kite died a chicken death

Poet(Potte)ry in the making

My mother's big black bus

I once knew a man who I was fortunate to know. My mother told me that he was at one time a well respected policeman in former East Pakistan. He was tall, handsome and a sight to behold as said by people who knew him. I have also personally verified this by seeing his handsome image in many old black and white photographs lovingly kept by one of his dear ones. Proud as he was of his looks he believed that his calves were his sexiest feature. It would give him a kick to take his patrol rounds in his cycle with his shorts showing off his strong and long calves. Well, that was what was said of him. Later on he took retirement from the Police and settled in a burgeoning town in the southern part of the state. Being a rich man he fathered many children and had a few mistresses also, which was more or less an undesirable fact that the family had to learn to live with. He had houses, properties, a few trucks and even land rover MUVs. All unimaginable but testifying to the fact that he was one of the richest in his area at that time. The children did partake the riches of the father also and led comfortable lives. However in the times that came, like every unavoidable interruption to a happy story, the military came to the land with full battle armour going after a few rebels armed with country made rifles and a few stolen .303 rifles. The state was in turmoil. Unfortunately the man was accused of being a rebel sympathiser and supporter and some of his assets were confiscated and some got lost in the turmoil of events.
All I could remember later on was a big black bus that use to come intermittently to Aizawl ferrying passengers from the Central Jail at Silchar. I would wait at the Jail corner with my young mother who would have my infant sister quietly sleeping on her back and my younger brother beside her. I would hang around in the back somewhere close by. At that time I could not fathom the reason why she cried whenever a tall and gaunt man use to come down from the bus, give her a small hug, say something and climb back on to the black bus. The bus would start again and then ferry the passenger to god knows where? I do not even recollect my father being beside her once also during any of these episodes. Perhaps it was embarrassing and compromising for a young and honest upcoming bureaucrat to have liaisons with prisoners, or maybe I was just too young to recollect his presence. Whatever was the case what I can still remember was the bitter happiness that my mother's face reflected in the man's brief presence and the sorrow of loss that she felt whenever the bus would pull away to return only a few months later.
In the years that came the man was released from prison and in the occasional visits that we made to my Grandma’s place, i use to see the man brewing black tea over an electric heater almost all the time. He would hardly talk to me cept for a wizened look that he used to give me. Coming to think about it now, I can now understand the outburst by my youngest aunt when I once mistakenly wiped my washed hands after dinner on a shirt that was hanging by the bathroom door. How was a boy of 5-6 years suppose to make out the difference between a towel and a shirt by candle light and at the same time be wary of the deep psychological scar and possessiveness felt by the people who were near to the man?.
A short time from then the man died. I later on realized that he had been having a long bout of illness and it was only because of this that he was released from prison.
Now leaving the story behind. In life most people are made by the teachings that are inculcated and imbibed in them by their teachers as they transverse through life. In my case the teachings are learned in retrospection from the people and events that were before and which I have only related to in the present. In this case I have to learn to be dignified and not to bow down to any that challenges my core values, principles and beliefs, whatever the repercussions may be. You see the man was my grandfather and whatever he has taught me in retrospection, I would want my descendents to imbibe the same from me that my grandfather was a champion of. After all he was the only grandfather that I knew.

Across the land of the 5 rivers

give it back

Would I be allowed to have a year back
When I discover that I have squandered many,
Would life treat me a little better
If I learn now to respect it a little,
Would the chances that I give to many
Return just one for the many I let pass,
Would the price that I have to pay
For life’s follies be one that takes my life away.

Would the years I spent in a false cause
Be the punishment of a lifetime,
Would it give me wisdom dearer
To make this life better,
Would the myopia of my days’ visions
Cloud the vision of my days,
Would it lift away rather
The cloud that has shrouded my life’s reason.

Would the wrongs I have righted
Right the wrongs on me or none,
Would the hurts I have given
Reciprocate me with more than given,
Would it make me more sensitive
To hurt others no more,
Would it reward me as this life now
Incapable of any feelings, of what life am.

connections of the noses

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