Myriad Reflections. Shastri Akella

Departures
The car wheezes through the thicket of the early evening traffic, its gentle snore rising steadily to combat the music of the rain as it patters over ephemeral worldly objects along the course of its descent from eternal heavens. In an era proclaimed as the zenith of corporate rivalry, the inanimate too have a right to claim competition, I decide. The drone-like hum of the car. The drumbeat of splenetic rain sheets over tarmacs and car tops. A soaring competition of sorts, sultry as the summer noons that have just bid their farewell.
The car halts suddenly with a screeching noise that almost seems like a mild objection to the cramped road space offered to its rather flamboyant gray body, as if in pittance. Cars have lost their glory. Gone are the days when they had an air of mysticism surrounding them, their association with affluence, instant, almost satanically unconscious. Why, even the street urchins who would run behind the aura-effused four-wheelers (as an unfair bargain for their adulation, dousing themselves in layers of dust it unleashes in the wake of its departure), bear a bored look, one of a resigned, ironic observer when they watch a car zoom past. They have found avocations and interests more profound than a zooming mass of tin and petrol. Alas, what has the grandeur of the car been reduced into.
The traffic jam thickens and I realize it is going to be a while before locomotion can be hoped for. The delicate whimpers of the radio as it croons “Thank you for the music” is snubbed by the fierce honks created by inebriated truck drivers and anguished employees returning home after another frustrating day of worklife. I crane my neck to stare distractedly at the sky, where amidst the splenetic sheets of rain the sun peeps charily from behind a cloud. It quickly hides behind the cloud, momentarily converting the gray cloud mass into an illuminated chandelier. It emerges again, and for a moment I think of the sun as a conspiring kid, playing games of peek-a-boo with me. Amused, I look around to see that the rest of the sky is overcast, a thick streak of gray painted in somber strokes over the sky. It is a perfect setting for a burying a departed soul, I think. My wandering gaze and thoughts are suddenly arrested by an intriguing sight. A line of television sets of varying sizes are placed atop the roof of fading yellow building. 21 “, 15 “, and the more pristine 9”. I try and conjecture the brands of what have now been reduced to mere lifeless boxes. Sony, Philips, and Onida. Color, Black & White, and Black & White. What are televisions doing atop a fading, dying, yellow building – the thick streaks of water clogged lines left atop its crumbling surface like the approaching noose of Yama. (Like competition, the inanimate also have a right to ultimate redemption from the vagaries of existence, you see). I realize I have spelt my question aloud when the driver answers me – his bored voice not very different from the voice of the engine as it hums in its temporary immure. Apparently, the television sets are products exchanged by eager families in return of more sophisticated models. While the deal takes place in suave, air conditioned show rooms under the aegis of a smiling, lipstick smeared dame, the accepted, unused sets are handed over to mechanics and other technicians as such. Having extracted vital usable parts from the television – the remains – a true blue idiot box is discarded atop this fading yellow building, till a kabadiwalah with a spare trifle offers it deliverance. The driver’s eyes suddenly gleam to life when he notices a small clearing – an escaped from the gnomish traffic that encircles us. As the vehicle sputters to life again – the roar, again distinct, I stare back, silhouettes of square bodies disappearing into the gray of the hour. I think: For how many years have these televisions entertained a little family in some alcove, in some apartment, the fading lights of the evenings settling over their excitement. I can imagine the 9” television set in a dinghy, squalid single-bedroom apartment, its incessant flicker reflecting on the faces of the family accumulated in front of it. Grandmother crying as the soap unleashes its saga. The tiny body of five year old Bunty in all the wilderness of a baboon as he watches the animated ‘Jungle Book’. Grandfather’s brows knitting over darkened eyes as he watches the latest political conspiracy revealed under the vigilant eye of a news channel. Father sitting on the edge of an easy chair – his fingers drumming over his knees, his temples streaked with sweat, and his chest rising in accordance to the cadence of tension and excitement, as he watches the final over of an India-Pakistan one day international. Mother, as she furiously fights the lures of an afternoon siesta, her fingers fidgeting with pen and paper to carefully note the recipe chattered away by a corpulent, bubbly Sindhi. So many tales, so many hours, so many emotions, all cramped in the tiny space – between television set and easy chair, between viewer and object on display. The dank dullness of the drawing room, only marred by the gay flicker of the television set and of course, the emotions it unleashed in its viewer – sorrow, mirth, solicitude, excitement, and agile eagerness. But today, gone is its moment of limited glory, and it lies in an unknown, crumbling building, privy to its fate, and perhaps its existence. Why cannot discarding be done with an air of dignity, I wonder. But perhaps, as a wise man had once said, sometimes, journeys must be undertaken, even when there is no specific destination to be reached. So here is the 9” set, away from the long years of familial love, with no destination it seeks anywhere in the vicinity of its dead gaze, fading from my vision and under the gray shroud that sky had become.
