The Vigil’s Progress
We begin with the immediate memories
Grandpa’s last phone call to each one of us
only to hand over the receiver to grandma
both hard of hearing and full of love
Armed with pliers and a length of copper
he repaired our mixers, transistors and bicycles
changed the chandeliers and polished the doorknobs
while grandma kept her third fast of the week
Slowly but visibly, the body is growing cold
the sockets of the eyes are sinking in
the peace that’s settled on his face
is unlike any we knew when he was around
His honour had real tokens - an unending supply
of soap at home, the freedom to watch
gooey serials with the TV at full blast and a roof
he paid the rent for till he breathed his last
The gathering has now dwindled to a circle of cousins
The night has grown deep, with a tiny pill
my cousin sedates grandma to save her
from going mad in the diaphanousness of grief
We recount his days match-making and house-hunting at large
the day he saw a fellow line-man electrocuted
when someone closed a circuit before the men came down
He always ended the tale by saying that could have been him
The lamp needs ladles of oil and someone
among us shall keep it alive in the coming weeks
For grandpa, who claimed the laurel of electrifying entire villages,
the modest wick seemed too thin a conceit
He was an infant when the plague took his father away
and made his mother a widow of shaven head
He grew up at the mercy of relatives who grabbed their land,
and it always seemed this tale was of another man, faraway
By dawn, grief has given way to fatigue
whose origins lay in a place beyond words
The Brahmins prepare to send him off
with a thousand names of God
One of them says his actions are beyond reason
and another of his unbounded wrath
My grandma sees her husband in some of them
The rest of us, novices at death, are perplexed by everything
They take him away and consign him to fire
and we have a meal which grandpa relished
The daughters, grandchildren and grandma, then
play a rambunctious game of dice with passion, glee and bile
Through the watches of the night and by the day
we send grandpa heavenward, borne by our mirth
The living vindicate the dead thus
and the inscrutable dead live on in us.
Madonna and Bambino
Clinging to the bosom of the young maid, clad in blue,
lies the infant, Jesu, a ball of light
around their crowns an ancient halo
a tender ivy of light untouched by flesh
The land of deep valleys, with
Judea’s sea behind it, desert country
the pale glow of the breast-feeding mother’s pallorless bones
spread across the canvas like silver flour
Even with the infant at hand, her face betrays no smile
to what immemorial sorrow does she stand testimony?
the cherubs fuss around the firmament
the soothsaying magi crowd
Well before the day
when they hammer this child to a crucifix
and the motherly womb writhes in pain
did the heart foresee a distant sorrow?
Did the Lord’s truth, indecipherable to men
shine through in a moment’s flash
and a thirty and two years ahead of its appointed hour
leave in its wake a face frozen in grief?
(Note: Medieval paintings of Mother Mary and Infant Jesus depict the young mother in grief. Theologians argue, and art historians concur, that her face betrays foresight of the impending tragedy.)
The Poet’s Crime
Urchins have run away with the couplings of the track
The train is here in a moment
Will a concerned eye see this
A child leaning from the balcony
With the ramparts about to give way
Will a hand hook the nape
A lonely girl by the bridge
A beehive bursting in her head
Will a stranger pass by
The blind man's stick taps against the slab
Its cracks awaiting a final step
Will a passer-by shove him
I witness these happenings
But the world's appearances dazzle me
If only someone else were here, just in time.
About the Poet:
Ashwin Kumar teaches writing and translation at Ahmedabad University. His research is in philosophy of culture, and his book "Nationalism, Language and Identity in India: Measures of Community" has been published by Routledge. He also writes in Kannada and translates into it.