and felt like hugging the girl wearing a yellow kurta and pink pyjama but I checked my temptation. I hadn’t dared to touch her fingers when I met her last and I was not sure how she would react to my excitement.
She came at the two meter tall fence to meet me.
“I had seen you but hid myself to surprise you”, she said, with bewitching smile. I had met her after two months but her eyes and lips were as fresh as I had seen them. She appeared willing to talk to me this time.
I raised my fist and showed her the watch.
“It is for you to wear”, I said stretching my hand beyond the fence to give her.
She guided me to cross the fence and escorted me behind the creepers of bougainvillea. She spread green leaves of oleander and hibiscus on the flour and asked me to sit down. She sat down facing me at a meter away and said, “It’s a village. The people don’t like girl and boy talking to each other. That’s why I have brought you in the cover the bushes”.
“You are so wise”, I said, looking in her eyes.
“Don’t stand up. The cowherds might be grazing cattle beyond banana leaves. We will be in trouble if they see us”, she said.
When I gave her the watch, she said, “It is so nice but I don’t know how to tie it in my wrist”.
I held her wrist and tied the strap around it; the muscle on it was as soft as wheat dough rounded in milk and honey. I held her wrist in my palm and softy pressed it. She let me keep her hand on my palm and looked lovingly in my face. She had winning eyes. I looked at her without speaking for a minute.
“I too have brought something for you”, she said opening a small wrap in the corner of her scarf. There were three yellow bananas and a bunch of velvety litchis in the wrap. She peeled off the prickly skin from a litchi with her rose petals like fingers and nails and put the soft pulp in my palm.
“Eat it, it is sweet and juicy”, she said.
“I am coming after two months. Did you bring the fruits every day”, I asked.
“I do visit the garden every day and bring the fruits to eat. Visiting the garden, plucking the flowers and sprucing its leaves are my routine work. It’s not that I visited it especially for you but I waited for you. You had told me that you would come again”, she said.
She peeled of another litchi and put it on my palm again. I tried to put it in her mouth with my hand. She blushed and pushed herself back. I didn’t insist further. I peeled off a banana and extended it to her lips. This time she opened her mouth and cut half of the fruit taking it in. I put rest of the banana in my mouth.
She smiled and said, “Aap bahut pyara ho (You are so lovely)”.
“You are the nicest and the prettiest”, I said.
“I presume you are a student and study in the college across the river”, she said.
I said, “You are right! I study in the college at Patna”.
“You will become a big saheb, one day, and will marry a Memsahib”, she said.
“I will marry you. You will be my memsahib. I won’t marry anyone else”, I said in a spontaneous gush of desire for her.
“I am a gardener girl. I can tell you everything about the flowers but can’t read and write. How can you marry me?”
“You are you my queen. You are beautiful than all the flowers. I love you”, I said.
She looked intensely in my face. I could see the stream of tender feelings for me in her eyes.
“By the way”, I said, “Tell me about the flowers”.
“The portulaca is unique. It blossoms the more the more the sun gets hot. It shrinks when the sun sinks”, she said.
I said, “You are no less than portulaca. The sun makes no difference with the glaze on your face. I haven’t seen anyone as beautiful as you”.
“If you won’t mind, I will tell you what I like and what I don’t”, she said.
“God ahead and tell without any hesitation!”
“I am a gardener girl; I sell the flowers in the Amba temple for living. I have to meet the priest every day to give him flowers. I don’t like him because he looks at me as if he will devour me with his eyes. I don’t want to sell the flowers to politicians either. I fear their eyes”.
“What do you expect from me?”
“I will grow flowers for you and decorate your home but you will never make me sell the followers to that priest and the politicians”.
I said, “I won’t let the priest and politicians to cast their shadow on you. You are my loveliest flower and you will do whatever you feel like. My Love! I won’t ask you do anything that you don’t like. I am feeling blessed that you have thought of marrying me”.
I was amazed by her knowledge not only of portulaca but many flowers. She knew the behaviour of all the flowers—marigold, dahlia, roses, bougainvillea, jasmine and oleander which were there in the field.
