CON-TENT-MENT

She stands by the window. 

Expecting, sensing, dreaming. 

Her books are torn and her yellowed satchel is now used to stuff old clothes and other nonsense.  

All of eight, Lola misses her school, and her best friend Zoya. She also misses the sparrows who would invariably drop by during recess to nibble at the odd titbits that she fed them. A lone tear rolls down her face. 

Mrs. G, a retired English teacher stays at the end of the lane in an old fashioned bungalow. She is down with ‘Arthritis.' Her house is huge and there is no help. The deal is clinched between Lola's mother and Mrs. G. In exchange of few hundreds it is agreed that Lola shall take care of Mrs. G and her household chores, till she recovers. 

Lola can't even get the word right. In her third attempt she finally says the word arthritis out loud (ARTEE-RIGHT-IS). She is pleased with herself for getting the word right but is not pleased about going to Mrs. G’s house. Next morning, at the chime of eight Lola reaches her house.  

Mrs. G is sitting on a rocking chair. Her hands are trembling as she tries hard to keep them steady while holding the arm rests of her favourite chair. Lola dusts the house, scrubs the floor and puts the washed clothes out on the string to dry. In the afternoon, she massages Mrs. G’s feet kneading her fingers all the way up to her calves with a sticky peppermint oil. The scent reminds her of visiting a local village fair with her Baba not so long ago and eating peppermint candies from shiny transparent bottles that adorned a sweet shop. For a moment, Lola thinks of dipping her little finger into the oil and licking it just once so as to revive old memories that could transport her back to the village fair when Baba was still alive. Sitting atop his broad shoulders she remembers soaking in the magic of carousel rides and watching the monkeys perform fun filled antics. 

Mrs. G says she is feeling this contented after a really long time. It is difficult for Lola's little brain to comprehend what does ‘contented' exactly mean. Does it mean Mrs. G is happy with Lola or not so happy?  She lets the question rest in her head.  

Seeing the muddled expression on Lola’s face, Mrs. G laughs. She ruffles her hair and says, “To feel contented Lola, means to be simply happy. One could be happy just by gazing at the blue sky, or eating your favourite ice cream from a tub, or watching your mother fry your choicest samosas.”  With a wistful sigh she continues, “There are days when my joints hurt badly and I tend to get a little sad. But today, after long, I am feeling truly happy and contented. Your lively chatter has made this house come alive. And the massage, Ah! It has done wonders to my aching feet." 

She then opens a book and reads out a story to Lola. It is about six tiny gnomes who help a little girl find her way back home when she gets lost in a circus. Lola listens to the story with rapt attention. After Mrs. G finishes narrating it, Lola has loads of questions brimming in her head. One by one, Mrs. G, patiently answers them all. She is impressed with Lola’s curious bent of mind. Adjusting her frames over her head, she instructs Lola to fetch a small trunk of books kept underneath her bed.  

“Here it is!” tells Lola, panting slightly after she finishes dragging the trunk. The hinges creak as they both open it. 

“Wow! so many books!” shrieks Lola with joy. From underneath those books comes out a blue bordered slate and a handful of chalks. Lola’s first lesson has started. She is excited and so is Mrs. G catching on her enthusiasm giggling like a school girl herself.  

Mrs. G decides to give English lessons to Lola daily.  

At the dot of six Lola's mother comes to fetch her after a hard day at the fields. Mrs. G says in her raspy voice, “I shall see you tomorrow Lola. I will be waiting for you.” 

Lola runs back and hugs her tightly. Mrs. G in return slips few candy sweets into her hands. One of it is her favourite; the peppermint one. Lola’s eyes grow bigger than golgappas and her face breaks into a wide grin.  

On their way back home, Lola and her mother both walk hand in hand. The sun has settled to a pale orange hue and the leaves of the Dahlia trees crackle against the wind. 

“Are you happy there Lola?” asks her mother as she lovingly caresses her head.

“Yes, totally. I am feeling Con-Ten-Ted today, Ma” says Lola with a twinkle in her eye.

Her mother looks at her blankly not understanding a thing. 

But for Lola, her school and her books which she had missed so dearly till now, has finally figured a way to come back into her life.

A Spanish love poem

Marianna grew up in a sleepy little neighbourhood, 

In another part of the day and world.

When she was young and all of sixteen,

She would paint her toenails a bright red 

Her hair always gathered in a mass of tumbling brown curls.

Their paths often crossed those days,

She describing him to her friends as an unsuitable boy 

from amongst all her other suitors

Who would wait below her two storeyed building,

Vrooming in their flashy bikes

Making catcalls with their collars upturned 

And their slick hairstyles.

