Jambourree

i
Blossoms bending branches
Your footsteps by mine
I wish to hear

ii
Icy wind

Damp clothes

Huddled frames

iii

You sleep – I ache

Two sides of the world

Darkness and light

iv

Pain binds us

A world we share no more

Filled with autumn leaves

v
Left you one winter morning
My heavy heart did not stop me
From wiping out the songs we sang

You are beautiful

The nurse had grown fond of him. She would often check on him and stay a while to chat with him . That day she noticed a bottle of baby lotion next to his bed and impulsively picked it up and began applying on his face – something he has hated since he was a tiny baby. He made a terrible face and asked her to stop. The nurse said, “ I am making your face more beautiful.’

After she went away, he looked up with tears in his eyes, “Mamma, am I not beautiful already? Why does she need to make me more beautiful?’ After a pause, ‘Does she think that a cream can change my face?’

Communiqué

‘What did you think of their house?’
‘Nice'
‘I loved the way they have used the blue theme – everything is in different shades of blue –from upholstery to curios, crockery, crystals – all carefully chosen’
‘Frankly the house is a showpiece not a home.’
‘Its arty - Even we can afford to - but we don’t bother’
‘Need to be practical with a kid around – damage control is easier’
‘Its impossible talking to you’
‘If you feel that way then change things’
‘I don’t want to blindly ape them’
‘Then don’t’
‘Fine’
‘Fine’

‘…Actually, you are right I think it looks at bit silly – monochromatic’

His cry

Can hear him cry
his voice pierces me like an arrow
amidst similar such cries

Smoky horizon

She had anticipated the diagnosis. The phone call only confirmed her worst fears. She rushed to the hospital and within a few minutes CF brought him in - he was taken to the procedure room and instantly began chatting to the doctors. As usual, she felt proud of him – he talks so sweetly and logically. She hugged him and kissed him. ‘You’ll be okay’, she told him. ‘I know that’ he told me smiling that angelic smile of a 4 year old.

Actually, CF was so spaced out that he did not even tell her – his colleague reminded him to tell her just when they rushed their boy to the procedure room. She had no time to react or shed tears- had to pull herself up – wipe the dark kohl stained tears and rush into the doctor’s chamber.

For the parents it is shattering - the world has crashed. Nothing makes sense and the worst is feared. The doctors were patient with her as she was still wiping her tears. A part of their occupational hazard is dealing with hysterical parents – she reflected later.

The doctor gently explained to them that though the treatment is long, it is curable and that she and her husband can talk to other parents at his clinic to find out more or attend support groups.

His words did sink in – a colleague’s son was diagnosed with it last year – but somehow one never thinks it would happen to your own child. At that moment, she did not care whether her anguish is being or has been experienced by several other parents – at that moment she was completely isolated in grief. All her emotions regarding her child liquidizing into hot tears spilling down my cheeks to be wiped off angrily. ‘Why my child?’ she thought angrily.

That night when she went back home to collect stuff for the long hospital stay, she cried inconsolably – the fear of loosing her baby. She needed to be strong but could not think of anything positive. Tried to pray but could not. Shed all the fears and anguish through tears - until there were no tears left.

Driving back to the hospital she made a promise to herself – ‘I will make the most of my time with him come what may.’ She vowed not to cry again. She willed her riotous emotions into a one powerful thought – I have to be there for him.

Post script : CF has been reading up on it like crazy – time to time cautioning her about the worst that they have to witness as the treatment unfolds – may be she in denial but she still cannot think about it …literally handling it one day at a time helps her to deal with it.

This was a period of experiencing motherhood as never before. This was a period of bonding like never before. This was a chance to love as never before.

The door next to ours

Every day when I would come back from school, I would reach our floor and try not to look at any other direction but our door. Invariably I would cast a sideway glance. There she would be sitting there on her chair with her door open. She would smile …a toothless grin and I would return it with a shy smile of my own.

I do not know why I could never get used to this regular afternoon exchange. Perhaps I hoped that one day she would not be sitting there -that the door would be closed. It was a dreadful eerie ten seconds that I put myself through everyday for no reason.

She was our ‘next door’. neighbour in the apartment building we lived in. Literally next door as the entrances to the four flats on the floor were abosulutely next to each other. She lived all alone. Her son lived in Canada and her daughter lived in the same city and came to check on her once a week. A woman would come twice a day to cook and clean for her.

Her door remained opened through out the day and she sat there watching whoever came and went. I am sure she waited for me to come back from school and knew exactly what time the man in the opposite flat came home from office – we only saw him on weekends.