She said, “I have come here for the last time in the season. Tomorrow, my father will clear off the field which will be inundated by the river in the monsoon. He will plant the seeds again in October after the rains go. The flowers will bloom in January/February and I will begin coming here again”.
I said, “We too will go home in summer vacation. We will return in July when the monsoon will be in the full swing and the Ganga will be swollen. I will come in January and we will work out on our marriage”.
“My father was looking for my groom, this season. But the marriage season is over and he will stop searching it now. I will wait for you”, she said.
I said, “Discuss about me with your father; I will meet him when I come next”.
She was perplexed and said, “No, I can’t discuss with my father. He will get angry. I will not show the wrist watch to him either. I will show it to my elder sister who is married and has a baby when she comes next month. I will tell her about you and she will talk to our mother. She understands me”.
I understood that she was interested in me and she would work to facilitate our marriage in her own way. I asked about her village. She raised her index finger showing me a village surrounded by mango, guava, banana groves and bougainvillea and jasmine creepers at some distance. “It is the village of gardeners. All of us have planted flowers at our doors. We have beautiful huts with creepers of bougainvillea and jasmine spread on them. There are butterflies and dragon flies of various hues. The trees have nests of honeybees. You will enjoy the fragrance of flowers and honey at our village”, she said.
She was seated a meter away from me but had placed her palm in my palm. Her palm was like red hibiscus blossom and nails like pink calendula petals.
She said, “It’s already late. My mother might be looking for me”.
I expressed the desire to kiss her lips.
She blushed but allowed me to touch her cheeks and eyes with my fingers.
“Wheat and mustards have been harvested and the fields are bare. You never know! A cowherd can spring up and see us and we will be in trouble”, she said, promising, “I will let you kiss me when you visit next time and we have tall maize crops around. We will go in the thick of the maize field and I will let you kiss me as long as you wish”, she said.
She gave me a red marigold blossom and softly pinched my nose with her thumb and index finger. I caressed her lips and cheeks and parted.
While returning I looked back till she disappeared beyond the banana plantation with the basket full with blossoms on her head. She also turned to look at me. The sun was up in the sky and its rays beat down the earth but I felt a cool fragrance caressing me. It was, perhaps, the happiest moment in my life. Indra, Kamal and the boatman welcomed me with litti chokha under the Peepal shade. They were happy that I had met her.
“What is her name?” Indra asked.
I was embarrassed because I had not asked her name.
“No problem! Call her by the name of Flower Girl”, Indra said.
We ferried back to our hostel. Next day, Kamal and Indra had taken the train to to Buxar and I had boarded a steamer at Mahendru Ghat to cross the Ganga and alight at Pahleja ghat from where I picked up train to reach my native place on the Bihar-Uttar Pradesh borders known as Purvanchal region of India.
--4--
I lived with my grandfather, a fantastic folktale teller and avid newspaper reader at my village. The monsoon had broken out and peasants ploughed muddied field to sow paddy seeds. It rained intermittently and black and gray clouds hovered in the sky. The peasants sang ballads of Allha-Rudal at our door in the evening and grandfather explained to me the story of the heroics of Allah-Rudal—legendry warriors of their time.
Our college was to open on July 20 and my grandfather informed me that the bridge on the Ganga—known as Mahatma Gandhi setu-- had gone operational. He had read in the newspapers that the Prime Minister, Indira Gandhi had inaugurated it and I was no longer required to take the train from Siwan to Pahleja Ghat as I could board a bus that would drop me near my hostel. I boarded the bus.
I tried to look towards the bank across our hostel from the window as the bus hit the bridge but it sped past the 5.575 kilometre bridge within five minutes. The river was swollen and water had spread all over on what were the dried fields. I could see the top of some tall trees and roofs of thatched houses that looked like floating in water from the speeding vehicle.
Indra and Kamal who had reached earlier welcomed me at the hostel. The sun had gone down and after lodging my bag in my room, we went to the hermit. The hermit was happy to meet us. We were seeing him after over two months. He shared chillum with us and gave us pudding to eat.
The hermit was unique. He didn’t talk to those who avoided him but he was not bitter to anyone. He never bragged or boasted. The hostel superintendent hated him because he thought that by making the students smoke chillum he would spoil them. He scolded us for meeting the hermit but Zara relished teaching Indra and Kamal. Since I lived with them, she couldn’t have ignored me though she was more comfortable with them.
