Funeral
Here the rituals of death are elaborate- a thirteen- day period of hard abstinence- you can’t comb your hair or sleep in bed or wear stitched clothes. Family, neighbors, friends keep coming in and going, and all the time is spent in talking about the dead. The wife and the mother weep uncontrollably, faint intermittently, and are consoled by other weeping women. The men make the funeral arrangements- firewood, incense, white sheet to cover the dead from head to toe, so that the decay doesn’t show.
There is a buzz in the house and the children run about happy to see their cousins suddenly home. Even a somnambulant home, which has only always followed a well-beaten schedule, comes alive when there is a death. The rituals of the everyday are broken, the faceless, nameless woman of the house is suddenly given a lot of attention. In between the weeping you notice how she looks around her to see who has come to visit. Her tears go dry in a few hours but she must weep. She has lost her husband, the father of her young children. But she glows today as on her wedding day.
This is the last that she will be the centre of anything.
The crowd thins from next day onwards. People have to get back to work, children have school, board exams, maids to attend to.
The end of the period of abstinence is marked by a feast on the thirteenth day. The photograph of the dead is ceremoniously garlanded, and house is now ready to slip back into its old schedule. The woman does the same things as before- sans vermillion, sans some glass bangles. She looks at her wedding photographs when she is alone or when a sister comes visiting some months later.
The garland will not be changed after some time and the photograph will gather dust. Later the living will be much older than the dead. Then there will be forgetting.
Finally, the mourning will be over.
Always.
Tuesday, October 09, 2007
Friday, December 08, 2006
Growing Old
We were not prepared for a world without postmen and time. We did not know what they taught us at school will turn out all wrong. We did not know that we will be the last to remember.
It has been years since I bought a bottle of ink
.
There was a boy I knew from my young-time. His dark skin shone in the sun and in his bag he carried songs and paintbrushes. His sister had bought him shoes he would wear for years. And his eyes would always be wet with too much love. And all the women loved him as their own kind. And all his aunts and sisters would tell him their secrets and would know they were beautiful because he said so. The river in the city would grow kaansh in autumn and only he could see it pink. Imagine! And he had a brother who was a tramp but who knew Latin and an old teacher who dyed his hair red in autumn, who had a mind as fine as a woman’s lies but would forget his mornings from his nights.
The bridges across the river are too big these days and the kaansh is just a speck at a distance.
They are all dead now- the sisters and aunts and old teachers, the river and my friend from young –time.
There are plenty of shops around but you cannot get a bottle of ink that easily. But there are many things to choose from and you can get everything else.
And everybody I see is beautiful. They don’t have friends from young-time for they are all young, them. And they don’t remember for they know no yesterday.
And they are all taught well in schools and what they know is very relevant. They achieve all their plans and they never play the shoeshine boy. And they they never get letters in inlands and they have no time. They are all young, them. Their clothes fit them well and they all walk in step. They know not that the river is dead and that the kaansh could be pink.
I stare bewildered at this terrifying nowness and the forever young.
I walk around in my grey oversized jacket looking for ways of growing old.
We were not prepared for a world without postmen and time. We did not know what they taught us at school will turn out all wrong. We did not know that we will be the last to remember.
It has been years since I bought a bottle of ink
.
There was a boy I knew from my young-time. His dark skin shone in the sun and in his bag he carried songs and paintbrushes. His sister had bought him shoes he would wear for years. And his eyes would always be wet with too much love. And all the women loved him as their own kind. And all his aunts and sisters would tell him their secrets and would know they were beautiful because he said so. The river in the city would grow kaansh in autumn and only he could see it pink. Imagine! And he had a brother who was a tramp but who knew Latin and an old teacher who dyed his hair red in autumn, who had a mind as fine as a woman’s lies but would forget his mornings from his nights.
The bridges across the river are too big these days and the kaansh is just a speck at a distance.
They are all dead now- the sisters and aunts and old teachers, the river and my friend from young –time.
There are plenty of shops around but you cannot get a bottle of ink that easily. But there are many things to choose from and you can get everything else.
And everybody I see is beautiful. They don’t have friends from young-time for they are all young, them. And they don’t remember for they know no yesterday.
And they are all taught well in schools and what they know is very relevant. They achieve all their plans and they never play the shoeshine boy. And they they never get letters in inlands and they have no time. They are all young, them. Their clothes fit them well and they all walk in step. They know not that the river is dead and that the kaansh could be pink.
I stare bewildered at this terrifying nowness and the forever young.
I walk around in my grey oversized jacket looking for ways of growing old.
Wednesday, November 22, 2006
November
Rain-stained November. There should be white flowers on my table and my arms four and some light from far away flicker into my eyes and yours and the noise of the city- shifting lanes, brakes, honk!honk!, hurried shoes, rush homewards, all that outside- quieter than our breath, quieter than the trickle on the window pane of my one room house-drop, drop, drop, drop, drop.
