LOSS

 

 

I miss
those I have left behind,
n’ those who have left me behind.
Loss lurks around 
the skylight of my being,
shadowing my awakening. 

Nostalgia

has spread like fungus.

Mycellium running through veins,

nourishing cells with the mirage

of memories.        

And yet,

sitting under the shade

of an umbrella pine,

this hot summer day,

gaze dreaming on

the blue Mediterranean,

there is peace.  

 

 

A few Haikus, a few pretend Haikus and and a few inspired by Haikus

 

 

 

 

 Childhood 

1. Languid  summer afternoons
    lying wrapped in ma’s cotton sari,
    her scent a gentle presence.

2. In the smaller room, 
    sun on a wooden clothes rack, 
     Ma’s saris, underskirts and blouses. 

3. My widowed grandma
    in white sari, emblem of widowhood
    with shrivelled onion breasts. 

 Adolescence

  April month of fire, 

  the *loo's fevered breath, scorching

  my unguarded face.  

 
 * The Loo is a strong, dusty, gusty, hot and dry summer wind from the west which blows over           the Indo- Gangetic region of North India and Pakistan.

        School

In the hall a  glass cupboard 
of ceramic geishas in 
 pretty, flower kimonos, 
serene gaze in oval face.
The Principal’s’ collection. 
A lonely child stops to look,
her mistrust of the dragon
allayed by their beauty. 
 

Memory 

  Summer afternoons,
  beige curtains drawn, shadowed room,
  having tea with pa.

            

        Absence 

 
The clothes line on the balcony
without the morning’s washing of 
worn under-shirts, sarongs, towels, 
flapping in the sea breeze. 
An infinitesimal pattern of life 
swept clean by death.