One evening Zara invited us for snacks of fried egg plants, potato and tea. Zara told me, “Indra and Kamal have spoiled themselves by smoking chillum with that wretched hermit. You are relatively new to the hostel and you should avoid getting addicted to chillum”.
“Okay, I will keep your advice in my mind”, I said on her face but thought of discussing it with the hermit.
“The Professor and his daughter advice us against keeping your company and smoking chillum”, I said to the hermit.
The hermit said, “Keeping my company and smoking chillum are two different issues. You can choose your friends according to your own like and dislike. As a Sanyasi I have good wishes for everyone. It doesn’t matter if you come to me or not. As regards smoking chillum, excess of everything is bad. You are a student and as such you shouldn’t do something that comes in the way of your studies. Yes, there are several herbs and plants in the nature that enliven our mood. It will give you joy if you use them judiciously and it will harm you if you indulge excessively in its pleasure”.
The hermit never spoke anything against anyone. He was egalitarian in his outlook. He always encouraged us.
I had scored reasonably well in my language papers but poorly in mathematics. I asked the hermit, “I don’t like solving sums and don’t do well in the subject”
The hermit said, “You should pursue what you like. If you enjoy the languages you should focus on it and leave out what you don’t enjoy”.
“If I don’t score well in the sums I can fail”.
He said, “Never think in terms success and failure. It’s meaningless. Focus on your interests and be honest to yourself. Be happy and leave the rest to Lord Shiva. I became a ‘sanyasi’ when I was eleven years old because I was interested in exploring the meaning of our existence. I do what I want to do and you should do what you want to but we shouldn’t hurt others”.
I had no reason to leave the company of the hermit whose words solaced me and he never spoke anything against anyone.
Zara and the Professor, one day, took us to Muzaffarpur through the bridge. The four-lane approach road –capped with street lights—had come up on the bazaar we had eaten loafs and cauliflower at and shops of vegetables, bangles, towels, nail paints and talcum powder had vanished. The boats and boatmen were missing. “The bank is cleared off encroachment”, the Professor said. Zara was enjoying her drive.
“The loaf and cauliflower that we ate at the small hut was very tasty”, Indra reminisced.
“But it was not clean and hygienic. Zara had pain in her stomach that evening”, the Professor said.
“We will stop at a decent restaurant on the highway across the bridge to have our meal”, Zara said.
All of us were served naan and chicken curry in clean plates by a decently dressed waiter at the restaurant.
“More and more such restaurants will come up on the road with the bridge coming up”, the Professor said, elucidating on the perspective of development. We were more interested in eating the naan and chicken than listening to him.
Zara drove us at their bungalow at Muzaffarpur. It was in the middle of the city. Zara’s old grandparents were happy to see her coming in the car for the first time and the Professor introduced us to them. A servant brought tea and snacks for us. Zara took us in the market leaving the Professor to talk to his parents. She made us see a school in which she had studied when she was small.
When we were returning, the Professor said, “By the end of the monsoon, the government will begin work to build a driveway along the river Ganga that will pass through our hostel. The river bank near us will be cleared off the temple, the chillum smoking hermit, huts of boatmen and cowherds for the sixty fit wide driveway that will connect our college with the bridge. Then it will become easier for us to take our car on the bridge and reach Muzaffarpur in less time”.
Indra, Kamal and I instantly got upset at the Professor’s prophesy. “What is the need of driveway near our college? Will the boatman who takes us on picnic be driven out? Where will the hermit go if the temple is removed?” Kamal asked.
The professor said, “The hermit is a big nuisance. He will have to go. As regards, the boatmen, they have illegally encroached upon the banks. Motor boats will replace the unsafe skiffs that they row in swirling waters. You can ride the motorboats for your picnics. The motorboats will serve you good food and clean drinking water. Nobody will stop you from swimming in the river”.
Zara was happy but none of us liked the Professor’s words.
“We are not interested in the driveway near our hostel. We love the boatman and the hermit. They do us no harm”, Indra said.