There is November. And just some rain.
Rain-stained November. There should be white flowers on my table and my arms four and some light from far away flicker into my eyes and yours and the noise of the city- shifting lanes, brakes, honk!honk!, hurried shoes, rush homewards, all that outside- quieter than our breath, quieter than the trickle on the window pane of my one room house-drop, drop, drop, drop, drop.
There is November. And just some rain.
Monday, October 30, 2006
Malu and her Son
Malu was this mountain girl who came far, very far away from home to the sea-town of fish and oil and ships. Malu is also a tree that lines the hills and its leaves look like the palms of a mother’s hand. If you love someone desperately in the hills you call her Malu.
Malu was the most loved in her family and fed on a diet of milk and curd. Her skin was the smooth of butter and her eyes like the shade of a gentle cow. The mountains then were green and rain-fresh and Malu would always remember them that way far, far away in the sea town of fish and oil and ships.
The sea town would ring with the song of the mountains and it would never leave Saral, born in the sea town of fish and oil and ships, the plaintive song of the mountains- plaintive for distance and longing, would never leave him, O leave him never, never.
When Malu was big with Saral, they said she would die. She did not eat a morsel and saw the sky in a swirl. Malu was often alone those days, and though she could read little, would want to write the story of the poor poet and his life. Malu did not know then that words are dangerous, and that they suck up men and scenes and happiness. They can take the shimmer from a flower and love from a heart and pattern in a poem or a tale.
When it would thunder at night, Malu would hold her son tight, cheek against cheek and both would look out of the window in fright and delight. There was this crow that came to the kitchen window everyday and Malu and her son would call him Blackie and blackie would come everyday and everyday was a happy day- a new word learnt, a new lie learnt.
The mangled chain of words and pain and longing and mountain-fret tied Malu and her son like a noose around a dead man’s neck.
Though Malu was a mountain girl she cannot forget the sea now. The sea town and the ships, now far away, where Saral was born. And she cannot forget the first words learnt and she cannot forget Blackie and cries now because she wanted to write the story of a poor poet and his life.
Malu and her son.
Malu
And
Her Son.
Malu is still nineteen though she is grey and old and frail. With her legs stretched on her bed she only speaks of the time when she was big with Saral and how she almost died. She tires people with her jabber and bores them with stories of Saral and how he learnt a new word everyday.
Saral learnt the words very well. Words that carry the ring of the mountain song and the chatter of the bird that came to the window sill everyday and the warmth of a cheek in a wet, rainy night. Words that pattern a poem and suck love out of one’s heart.
Though words change much and words change all but even now, the malu lines the way to the hills and its leaves still touch like the palm of a mother’s hands.
Malu was this mountain girl who came far, very far away from home to the sea-town of fish and oil and ships. Malu is also a tree that lines the hills and its leaves look like the palms of a mother’s hand. If you love someone desperately in the hills you call her Malu.
Malu was the most loved in her family and fed on a diet of milk and curd. Her skin was the smooth of butter and her eyes like the shade of a gentle cow. The mountains then were green and rain-fresh and Malu would always remember them that way far, far away in the sea town of fish and oil and ships.
The sea town would ring with the song of the mountains and it would never leave Saral, born in the sea town of fish and oil and ships, the plaintive song of the mountains- plaintive for distance and longing, would never leave him, O leave him never, never.
When Malu was big with Saral, they said she would die. She did not eat a morsel and saw the sky in a swirl. Malu was often alone those days, and though she could read little, would want to write the story of the poor poet and his life. Malu did not know then that words are dangerous, and that they suck up men and scenes and happiness. They can take the shimmer from a flower and love from a heart and pattern in a poem or a tale.
When it would thunder at night, Malu would hold her son tight, cheek against cheek and both would look out of the window in fright and delight. There was this crow that came to the kitchen window everyday and Malu and her son would call him Blackie and blackie would come everyday and everyday was a happy day- a new word learnt, a new lie learnt.
The mangled chain of words and pain and longing and mountain-fret tied Malu and her son like a noose around a dead man’s neck.
Though Malu was a mountain girl she cannot forget the sea now. The sea town and the ships, now far away, where Saral was born. And she cannot forget the first words learnt and she cannot forget Blackie and cries now because she wanted to write the story of a poor poet and his life.
Malu and her son.
Malu
And
Her Son.
Malu is still nineteen though she is grey and old and frail. With her legs stretched on her bed she only speaks of the time when she was big with Saral and how she almost died. She tires people with her jabber and bores them with stories of Saral and how he learnt a new word everyday.
Saral learnt the words very well. Words that carry the ring of the mountain song and the chatter of the bird that came to the window sill everyday and the warmth of a cheek in a wet, rainy night. Words that pattern a poem and suck love out of one’s heart.