He with his ordinary mannerisms, 

bespectacled; carrying an air of unusual calmness,

He hiding behind books most of the time 

or tending to roadside kittens, by feeding them milk and other titbits.

He who would look at her from the corner of his eye,

When she took short walks with her mamma.

Wearing bright purple and yellow dresses

and to church on Sundays a red pleated one 

with frilly smocking in the front,

Stitched by her Papa who was the best tailor in town.

He who would always patiently wait, 

At the bus-stop, outside the library,

And next to the college canteen,

He who would seamlessly blend into a crowd without anybody noticing. 

And then there arrived that one day 

When he walked up to Marianna with faltering steps 

And handed her a note.

The previous night she had seen him waiting long enough 

for the other boys to finish a game of night football

And then he had sat under the flickering light

Maybe pouring his heart out onto that piece of paper.

There was a kind of wretchedness in Marianna then 

One could only blame it on the age of raw adolescence 

No words were exchanged. 

She left the note unread 

crushing it under her feet

Tossing it onto the nearby brown puddle. 

His look said it all then

As though the gates of hell had opened up, 

Mighty dragons spitting venom all around

All his dreams and hopes getting crushed in an instance.

She felt the tiniest bit of regret

But was too flippant and young enough to care much.

She watched him walk past

Never turning back

His broad shoulders glistening under the glare of the hot sun

                                                 ******

Marianna still likes to paint her toenails a bright red 

with a shade called as Fiery Rasputin,

Her hair is whiter than ever before,

And there are weight laden bags underneath her eyes now.

Her feet has purple spidery lines running all the way up to her knees 

That creak a little whenever she walks for more than half a mile.

Now at the age of sixty, married but separated,

She has three children and six grandchildren 

A whole boisterous lot 

scattered across different parts of the world. 

She has come back to her home in Toledo 

where the papaya leaves still turn a shade of olive green 

when monsoon settles in

and the jackfruits hanging in the garden are all big and sombre 

resembling her papa's mood when he used to come home tired and weary 

after a hard day's work.

Word gets around. 

Marianna's friends tell her that he has always remained single;

Some days she sees him at the sidewalk

with his group of old cronies

Looking all distinguished and sacred 

Today it is she who waits to catch a glimpse of him

From behind the sheer curtains of her window

Knowing truly well that he shall never again approach her

And neither will she.

But there is a memory of a little boy

etched in her mind

Wearing worn out slippers

Hair in a tousled mess 

But his eyes carrying a searing flame 

That would light up every time he saw his lady love passing by 

Marianna still wonders about the unread note

Did it profess undying love

Did it contain vows 

Did it mention about growing old together

And was it finally sealed with a kiss

Her heart stalls for a second 

She would never know

She would never ever know….

A walk to remember

I get caught on the surface sometimes, 

laughing at my own naiveté.

I stand still and stare hard at the flowers blooming in the garden,

The flaming orange of the gulmohurs and the crimson reds of the poinsettia's as though are anxious enough to start a conversation with me.

There are days when my footsteps are slower than other days, prompting me to halt on a hot sultry afternoon, 

when the sun is blinking harshly from above. 

What has caught my fancy then is a row of six cuddlesome puppies in various shades of brown and orange

hungrily suckling at their mother for milk.

I bend down on my knees, and tickle a fawn coloured fellow who has stripes running all over his tiny frame 

like that of a hyena.

The ever so protective mother, 

seeming not too excited at this unnecessary indulgence 

lets out a snarl, her canines positioned outwardly, 

ready to attack.

I back out, allowing my submission known thereof, 

towards her rage that is justified

I move along a little further.

A packet of half eaten black raisins lie strewn on the path.

Of the puppies a brave fellow, finds it endearing to leave the comforts of resting on his mother’s belly and has faithfully followed my tracks.

As I stoop down to look at the raisins that resembles warm pellets of maybe a goat’s droppings, the enthusiastic fellow has already clawed open the packet with an appetite that must beat even my grandmother’s who at the ripe old age of eighty eight always has food on her mind.

On certain days, she enters the kitchen sneakily when people at home are enjoying their afternoon siesta One can then hear a tiny rumble of tins getting opened and closed.

A slight groan from my mother, sleeping in the adjacent bedroom is enough for her to dash out with a forced agility. The loose ends of her saree covers half of her face and behind the thin cotton I imagine traces of coconut biscuits with sugar dressing adorning her quivering mouth. When I later spot half closed plastic tins and a row of ants marching along with the weight of sugar crumbs stuck to their little forms, I break into a half smile.