Kamal added, “We will chase out the government officials if they come to interfere with the area near our hostel”.
I strongly supported my friends. The professor said, “Don’t think recklessly. You will live in the hostel for two years. The government has the long term development vision. If you impede the government’s work, you will be arrested and lodged in jail. Your career will be spoiled”.
Zara dropped us at our hostel and entered in her campus adjacent to it.
“I won’t go to Zara and Professor now. I don’t like them”, I said when we left the car.
“We too will not go to them. They speak against everything we love—Sanyasi ji and boatman”, Indra said.
Kamal said, “The Professor has a car and Zara loves driving. The Professor is selfish; he does everything to please his daughter. They talk all rubbish about Sanyasi ji and the boatman who are so nice to us”.
We lived more with the hermit. The river was swollen and the boatman fished in the river but we avoided riding the boat in the swollen river. The river looked like the sea with the swirling waters leaping and falling in waves. The surface of water met the sky full with black and gray fluff of clouds roaring intermittently at the distance. No landmass was visible.
--5--
The monsoon gave way to spring and spring followed the winter. Waters receded and now we could see the bank and landscape across the river. We got the hint of the Professor’s prophesy coming true when the boatman, one day, said that he had been served notice to vacate the area for the driveway to come up along the river. The newspapers of the day also said that the work to build the driveway had begun near the bridge. There was sense of unease among the boatmen settled in makeshift huts near us. The locals feared that the Shiva temple too might be removed.
But there was no disquiet on the hermit’s face. He hardly went to the city but, he would swim 200 kilometres along the river course, brass tumbler fastened in his head, to reach Shiva temple in Varanasi on the bank of the Ganga once in a year or whenever he felt like.
“The temple might be removed as the government is building driveway”, I said melancholically to the hermit.
“It doesn’t matter. I will go to another place along the river course”, he said with usual calmness. His ash smeared forehead glistened above his broad shoulders and flat stomach. He was always calm and composed.
We planned to go for picnic on January 1 to celebrate New Year. I was excited to meet the girl who had asked me to come in January. Indra and Kamal knew about my emotion for her. We bought a blue sweater for her.
“It is too cold. We won’t bathe in the river. We will bask in the sun on the bank and cook litti-chokha with the boatman. You can go to meet her in the garden”, Indra said as the boat proceeded. The boatman was tensed. “I don’t know how long I will be able to row the boat. They might evacuate us in a few months”, he said. Kamal said, “Don’t worry. We will try to stall the work. We will organise students to protest against the driveway”.
Indra, Kamal and the boatman sat, basking in the pale sun and I left for the field of flowers to meet my love.
I was in for a rude shock. As I crossed the banana grove I saw over twenty workers with spades and baskets filling earth and bricks where the flower garden existed. Five tractors and a truck loaded with rods, bricks and stone chips were lined up on the upcoming road adjacent to where I had met her.
I enquired about the flower field and the girl from the workers. They suggested me to speak to ‘Engineer Sahib’ wearing a leather blazer and black pants, and sauntering busily on the site.
“Where are the girl and the flower garden?” I asked the man.
“Who was that girl? It’s my field. I am converting it into a motel”.
“The girl was tall and beautiful. She had the flower garden here”, I said.
“My father had given the field to a gardener of the gardeners’ village. The gardeners were evacuated after the village fell in the road. They have gone to some other places”, he said, waving his index finger at the place which the girl had suggested as her place. The men and machines were working at what had lush green groves and flowers.
I was devastated.
The man came to me speaking softly, “Do you know the name of the girl?”
“No”.
He said, “It is hard to find her out. Even if you knew her name it would not have helped. The gardeners left the village two months ago. They have gone to other places which we don’t know”.
I had lost all hope. Still I begged, “Can you help me locate the girl?”
He said, “I did not live at our village. I completed my engineering from IIT, Khadagpur and came back only last month. I am getting a motel built that would fetch better dividends with the bridge on the Ganaga coming up close by. You can see a new road connecting this place with Vaishali is coming up. There is no use of growing flowers and paddy now”.
