My Living Historian - Three poems by Itika Chandna

My Living Historian

// Everything is possible

Yet nothing is

And so we live and die

In this circle of pity //

It was 3:20 am

When my father woke up abruptly

To tell me about the dream he had

“I was swimming”, he says

“You were in my lap, in the swimming tube, you were so small Ittu. So small.”

I remember crying back to sleep

After hearing him

Tears crawled down my eyes

Like ants carrying their food

home

It’s scary how life

Just passes by

Without any warning

Until one day

You lose it all

My father’s illness has taken him

To a past that I thought

I have lost forever

But each day, there’s something

New that he remembers

And become my living historian

“When did you grow up so fast? Why can’t I remember it?” He often asks

“I can’t either”

I tell him

I can’t either.

When you start living on the 18th floor

When you start living on the 18th floor

The height stops scaring you

And you imagine jumping off the balcony

a thousand times

while smoking cigarettes,

sticking close to the boundaries

As if you own it.

Your fear towards faith

starts building rationality

And your tiny existence

Fails to create meaning

of its own.

When you start living on the 18th floor

Nobody hears you screaming

You realise you aren’t

Any close to the sky and

The people sleeping on the streets

Feel it closer than you.

The unbearable lightness of being

Shakes you to your core

and you dream of floating

In the sea over and over.

When you live on the 18th floor

All by yourself

You are reminded of the world

That does not stop for you.

You hear the cars passing by,

You hear the construction

of new buildings with 18 floors

and beyond

And you just try

To get up

To make it to another day

And hope to be.

To Wait

My father weeps all night

his cries float through oceans

Waiting desperately to drown

I ask for nothing now

My existence is a shameless being

Crawling through the dark

With no desire for light

‘Things will change, it will, it has to!’

A woman keeps reminding me

Every day in the temple

And I just nod

I nod like I was taught to

Selflessly, with no understanding

Vomiting nothing but silence

A desperate love sets itself on fire

and the Ganga

No more reflects the face I know

Thousands of flowers wash ashore

And I mumble my only verb

‘To wait’..

Oh, the endless wait.

---

Itika Chandra grew up in Rishikesh and has always felt close to rivers and mountains. She is currently pursuing a bachelor's degree in History Honours.