Her evenings were spent watching children play in the playground downstairs. We would see her seating and peering through the railings of the balcony as we sped on our cycles around the building. Sometimes another elderly woman from the adjacent apartment building would come over in the late evenings to chat with her. I would have just got back home a swimming session – and there would be the two of them staring at me.

I rarely spoke to her. My mother occasionally would send me across with some vegetarian fare – she would receive it with the widest of toothless grin and pet my head with a shaky hand. I would smile politely but never volunteered a conversation. She would ask me a thing or two and my replies would be as monosyllabic as possible. She would sometimes ask me if I was feeling shy and I would nod my head – desperate to run.

She used to like my grandmother. Whenever my grandmother visited us she would come to our house to talk to her. I would open the door to let her in, ask her to sit and then run away to my room. My mom would make tea for her, which she would pour on the saucer and drink. Her toothless mouth would make a loud slurping sound as she sipped the tea. ‘Shuuruuuuuuth’. This I would delightfully witness from a distance.

Our gang of friends named her Juju – a sort of code word for a scary person. We would talk about her and giggle. We would imagine bizarre situations with Juju in it. I would be teased about Juju visiting our house. We would mimic Juju’s broken quivering voice and the way she drank tea. One of us would pretend to be Juju and chase the others as they shrieked and ran away.

One day I came home as usual casting my covert glance at the door next to ours only to find it shut. I rang our doorbell. My mom opened the door and I saw Juju’s daughter sitting on the sofa – red eyed. Mom asked me to go to my room – where else. I tip toed towards the drawing room to hear what was on.

‘She is very fond of your daughter – used to wait for her to be back form school. Used to remind her of my brother’s daughter – she is also 9 years old. I am so grateful to you for checking on her. I really could not do much for her – you know how joint families are.’
‘Hope she does not suffer too much’, said my mom.

They spoke in low tone and I could not strain myself anymore to hear them. So I waited. I hear her leaving shortly and rush to my mom. Ma told me that she suffered a stroke and was taken to the hospital in the morning. Luckily, the woman who cleans was there and she called the neighbours.

‘Will she be okay ma?’
‘Well she is in coma- it is better if she passes away – she won’t suffer that way’

I rushed off to the terrace where my friends were and breathlessly told them the news. There was a silence and then one of them said, ‘Now she will really come as a ghost and scare us at night.’ ‘Shut up**’ we shouted said unanimously.

Could not sleep that night. Cried a bit. Wished that I had spoken to her – spent time with her. Promised to make it up to her when she was back. Prayed hard that she comes back.

But she never did. The door next to ours remained shut. Each day I dreaded to come back from school to be waiting for our door to open. I could almost feel her eyes on me…beckoning me but never demanding.

Standing in front of our door with that door on the side was eerie and suffocating. I could not tell this to my mom – she would have shut me up and I did not tell this to my friends for I was not sure of their reaction…So I suffered in silence – ridiculously avoiding eye contact with the closed door as I did when it used to be open.

The ordeal finally ended when some months later we shifted to another house. The distance did me good. I could finally sleep – I was finally at peace with her.

Shining star smile down at me

Mamma will you always be there?
Sometimes I may have to go.

Mamma will you come back?
Yes my dear you know I will I always do.

But what if someday you don’t come back?
Then look at the night sky.
The brightest star there will be your Mamma
Smiling down at you.

The sea and she

She walked softly on the sand until she reached the end of the shore. She watched mesmerized as the phosphorous crowned waves splashed on the shore in quick successions. The stars simmered at her as she looked up. She stood there for a while calming her thoughts, her eyes closed and then with a firm nod she strode forward swiftly, only to be slowed down by the wet sand. She pushed her feet through the heavy sand bending her knees as she entered the water so that it reached her upper body. As she went further in, she slowly straightened up till it was deep enough for her to be standing tiptoe. Then suddenly she could no longer feel the bottom. She allowed herself to sink but the swimmer in her instinctively made her bob up and down comfortably. She steeled her mind and plunged forward deeper, to let the waves have her.

Angry waves caught her, pulling her up with in one swift motion and thrashing her down again. While time stood still, she was, twirled and tossed, till the waves had their fill. Weary waves dropped her off on the shore on the cold clammy sand.

She lay face down numbed by cold and pain. It was a while before she lifted her head …a long stretch of darkness lay in front of her with lights blinking in the distance. She did not have the strength to lift herself so she lay down with her cheek on the cold sand…she picked up a fistful of wet sand and began to laugh…her body paining as it shook with laughter…