I was lost in the whir of the machines, dust leaping and workers sinking in and lifting up their spades. To me the men and machines looked like an army of marauders who had cruelly murdered my sweetheart and were gleefully filling earth on her grave. I felt guilty of not asking her name. The bumblebees, the butterflies and the dragon flies had all vanished.
“What are you doing here? Get up”, Indra who held my hairs and pulled me out of the pit said.
I didn’t know when I had come near the banana grove and had fallen with my face down in the mud and dust.
Indra and Kamal had come searching for me when I had not returned for long. They had assessed the situation and had understood the reason of my despondency. My face was stuck with mud and tears.
“Don’t get sad. We know how much you loved her and how hard it is for you to forget her. We will try to locate her for you”, Kamal said.
Indra said, “I don’t know if we will ever find her but we will never leave you. Let us meet the hermit. He can suggest some ways”. My friends gathered the sweater lying on the earth. Indra had his eyes numb, inspecting the sweater. Kamal wiped my tears with his handkerchief.
We returned in the boat. “I will arrange a cart to sell vegetables in the city. They won’t let me live at the ghat and row my boat”, the boatman said, looking at the oars as if he was rowing his boat for the last time. He had grown rowing the boat. Pal of sadness was palpable on his face. We had no clue to empathise with the boatman who loved us as much as he loved his own life and family.
I kept lying in my bed for two days. Indra and Kamal didn’t come to me. Perhaps, they thought it wise to let me be with my grief. On the third morning, I reached to the hermit who was loading marijuana leaves in the chillum; I had that sweater wrapped around my neck. The hermit was as calm as the river.
“Sanyasi ji! I am destroyed. Is there a way I can get my Flower Girl?” I asked.
He looked at me, smiling, and said “My boy! You will keep on getting the spells of grief and happiness. This is how the world has been structured. Day follows the night and night follows the day—no spell lasts forever. Your grief too will not last. There will come the moment of happiness”.
“How can my grief go? I can’t forget my Flower Girl?”
“At this stage I can’t tell you much but I will pray Lord Shiva to get your love back. Have faith in Shiva”, he said.
“Sanyasi ji! I will worship you for whole my life if you get my love back. I will give her this sweater and will never leave her once I meet her”.
The boatman with potato, onion, cauliflowers and pumpkins on his cart was going towards the city. The hermit called him and gave him his cow. “Take care of the cow, it will give milk which you and your family members can drink and sell,” the hermit said to the boatman turned vegetable seller. The boatman accepted the cow with gratitude.
Then the hermit turned back to me and said, “Don’t keep this sweater. Give it to someone who needs it. If it is not used it will lose its utility”.
“But I have kept it for my Flower Girl”, I objected.
The hermit said, “My boy! I gave the cow to the boatman because he needs it more than me today. I loved the cow, offered her milk on Lord Shiva and drank it. The omnipotent Shiva and I, a worshiper of Shiva, are capable of getting the milk and cow but the boatman faced with the threat of losing his job and home needs it more. Similarly, your love is not dependent on the gift of your sweater which can be of the use of a needy one. Give it to a needy and leave on us—Shiva and my prayers—to get your love back”.
The hermit suddenly fastened his tumbler in his head and dived into the river in the chill of January and began swimming like a flying fish. Within seconds he disappeared in the streams meandering along the banks dotted with ubiquitous huts and houses.
The suddenness of event left me nonplussed.
Indra came to me patting on my shoulder, “The hermit today left the bank. He won’t return now”.
Aghast, I said, “But he said he would pray Lord Shiva to get my love back”.
Indra said, “That he will do. He is a Sanyasi. He will do it in his own way which we may not understand”.
I gave the sweater to the boatman’s wife who blessed me profusely.
--6--
Fifteen years had rolled by since we had left the college and had shifted Delhi, capital of India. Indra and Kamal were diligent students. Indra had qualified the Indian civil services examinations and was an officer with the foreign affairs’ office of India. Kamal was a brilliant lawyers practicing in the Supreme Court and earning huge money.
I was a big failure. My problem was I wrote very long answers. There were five questions of 20 marks each in all the six papers of B.A -History Honours’ examinations. I had a very poor sense of timing. I used to begin writing the answer of first question and kept writing all through the three hours allotted for answering five questions. I used to get twenty marks each in all the six papers. I failed to clear my B.A (Honours) examinations in two attempts. I was a butt of ridicule for teachers and students but Indra and Kamal loved me.
