#the rains

enchanted mirror
fallen from the sky
thats kerala when it rains.

#sweet summer

its started raining today
the first rains after the summer
This summer was different
i didn't have time to sit sulking for rain
or shake my fist at the old man in the sky
when i was younger i have begged for rain
with the panting drooping foliage
with the red roasted dried up earth of the paddy field


the first rains, i felt rained for me
foolishly thought someone heard my pleas
and the thunderstorm and lightning and
the incessant drumming on the tiled roof was all for me.
i wouldn't sleep that night,my terrace door half open
for i'd rather listen to the swishing of the heavy coconut heads
an angry earth appeased by a repentant lover

this year i enjoyed the sweat tricking down my back
for its been a decade since i sweated thus
and instead of cribbing about the heat
summer was more sweet watermelon on crushed ice,
and a thousand mangoes some eaten whole
i think i'll smell of mangoes all this year
summer was red chilles drying on the terrace floor
summer was coloured cotton sarees spread out for the sun.
summer was a blessed shower before bed.

its strange what life teaches us. to love sweat.
for now i think i value work above seasons.
we know that summers will come before rains
and it cant keep raining for ever.and hot summers
and all its wanting
and sweating and sleepless nights are nothing
if we can start to love summers
as much as the rains.and its never seasons that holds happiness
but what we did with them.

#one busy morning

and today it struck me
while i was ironing my saree
5 yards of brown sweaty embrodiery
its not easy to wash this every day
so we sun them awhile and fold them away

so this thought struck me from nowhere
about when i am going to die
its funny beacause iam not in a morbid mood
you see mornings are about hot sambhar and idlis
and coconut chutney

and all day iam busy
or trying to be
I haven't thought about death after i left my teens
my teens were spent on the hot terraces waiting for rain in the summer
and in spring you wouldn't even see me
cause i would be lying among the foliage watching wasps building paper nests.

but today it struck me. that i will be gone.
and everyone went about their chores
my aged in laws were praying,
the maid cutting onions
my nephew learning the mutiplication table
the cat snoring.and me ironing my sweaty saree.

and i had thought i was clever.
at least cleverer than my peers
because i aimed at dying happy not marrying rich
I thought i would do something that my cousin Anita
who lived in Chennai would fly down to cry at my funeral
and that my parents would be proud , a little sad but still proud.

and i thought i would write songs
true songs that had a thousand echoes in them
wondrous echoes that whispered about life
and about truth . echoes that entered peoples heads
echoes that never died.

but the best i can do is live peaceful,
hold my mother inlaws hand
when she climbs down the steep stairs to church,
buy my maid some fancy shirt with mirror work,
or make some tasty uppamava in the mornings,
water the orchids in the garden
and feed the fish.

#teary fruit

my mother in law
back from a holiday at her hometown
offered me some jackfruit

the fruit tasted just like her
not sticky soft
like the ones i've eaten

the sheaths sitting in rows
organised
and delicate

a little too watery
perhaps over there
nobody is too stingy with tears either.