The little puppy looks up endearingly at me; his red coloured tongue now sprayed with black and purple stains after he has devoured every last bit of the raisin.

I lift him up carefully and as he snuggles deeper into the crook of my arm, I rest a kiss on his upturned belly so soft and soothing to touch. His coat resembles the shade of a burnished orange reminding me of a maple leaf I had stored in a History book long ago.

With a heavy heart I carry him back to his mother and make him lie next to the bundle of the other five litters.

Such an alluring sight.

An afternoon that I cherish and is indeed truly well spent.

All the way up and all the way down

Steps

Steps that take her up and bring her down and on certain days manage to leave her at intersections and crossovers where she bumps into a former lover. They share a friendly hug. It gets awkward at first and the awkwardness slowly melts with time when they started talking about Toby and Mathias their friends from the library.

Toby had once let out his plump faced hamster from the bag causing a stir in the library. The hamster kept hopping from table to table, and finally when he landed on the librarian's desk, they both had an eye to eye moment causing the stern faced librarian to topple from her seat and let out a loud shriek.

"Where did he vanish? said a baffled Toby. 

They all had then searched for him high and low, underneath lined bookshelves, spaces between antique looking cupboards and peeped into wastepaper baskets. But they couldn't locate him and had finally resigned to the fact thinking that maybe the poor fellow had gotten around making a nice home for himself in the midst of books that carried the faint scent of war stories and stories of unrequited love locked within.

She wondered about him then and she still wonders at times whether he had shown some refined manners by not going around tearing pages and on second thoughts if he did, whether he had made a nice makeshift bed from those very pile of pages. He would have then sunk deeper into the mound seeking warmth on rainy days when it kept pouring really hard outside.

Steps

A day she remembers climbing nearly a hundred steps, that went winding all the way up with tufts of green grass growing in patches at the sides. Once on top the view from the hillock was magnificent. The depth of the city with terracotta tiles as roofs over houses displayed a brown hush everywhere. In the background the sky kept changing its colours from a livid orange to a tempered brown and by evening the daylight had shifted to a purple haze knocking off the sun behind. But the evening mostly carried with it the fragrance of jasmine buds growing in clumps beneath her feet. 

Couples sat in various corners, their bodies fitting snugly in stone-walled arches, arms and legs colliding with one another. She simply sat on a battered ledge drinking in the view. Occasionally, she watched those couples from the corner of her eye with a growing agitation fuelling inside her; waiting for the boy whom she loved then and who she knew was not going to turn up.

But with the shift in time, she felt subdued and a sense of calm settled over her agitated nerves. The boy, the lecture that she had missed to come here all the way, her evening coffee, friends from college all felt hazy in the background and what took centre-stage then was the horizon, the melee of houses below, the rocky valley and the sounds of exotic birds that filled up the warm afternoon air. 

In her own company she realised that sometimes it is the ordinary things in life that can bring you sheer bliss.

Lovers can always wait. 

Truth-or-Dare

Truth or dare

A game I loved.

My eyes closed

I opt for a dare

And as if unwittingly the other person 

Reading my mind 

Lays out a dare.

I place a hand over my chest

My heart beating wildly

As if a hundred horses are galloping all at once.

I walk up to him

To look into those coffee brown eyes and utter the magical words. 

To tell him, I saw him in my dreams last night

His face lingered around long after I woke up.

To tell him I snatch every bit of conversation I hear about him

In corridors, in public parks and in local libraries

To tell him I even know about the faded mole he carries in his left palm, 

Unobtrusive from the rest of the world but not a secret to me anymore. 

To tell him about every shrinking detail I have of him in my memory.

He sings a tune, my favourite too.

A long legged girl walks up from behind 

They share a kiss

She cocooned in his bear hug.

I wish to melt away

Instead, I withdraw, slowly and silently

The ‘Dare’ wilting away like a forgotten summer rose

The ‘Truth’ left hovering between my lips.

Truth or Dare

A game I will never ever play.

The daily travails in an Electrician's life

I knew an electrician, who had woken up on a certain morning with a pounding headache. The previous night’s dreams had assaulted him; where he had seen hammers and pliers everywhere. Outside his tin roofed shanty that morning, the birds were unusually chattery, leaving behind  droppings on his window sill.
Just before the birds arrived causing a cackle of sounds, he in his dream, was searching for screws in a room that had hammers lying in abundance everywhere. 

