MY, MY! THE SUN CAP THAT I WORE

When  I had started wearing this hat of the sun

There was a glow in my skull

That ate away at its content and form

I know not

As to how many many years,

And moments that took an age to complete,

Then there were the fast ones

Which were lost even before they began.

Now the burning has ceased, so also the pain

A thin layer of ice

Had formed inside

And when I wear that cap of sun

There is no more wilting and withering

But frozen crackling.

I ask that short and heartiest piece of life

To recover

Because much was gained even when it was lost

But me, I am so poor at accounts

And still could say

What would remain

Because I like to test the impossible

To see when and where

It would become possible

And I hit my head against it

Because my skull is the toughest bone

That I have

And because I want things to happen

That  were not there

And if I can’t do it

Why bear it any longer?

JOURNEY: DISTANCES

Though we are seated on the same vehicle

How  very different are our journeys

And  sometimes, though we travel quite apart

How similar are our inner trips.

Somebody started a song smelling of toddy

The bus went on a climb to the hill top

And as you went up

You could see a vaster area

While down below

 You  noticed the intricacies and finer detail.

There were those who had managed to get seats

Everybody going somewhere

Because the bus may still reach some point.

The rugged looking man next to me

Was sleeping with his mouth open

And I peered in expecting to see the world inside him.

A little kid started belching and throwing out

As we climbed

And those behind him

Pulled down the shutters.

There were people of  many types

Moving towards or away from something or some place

Work, family, lover, friend, school, meeting, war…..

The distances between them did not go

Even when they were sitting next to each other

And sometimes they were far apart and still connected

Religion, rebellion, art, history, nature-

Which trip were you making this time?

There were people who had been confined within the room

And yet had travelled vast distances

And those who had travelled all around the world and yet

Were still in their cozy room confined.

There were those who had made the train compartment

Their home

And those who had made their home

Into a train compartment

And there of course were those

Who had left the train compartment as a train compartment

And the home as a home.

The sailboats  of the modernists

Travelled  to the ‘primitive’ and  back

They had imagined themselves as both shores

And as the bridge between them

And as the flag of freedom flying high.

But for the ‘primitive’,  journeys were banned-

The tour companies had made sure

That they were not to travel

To another person or place.

They were imagined to be living vegetative lives

Ineffective and constant, without change

And their capability to speak

Was held in doubt

Somebody else’s tongue always spoke for them.

Cutting through the oceans

Came somebody

From among the Mahars

His voice

Like the saltiness of salt

Took in the margins with it.

Politics was no more to be searched for

Only in the elected bodies,

Because it was everywhere

In the dirty clothes, in cleanliness, in water, wages

And on the streets.

The sun had left after the 

Harvesting in the salt fields

And the moon after patrolling the streets at night.

In the memories of the nomadic tribes

The nations existed

Shorn of any adornment

And with borders

Meant to keep them out.

THE WOMEN I LOVE

Sometimes I love a woman

For her experience and vision

Sometimes for her listening

Sometimes for her articulation

Sometimes for her silence

Sometimes for her arguments

Sometimes for her dedication

Sometimes for her carelessness

Sometimes I love a woman

For her boldness

For her many connections

Many lovers and many loves

Because I don’t value chastity

Or feigned innocence.

Even a child carries forward some memories

And is never a clean slate

Or a pure state

So I love children as much as I love the aged

Because I don’t equate wisdom with old age

And rebellion with youth

So it is okay when the cupboard is open

And a few lingerie lingers there

Sometimes I love a woman for her headscarf

For being defiant in the face of the norm

For all that silent toiling

For her capacity to love and care and forgive

Sometimes I love a woman.

And women, I am curious

What do they look for in a man?

WHERE THE WAVES OF FIRE AND WATER COME AND GO

(To Das)

It has been a long time

Since I have visited that house

One has to walk some distance on the ledge

(That is know-ledge)

Of the river bank

Passing uncultivated paddy fields

To reach there.

A girl comes out from the house

Which the floods visit six times a year

And waves.

The cranes that touch down

On the reed thickets

The sparrows on the wire

A snake bird

Dipping itself in the flow.

Friend,

Eventhough you live

In the midst of the water

The flow  of the fires

Never left you.

Once

As if it were the beginning

Of the impossible

Fire came floating over the flooded river

From a train

Which had fallen

Head down into the river.

There were more incidents of fire

When year after year

The tall grass in the fields

Had caught fire

And had charred

The fishes, snakes, rats that had hidden in their holes,

Mynahs, seven sisters, crickets, scorpions

So many beings who had

Dipped their roots in the lows of the world.

Yet the houses on the river bund

Crossed through them unscathed.

Ammamma and chachan

Walked through the fields

Where tides of fire and water

Swept in and withdrew.

In their memories

Was an age that had

Stood with mud and water upto their knees

And this time

When they were left

Without cultivation

And they didn’t judge one definitely  as good or bad.

On a day

When having gone fishing

They had caught night itself

In the net

The thunder claps and flashes of lightning

Had filled your eyes  with fear.

To those who had sat on the bund

With grass and magic

Had come the songs of the Rastafarians,

John and his friends

And another song that you sung together with the nameless

Troups of street theater performers

Anil, Pradeep and Chinnan

Out there or sketching

A coconut leaf fallen into the river

Trips through the forests and ghats

Vijayamma, Jose, Lalu and Kabir

Where have all that gone?

The rodents from Jayalal’s drawings

The call of a crow- pheasant

Ways in which

The people rejuvenate themselves.

Somebody asked:

“How is the novel progressing?’

“In which class is your daughter?”

Without replying

You rowed the boat to the other shore

Seating those questions along with others

Through the flows

Of fire and water.

WHILE MAHADEVI AKKA CLEANS THE FISH

ASHALATHA

Morning

I can see from here that

The fish that had conquered Pangod market

Was lying calm and tame

In Mahadevi akkan’s hand.

Its shining beauty

The colourful scales, size.

Crouching  all covered up

Calling my dear Aattukaalammachi

Mahadevi akkan teaches it  advaita

Through kshurasya dhaara

And with the compassion  that

Life is impermanent

Sends it to seek salvation.

I can see its body charms

Becoming ragmented.

The waste and gills from inside for the crow

Head for the cat

The tail for the tailless dog

Breast to the single breasted

Ottamulachi

That is how Mahadevi akkan

Shares her egalitarianism.

Though I am least interested in

Re-appropriating  the kitchen

The rice and its buddies

Are sweating and boiling

Even on my stove.

The Word

Is boiling on the stove

Getting to the right boil

And keeps  boiling

Thereafter.

THE PRAYER OF A CHAPAL OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE

K. SACHIDANANDAN

You the cobbler of cobblers.

One who knows the size of each foot

And knows the distances

That are to be traversed by each.

But why is it  that I,

One who has received

With my body the stones, dust ,thorns and mud

Have to sit outside,

While this man who has never had to

Feel the pain in his feet

Stands close to you.

Salvation is for him , and hell for me.

At least  in the next birth

Please make this man were to be born as a chapal

And to lie there,

Outside heaven, with this  same prayer

Of the one who was left out.

(Trans: benoy.p.j)