Though words change much and words change all but even now, the malu lines the way to the hills and its leaves still touch like the palm of a mother’s hands.
Saturday, October 28, 2006
The Poet and the Scholar
For a long time I have argued with a poet and a scholar, both whose opinions and work I value immensely, on the significance of the vocation of studying literature. Being argumentative by nature and training, I have, on several occasions, defended the pursuit of writing over criticism with the scholar, and the importance of critical reflection as an independent form with the poet. I am sure it is possible to align a balance between the two pursuits in one’s engagement with literature, and my double- speak is perhaps indicative of the need to recognize this complementarity.
I have rarely doubted the merit of learning the skill to read effectively and with insight. I am good with anwers and can manipulate a linguistic game effortlesslessly. But one afternoon I was asked to explain the difference between a story and an argument and sometime later was asked to tell a lie that will make one happy. The scholar asked me the first question, and the poet posed the knotted - riddle to me one difficult evening. The questions have bothered me ever since.
I have no satisfactory answer to the first question though there are many possible, tentative suggestions- for instance; an argument rests on details that ultimately cohere whereas in a story they need not. An argument needs a defining consciousness; a story can have no center at all. But these suggestions are very provisional and can collapse at the slightest intellectually rigorous nudge.
And how does one tell a lie that can make you happy?
How does one begin to address this demand?
The vocation of writing and studying literature, perhaps, rests on the difficulty that these two questions pose. The object and objective of literature have always been regarded with some suspicion and cynicism. Astronomers do space, historians do the past, sociologists do society, engineers do bridges, but what do you do, poet? And critic, what the hell do you do?
Critical practitioners having found a space in the university have tried to defend their jobs by responding to the question value in varying degrees of confidence, tentativeness, self-righteousness and surrender.
Poets being generically more stylish than critics often say-“nothing” or “is there anything else worth doing” to the question of doing. Many being loners, hardly get into conversations and so the question of value remains unasked.
The question of value, nevertheless, is an important one. The social relevance of writing and reading can be calibrated in terms of literature’s relationship to politics. Though complex in itself, the politics of relevance is a well-documented and enquired one.
But when one chooses literature as a life-vocation as a writer or a reader, the issue of value perhaps also needs to be philosophically and existentially relevant. And this brings me back repeatedly to the questions that the scholar and the poet threw at me.
How does one explain the value of writing a poem or the pleasure one derives from reading it?
Interestingly, both the poet and the scholar suggested to me, at different times, to read Joyce’s “Dead” to understand the process of writing and reading literature.
It would be easy to write a long meditation on the story. I can do it and do it very well. But I am not sure any more if it is the story that I would be explaining. And why do I need to explain the story at all? Can it be done in the form of an argument or a story? And is the story a lie that made me happy?
These difficulties remain.
The poet and the scholar are my constant companions. Sometimes as people, sometimes as voices and sometimes as my selves.
For a long time I have argued with a poet and a scholar, both whose opinions and work I value immensely, on the significance of the vocation of studying literature. Being argumentative by nature and training, I have, on several occasions, defended the pursuit of writing over criticism with the scholar, and the importance of critical reflection as an independent form with the poet. I am sure it is possible to align a balance between the two pursuits in one’s engagement with literature, and my double- speak is perhaps indicative of the need to recognize this complementarity.
I have rarely doubted the merit of learning the skill to read effectively and with insight. I am good with anwers and can manipulate a linguistic game effortlesslessly. But one afternoon I was asked to explain the difference between a story and an argument and sometime later was asked to tell a lie that will make one happy. The scholar asked me the first question, and the poet posed the knotted - riddle to me one difficult evening. The questions have bothered me ever since.
I have no satisfactory answer to the first question though there are many possible, tentative suggestions- for instance; an argument rests on details that ultimately cohere whereas in a story they need not. An argument needs a defining consciousness; a story can have no center at all. But these suggestions are very provisional and can collapse at the slightest intellectually rigorous nudge.
And how does one tell a lie that can make you happy?
How does one begin to address this demand?
The vocation of writing and studying literature, perhaps, rests on the difficulty that these two questions pose. The object and objective of literature have always been regarded with some suspicion and cynicism. Astronomers do space, historians do the past, sociologists do society, engineers do bridges, but what do you do, poet? And critic, what the hell do you do?
Critical practitioners having found a space in the university have tried to defend their jobs by responding to the question value in varying degrees of confidence, tentativeness, self-righteousness and surrender.
Poets being generically more stylish than critics often say-“nothing” or “is there anything else worth doing” to the question of doing. Many being loners, hardly get into conversations and so the question of value remains unasked.
The question of value, nevertheless, is an important one. The social relevance of writing and reading can be calibrated in terms of literature’s relationship to politics. Though complex in itself, the politics of relevance is a well-documented and enquired one.