Jolted out of his reverie, he dashes to the bath for a quick shower before lighting up a stove to make himself a cup of tea which turns out to be pale and watery. All dried up, he opens a wooden shelf and notices a jar of half-used face cream, a tin of talcum powder and a packet full of colorful bindis. He pictures his mother with the red dot on her forehead and his eyes glisten unwittingly. He doesnt find it important to dispose any of his mother's bare belongings after she had passed away a few years ago. He locates a plastic bottle, lying at the far end of the shelf that has a fine layer of oil stuck around it's edges. On opening the cork, a strong whiff of jasmine scented oil arrests his nostrils. Pouring few drop on his roughened palm he gently applies it over his mop of curls and slicks it on to the side.
The tiny mirror by the kitchen window catches his blurred reflection showing few strands of grey sprouting at the temples. At the age of forty, intentionally single, he has no complains from life and busies himself in re-arranging the contents of his toolbox. The morning outside is nice and bright carrying with it the smells of chicken curries getting cooked in the neighbouring kitchen. His weather-beaten toolbox in tow he then heads to travel to faraway distances. A bus that he alights in takes him to a nearly dried up creek bed. Once he steps out, placing a leg atop a slithery stone; the toolbox held close to his chest; he takes two long strides and crosses the creek to get on to the other side. 

Every now and then his feet take him to strange unnamed streets, alcoves that look haunted, narrow gullies that are stretched forever. 

The sun today is certainly not kind; the harshness of the weather bringing in big droplets of sweat that drip casually from his underarms. By day end he would notice angry red blisters gathering in a clump at the soles of his feet. 
Days when he is fortunate enough to make a quick buck, he finds himself in dark sullen rooms wearing a slim torch like a band around his head. 

Behind dingy cupboards, the plaster peeling from wornout painted walls he discovers crumbling old switchboards. 
The switchboards he realises always made a creaking sound when drilled with screws and pliers. Once in a while he hears a splinter of darkened wood tearing away. A tangle of wires get ready to greet him sprouting out of those moth eaten wooden boards. The light shining weakly from his torch; he fumbles with a hundred open wires knowing exactly which one to puncture with his array of instruments. 

There are times, when he comes across buildings that are torn down and dilapidated; the owners themselves over ninety years old, coughing and tottering around with their walking sticks screaming out instructions to the electrician. 

On a certain evening, like today, when the sun is dipping behind the shadows, he is called to fix up a house that is enveloped in darkness due to the breakdown of electrical systems or faulty wires. The sight of half lit candles meet him everywhere; the melted wax dripping in a continous stream. 

Inside those rooms, where the blinds are perhaps raised to catch  the last filter of sunlight, spiders in a corner are busy rustling up a patchwork of intricately sewn cobwebs and roaches have a gathering of sorts in between weedy spaces of thin cupboards. 

Nothing misses his eye like today. His torchlight catches a flash of a mouse or two darting across from one end of the room to other, scurrying beneath the wooden four poster bed, and chewing at the weathered ends of a tray table. 

Under the glare, the mice appear to be frightened, taken aback, as they stand exposed to their crime. But in true sense, they are cocky enough to know, that the man standing before them is benevolent and is compassionate in nature and means no harm. And even if he decides to run after them with a stick in his hand, as they had often seen the old couple do, they had their runaway route planned. A hole in the bedroom wall, that was dug after days and days of perilious labour now stood in front of them worthy enough to justify every means of their escape. The meek mice stand at a distance, guilty as charged. 

The sharpness of their teeth amazes the electrician, and he  wonders in his head whether bits of flattened wire would have got stuck between their teeth while tampering with the switchboard. But answers he has none to and there is nothing much he could do, other than fixing those half chewed wires. The mice aware of his growing dilemma stare back at him, brazenly flashing their teeth. For a moment they both lock their gaze. In a flash of a second, they escape promptly by vanishing into their cubby hole. The last image, he catches of them is of their grey tails sweeping the ground below. 

The lights in the house is now restored, and the angry wrath from the old couple’s face is replaced with smiles and thankful gestures. 

Some decent money in his pocket, he stops by at his favourite Iranian restaurant. The owner recognizing that he is a regular, offers to add an additional spoon of sugar into the already sweetened milky chai, to which he gladly obliges.
He has his first proper meal of the day. Two slices of buttery toast with a spread of strawberry jam mocks his tastebuds and he devours it in an increasing speed. He leaves behind few annas as a tip which he has never done before and steps out of the place. 


The night breeze is cool as he resumes his journey back home. The street lamps glimmer on the pavements. Hunger-ridden moths circle wildly around those lights making it their home for the next few hours.

Lights, he wonders out aloud. The reason he makes a living.