I slouch and shut my eyes, and for reasons unknown to me, am reminded of a visit I had paid to a graveyard, about two years ago. I studied the names etched on gravestones over dove-white sepulchers. Strange names, varying life spans. Different continents, starkly contrasting destinies. All together sharing space and comfort in a little corner of the world. I suddenly notice a name: Ann Mary. Born 1945. Died 1990. And below is inscribed: “the great author whose little tales inspired children of many generations. I recall then, settling reverently in front of the gravestone, that I had read her stories as a child. Fables relating to strange worlds where mythical creatures ambled with the air of an emperor, to ancient cities that flourished in distant lands, to bygone epochs that bespoke of unthinkable splendor, and sometimes, to indigent, forgotten corners of our planet where nature and man existed, bearing a perennial sense of intimidation for the other. But how many of children – of course, grown into full-throttle youth now, busily pursuing our individual fortunes and phantoms – remember Ann Mary. How many know she died in 1990? Such evanescence, and such vanity in the name of posterity. Human life I decide is a series of ephemeral glories, interlaced with long, mournful departures. The presence of the glories ever so unpredictable, the presence of the departures, sure as the noose of death. A gust of wind blows, and the dried leaves rustle, sounding an elegy and for the dead. I get up to leave, but not before caressing the engraved name of Ann Mary, as if in that one moment of touch between the living and the dead, I had created a cosmic connection to transfer an eclectic word of gratitude. I leave, for it is time for departure too.
The car comes to a halt, and the driver informs me that my destination has arrived. I let out a long sigh, pay him and enter my destination. I am discarding my old home – to me, it is now, nothing but the grave where I wish to bury my anguished memories, traumas, the outcomes of my follies, and the melancholy that still pierces my heart with a merciless dagger. I draw out the key from my pocket and stare hopefully at it, as if it were not the key to my new home, but the entrance to a heaven, where freedom from the miseries that manacle me to themselves is an assured benediction of the Gods above.
I open the door of the house, the musty, mildew-coated air of unused rooms and unspelt dreams conspicuous. I stare into the empty spaces that will witness my life as it unfurls – interlacing sorrow with little sprinklings of joy, and wonder: how long will this sojourn last, before it is time again, for another departure?

What mother knows
A grainy silence, rivaling the uneven surface of the sheets I am about to etch my thoughts on, fills my mind with a curious thought: my life as I understand it from keenly observed memories is incomplete: an unfinished manuscript, some vital images of early days, conspicuous by their absence. Who would know of those times better than mother?
Mothers, the keepers of the dusty, forgotten corners of the heart. So I set to work describing the images mother would recount unto me, if I were to ask her what she recalled of my toddler days. Topping the list is a bucket full of bathwater: soapy, a little dirty, and freshly drawn from the baby tub, its rippling, unclear contents reflecting a distorted version of the smile that twinkles on mother’s face as she watches the dew-fresh, petal-tender, pink skin of her child. Then comes the Johnson & Johnson baby oil bottle, its pink cap carelessly open – an otherwise meticulous woman forgetting to do the needful, in the hurry to invite the sleep that dances uncertainly over her baby’s eyes.
There is also the little soft toy of a puppy – his red tongue foolishly jutting out of an obnoxiously wide mouth, his sleepy button eyes casting a bored look, and a sienna coat rising alluringly over soft masses of cotton. A black dot suddenly appears in my field of imagination, and I add it eagerly to my list: a single dot of kohl, placed by a trembling, affection forefinger onto a cushion-soft cheek to ward off evil spirits. And of course the song proclaiming the virtues of Ram, sung as it is, placing the tender head of the child in the crook of the arm, and imbuing a fondness for immortal mythology in the blank mind sheets of incipient days. Finally, for some strange reason, I scribble the name of an audio cassette – its black body covered with layers of dust; it is a collection of mother’s favorite songs, and like the many things she savors, it has remained discarded in the wake of the newfound responsibility of child-raising.