But when one chooses literature as a life-vocation as a writer or a reader, the issue of value perhaps also needs to be philosophically and existentially relevant. And this brings me back repeatedly to the questions that the scholar and the poet threw at me.
How does one explain the value of writing a poem or the pleasure one derives from reading it?
Interestingly, both the poet and the scholar suggested to me, at different times, to read Joyce’s “Dead” to understand the process of writing and reading literature.
It would be easy to write a long meditation on the story. I can do it and do it very well. But I am not sure any more if it is the story that I would be explaining. And why do I need to explain the story at all? Can it be done in the form of an argument or a story? And is the story a lie that made me happy?
These difficulties remain.
The poet and the scholar are my constant companions. Sometimes as people, sometimes as voices and sometimes as my selves.
Thursday, October 26, 2006
memory of feeling
Memory of feeling
She was no longer young. How did he see her? With her dyed grey on her temples, the hint of a wrinkle when she smiled, the girding of middle-age fat round the waist. He would often watch her while she slept, always the child when she slept, clutching his index finger tight. And when the night came heavy, he would quietly, very quietly slip his finger out of her grip and leave the room dark, like a gazelle moves rustleless into the depths of the dawn- green escaping the stalking eyes of the hunting predator.
Did he know that the door to the room where she slept could never be shut tight and that a sliver of faint light from the world closed to her would always slip in through the crevices of the wood?
There. In the neon darkness of the city, in the wires of new machines he could write- away the script he felt he did not choose and tap a new story, a new tale, a new civilisation into being- of rhododendrons and red.
His thin shoulders, a slight hunch when he relaxes his back, curls that wear thin now with lost time make a sad picture. And sadder because he knows it too. He always imagines secrets and dangers around him. At times he doesn’t know if they are dreams. Could they be? But he does not sleep too well. Because sleep will take him to her, where lays only the memory of feeling.
There nothing is strapped down; everything drifts, like the shift of linen and the noiseless movement of passing youth. There he could feel the pulse race in his thin veins swollen with rush and the song of rain. He did not want to end this. The frenzied waltzing of passion and the inebriating sensation of long dark hair on his lean chest and the tentativeness of the moment that could so easilybe disturbed by the sound of her approaching footsteps.
Now he is not sure what an eye reveals. He prefers the aspect of a crocodile. Nose slightly above water, seeking beauty in the marshes.
He is no longer young. How does he see himself?
Though he misses nothing and no one, he misses the slow twilight and the fragrance of familiar trees. He has pasted some old, torn maps of a lost, then nameless land on the damp walls of his house. The stain from now absent furniture long kept needs to be washed clean still.
There is no need for quiet anymore. He often leaves the light on and rarely sleeps in bed.
He thinks of her in differing hours and places, searching for traces and perhaps some memory of feeling.
She was no longer young. How did he see her? With her dyed grey on her temples, the hint of a wrinkle when she smiled, the girding of middle-age fat round the waist. He would often watch her while she slept, always the child when she slept, clutching his index finger tight. And when the night came heavy, he would quietly, very quietly slip his finger out of her grip and leave the room dark, like a gazelle moves rustleless into the depths of the dawn- green escaping the stalking eyes of the hunting predator.
Did he know that the door to the room where she slept could never be shut tight and that a sliver of faint light from the world closed to her would always slip in through the crevices of the wood?
There. In the neon darkness of the city, in the wires of new machines he could write- away the script he felt he did not choose and tap a new story, a new tale, a new civilisation into being- of rhododendrons and red.
His thin shoulders, a slight hunch when he relaxes his back, curls that wear thin now with lost time make a sad picture. And sadder because he knows it too. He always imagines secrets and dangers around him. At times he doesn’t know if they are dreams. Could they be? But he does not sleep too well. Because sleep will take him to her, where lays only the memory of feeling.
There nothing is strapped down; everything drifts, like the shift of linen and the noiseless movement of passing youth. There he could feel the pulse race in his thin veins swollen with rush and the song of rain. He did not want to end this. The frenzied waltzing of passion and the inebriating sensation of long dark hair on his lean chest and the tentativeness of the moment that could so easilybe disturbed by the sound of her approaching footsteps.
Now he is not sure what an eye reveals. He prefers the aspect of a crocodile. Nose slightly above water, seeking beauty in the marshes.
He is no longer young. How does he see himself?
Though he misses nothing and no one, he misses the slow twilight and the fragrance of familiar trees. He has pasted some old, torn maps of a lost, then nameless land on the damp walls of his house. The stain from now absent furniture long kept needs to be washed clean still.
There is no need for quiet anymore. He often leaves the light on and rarely sleeps in bed.
He thinks of her in differing hours and places, searching for traces and perhaps some memory of feeling.
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