Indra had got a bungalow for him in a posh colony of Delhi. Kamal used to drop at his house every evening to chat and have drinks. Indra spared a good room for me and Kamal would buy as good cloths for me as for himself. I had begun writing stories for magazines. The magazines sometimes published my stories and sometime rejected them. I used to receive the cheques of rupees one hundred or two hundreds once in a while. But Indra would collect all my money, calling Kamal and buying booze. “Your money is for the party”, he would say. They took care of my needs—car to go wherever I wanted, cloths to wear and food to eat. His servants and driver honoured me. Kamal would put a wad of currency notes in my pocket telling, “You are as rich as we are. Indra and I earn enough; you are not required to think of money”.
It was about a year ago Indra had got me engaged with Annabel. Annabel was a researcher in Indology. Her husband, Oliver was a senior executive with the British High Commission in Delhi and was Indra’s friend. Annabel and Oliver had a ten years old son, Harry and they were looking for a tutor who could teach Harry Indian languages in English medium. The couple wanted the tutor to teach their son in the manner of telling stories. Indra recommended me and they found me suitable for the job. They paid me two thousand rupees per month for the tuition which was a handsome amount.
Annabel, one day, saw my story on Amrapali— a legendary character of Indian history in a London based magazine.
Amrapali’s parents were not known. A peasant had found the infant Amrapali in a mango grove and raised her. Amrapali grew as eternal beauty and courtesan of Vaishali—the first republic empire in the ancient world and capital city of the Lichhavi rulers. Amrapali was extraordinarily beautiful and her charm spread far and wide alluring the rich and nobles. The Magadha king, Bimbisara wished to make her as her consort and invaded Vaishali. To save Vaishali from the ravaging Bimbisara, Amrapali became his consort had a son Vimal Kondana with him. When Ajatshatru became the king of Magadha he too invaded and ravaged Vaishali for her but she had rejected him. Because of the quirk of circumstances she was known as ‘nagarbadhu (city courtesan)”. Later, she went to Lord Buddha and joined the Buddhist order.
Amrapali for thousands of years has been a huge character of history and Indians have various varieties of mangoes in her name. There are lakhs of shops, restaurants, hotels and villages in her name. The Corporate houses showcase the painting and images of Amrapali to augment their brand value.
Having seen my story on Amrapali, Annabel had discovered in me merit to help her with her project.
Annabel didn’t know that I had picked up Amrapali in keeping with the demand and style of the magazine that had commissioned me to write the story. No Amrapali or Cinderella could have replaced my Flower Girl in my heart. I guarded my Flower Girl’s memory and sulked for her in my loneliness but didn’t share her with anyone. Indra and Kamal knew about it but they avoided discussing it for fear of touching my raw nerves. I didn’t write on my Flower Girl, she was not the subject for me to earn a few ponds or dollars.
The motel had come up long ago and I would see it when I travelled in a bus for my native place once in two or three years. I used to shut my eyes when the bus passed off from that place.
Annabel bought air tickets for us and planned to stay in Patna for researching on Amrapali. As per the initial plan, we had to travel to Vaishali in a car via the Mahatma Gandhi Setu, spend time at the related archaeological sites and come back to Patna—a city with better hotels and malls. The Ganga had disappeared and skyscrapers had come up in the river bed along Patna which held no attraction for me now but I had agreed to travel with her to Patna and Vaishali to assist her with her project.
However, when we were travelling in Vaishali, Annabel saw the motel and stopped the car. She had overruled my objections and I had reluctantly entered in the motel with her.
When we were having our dinner together in the motel’s restaurant, she picked up Amrapali for discussion with me.
I was in foul mood and I said, “This motel has come up on the debris of my Flower Girl. My Flower Girl was far more beautiful than Amrapali. I am not interested in discussing Amrapali any longer”.
Annabel was flabbergasted and said, “You are talking all nonsense. Who was your Flower Girl? How could she be superior to Amrapali?”
I said, “To me Amrapali is nothing before my Flower Girl”.
