Anhad ka Baaja

The girl who delivered milk To the temple on the island Was always late Dependent as she was On the whims of the boatman The priest admonished her one day Saying Woman, Chanting the name of our

To pick up the phone And call someone To say Nalla irrukengala or Ki khobor Is fraught Today With an unvoiced dread And so I don't pick up the phone I don't call And lose the chance To say Nalla

And the very air we breathe Is contaminated Isn't it? We are condemned By this virus to Isolate Quarantine Breathe alone Live alone Even die alone Aren't we? But The pandemic has sparked An

When the boys were small And we played Catch the papoose Hug the papoose Crush the papoose There would be times when I would forget my own strength And the gurgles of delight Would dissolve into

It is easy enough To blame it all on Cyril Radcliffe But he was just Doing his job He just drew Lines on paper As he was told to It is the partitions In our hearts In our minds That have transmuted

The danger of a single story Is just that It  is a single story All the characters in a story After all Are protagonists to themselves Like in Kurosawa's Rashomon Or rather Like in Akutagawa's In a