These vivid images that I conjured from a burgeoning imagination worthy of a budding writer require affirmation from mother, and I wait for her return from the temple, fingers clutching onto those crusty sheets. I give the list a fancy title: “What mother knows”. It is the languid hour of afternoon, the heated fingers of the hour numbing my mind with a touch of somnolence. I drift into sleep, and when I awake, dusk has almost set in. The horizon is tinted with an amalgamation of ochre and crimson. I realize that the paper – that I slept clinging onto – is neatly folded and placed under a lamp on the bedside table. I open the paper, and decide on approaching mother, when I notice that the last item on the list has been struck off, and below it is scribbled in an affectionately familiar handwriting – the words curving and slanting like delightful terrains of nature and stating: “An ocean of love that only a child creates in the life of his mother”. And just then, finger run through my hair, the moment of familiar touch filling my eyes with unbidden tears, and my mind with a solitary thought: love experienced, in a little corner of the world.

She
Her hazel eyes, moving incessantly in milky-white sockets, peer eagerly at me, awaiting an answer that may satisfy her question. Golden curls cascading down her crevice, frame her face in thick, luscious strokes. Her cheeks – aglow like a Tuscan summer and pastel like caramel custard, make me shifty – I can no longer think of the answer I must provide. I am buried under an overwhelming desire to touch those cheeks – soft as a cushion and tender as a feather – and run my forefinger along the length of her cheekbone and the little cleft that sits prettily on her chin. She repeats the question and despite forgetting the question altogether, I don’t concentrate on what she is saying. The lapse somehow does not rivet me with the prospects of being reprimanded. I instead, stare at the deep crimson imprinted on her lips, and am reminded of the tulips of Amsterdam, how the sway in all the glory of their color, to the flirtatious flutter of an autumn wind (no, I have not had the good fortune of seeing either Tuscan or Italy. What I gather of these ethereal environs, is from longing glances affixed on postcards sister sends me religiously each time she pays a new foreign terrain a visit). How nature – in all its bounty and color, replicates itself with such precise clarity on a woman’s face does not cease surprising me. A man, even at the zenith of his manly splendor, appears pale in comparison to the brilliant mural that a woman’s visage ably lends itself to. Even a neutral God has a heart that palpitates with added vigor when creating a woman, I decide. So the mantle is laid carefully, every feature depicted by the divine brush in careful strokes, the overall developed after painstaking attention to the finest detail.
Suddenly, she snaps her finger, drawing me out of my state of poetic enrapture. She states her question again, a slight tinge of irritation now creeping into a carefully maintained phlegmatic tone (her Spanish accent delivering the vowels with an additional layer of air, her tuneful uttered words melting my sensibilities even further). Her mantilla – a fine lace cloth that is predominantly white, gently slides from her hair and falls to the floor. She chuckles and bends to pick it from the dusty carpet. Her legs are elegantly placed over each other, and as she picks up her fallen treasure, the floral patterns imprinted on the turquoise shirt pulled over a tautly sculpted upper body are creased. Placing the mantilla on the glass table she folds her hands across her chest and looks at me intently, oceans of hazel locking my dream-laden vision, ever so delicately. I nod my head, careful not disturb the cosmic connection so magically created. She breaks into a smile, her teeth – like perfectly cut marble stones, creating a brilliant instance of perfect alignment. She softly says, “thank you” and leaves the room, her stride certain to put even a doe’s jungle exploration in poor light.
I continue sitting there, staring at the vacant place that was once the chair she sat on, perhaps wanting to embrace the air of warmth lingering in the wake of her absence. I do not know what I have agreed to or where I have led myself to, but this much is true: when the heart leads, we have no option but to follow, even if the destination were an abyss or dungeon. For, in the cuddle of love, even the most formidable of places become reincarnations of what poets so emphatically describe to be paradise.
I collect a pinch of the warm air that is alive with her presence and feel giddy with delight. An unconscious finger patting over the table – providing rhythm to the sonnets the heart sings, abruptly encounters a soft piece of cloth. Without opening my eyes, I realize that it her mantilla and draw it close to my nose and take a deep breath; I’m instantly hit with a million smells – a drop of honey, mingled with the taste of figs, or perhaps a sprinkling of cinnamon over a small piece of sandalwood, or better still, a breath of frankincense sticks, imbued into an air, already divine with the smell of oil lamps set alive with ghee. I fold the mantilla and slip into my breast pocket. Subtle encounter with love, folded, encompassed and précised into a single mass of square cloth, and placed close to where such tales are nurtured – the heart (is there an invisible connection created now between the mantilla and my ululating heart?). I walk out of the room, humming a tune I had long forgotten. “She’s always a woman to me”