We were down with two pegs of whisky. She said, “I don’t know how you write your stories. You are such a stupid guy. You are talking about someone who is not a historical character. You don’t know even her name. I don’t think you were honest to her, otherwise, you would have known her name”.
I lost my cool and got up in huff, leaving Annabel and went to my room.
My sweetheart had come in my dream. She was lying in my arms and she said, “I had promised you that I would let you kiss me as long as you wish when I met you last. Kiss me and take me with you. We will never get separated now”, Flower Girl said to me.
It was at this stage the phone rang. Soon I heard the knock on my door. I opened the door to find Annabel standing. “Munna! I am very sorry I hurt you. I was under the influence of liquor and I couldn’t fathom the intensity of your love for your sweetheart. We will have coffee together and will discuss your sweetheart. I felt guilty when you left. I am sorry”, she said.
Annabel was, actually, not at fault at all. She had done no wrong. I realised it and went to her room to have coffee with her.
“We will leave the place today. I won’t insist on staying at the place which has bad memory about your beloved. Take it easy”, Annabel said.
I said, “No, Annabel. I too hurt you out of my frustration. I will help you doing your project. My wound is my wound. Why should I vent my pain on you?”Annabel pated on my head and said, “In any case, we will not stay here this evening. I can’t give you your sweetheart back but I won’t hurt you”.
After the coffee and breakfast we left the motel for Vaishali—which had a Buddhist shrine and ruins of the place where the peasant had found Amrapali when she was an infant.
Annabel went inside the ruins to inspect the site, suggesting me to stay out and interview some people who would speak in Hindi for her project.
I saw the hermit who had now black and gray beards on his face. He was wandering in mango grove with the same tumbler with which he had jumped in the river before my eyes; fifteen years ago but his ash smeared forehead was glistening as usual. I spontaneously headed to him.
“Munna! Come on. We are meeting after fifteen years. We will have chillum together”, he said, smiling at me.
He had recognised me.
I went close to him and said, “Sanyasi ji! You had told me that you would pray Lord Shiva and help me meet my beloved”.
He lighted the chillum and said, calmly, “Yes! I have got your sweetheart for you”.
My eyes sparkled and I said, “Where she is?”
The hermit said, “Your sweetheart is Phoolpali. Amrapali was found in Mango orchard. Amra is a Sanskrit word that means mango and Amrapali means the one found in mango grove. You found your sweetheart in flowers. Phool means flowers and, thus, Phoolpali means the one found in flowers”.
“But where is she?” I asked restively.
The hermit said, “Your Phoolpali is as young and as beautiful as you had found her fifteen years ago. She will remain young and beautiful as long as the world lasts. She will never get old. Today, you saw her. Did you find any change in her? No! She is yours; she will never come to anyone else. And when she comes to you she will make you feel as young as you were when you met her. She will keep on coming to you, my boy. You are right. Your Phoolpali is more beautiful than an Amrapali or a Cinderella. Wish you happy dreams with your Phoolpali”.
“When This Ends”
Lips brush my collarbone
Endless streams of seeping apologies.
Overfilled jam, sickly and fragrant,
Only Black Opium could compete.
Tangled limbs amidst polished blades
My, how we’ve grown alone
While the world shifted outside our doors.
How we carried on those nights,
staring at pixelated faces—disconnected longing.
Later, we shatter our past
spooning rose jam,
dripping down our quivering lips.
Let’s embrace like the world can pause
Since now we know it can.
“Sick Time”
Against early summer heat
Winter sleet still hit our cheeks
Time comfortable in our palms
Our skin dampens
Heavy and robust
We made plans to meet
On that broken street
But the clock ticked on
The gates shall close
Time trickled
you stayed put
Until the sirens rang
warning of fading souls
Did you head my cries
Let time antagonize
By my window, I look on
Tears at your pointless haunt
Our plans to meet
Deemed obsolete
“Distancing”
where no other soul is found
a warning crash
a looming splash
glances and sighs
hands between strong thighs
Police about, watch out!
two hearts on the run
nothing can trump our fun
oh! how selfish we must be,
taunting God with glee
graced in company
sand between our toes
embracing much too close.
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