Autumn’s here, the leaves they fall As they do when summer drifts away Slowly leaf by leaf, butterflies and bees All whisk away to other places where nippy winds Frost-nibbled grass and bare trees Have had their day. They change places For a spell, the cities wear new faces Borrowed for a while They smile, they sleep, they laugh, they dream Hand in hand with the people passing by
Autumn’s here, the leaves should fall As they do when summer slips away But the seasons can’t find their way Into this city, its leaves, butterflies and bees Have ceased to be. Permanently. Their carcasses one With those of their humans that once Lived in this place. They can’t change places Even for a while They cannot sit and weep and weep and weep Where mothers are slain and children are left to die.
He looks at him, his son-in-law Blinking, not recognizing him It has been over half a year Since this son was last here Half a lifetime in his existence Scrambled by dementia. Aasiya The daughter he’s barely spoken to Given in marriage at 22 He now remembers crystal clear As she sits with him, ministering Talking to him now without fear Ungrudgingly for all the years She was not enough. Arif Her husband with the business The opinions and the maleness Was the apple of her father’s eyes But now all he sees in the clouds of time Is this angel with her beautiful smile As she soothes him, and she feeds him Her gentle touch calming the storms Of confusion and disquietude That rage through him so often now All he sees, all he has eyes for Is his daughter, his beloved Aasiya.
Two weeks after Dharshini’s fall on the dance floor, the pain was gone along with any memory of it and all the wise resolutions made around preserving and safeguarding fragile body parts. Tuesday evening’s dance class was full of kinetic energy and impressive manoeuvres. Everyone had now been in the class for at least a month and even the most ungainly ones were showing glimmerings of talent; the improvements motivated by instructor infatuation and cheerful sociability were vast and pervasive. Dharshini had missed a fortnight of classes but she made up for lost time with her innate sense of rhythm, a natural vigor and the impetus of new love in her heart. So she danced and pranced and leaped around with wild abandon, taking many of her contemporaries by surprise; so much so that a number of times, the floor was left entirely to the explosive gymnastics of Dharshini and her gratified partner of the moment.
After class, while she was still wrapped in the warm glow of her recent exercise, Daniel approached her. He was happily surprised at her performance, he said. She was gifted. Dharshini smiled coyly and looked at him from deep, chocolate brown eyes surrounded by their fringe of thick lashes. Her undeniably superlative feature, her eyes were less windows to her soul and more her covert Weapon of Rapture. She blinked them, looking down and then up and then to one side, interspersing her optical guiles with little smiles and other enchanting expressions that left the object of her visual assault weak in the knees and short of breath. Daniel too capitulated under that focused bewitchery.
They went out to lunch twice and then finally to dinner. Dharshini had early on analysed the situation in minute detail and had decided that she would take this fabulous chance at romance. She had protected her tender heart for just such a once… twice … in a lifetime occasion. So for her, these meals and meet-ups were the steady, respectable progression to an ever lasting union. She was already feeling like a new woman; her old marriage now increasingly morphing into a burden that was best laid to rest at the earliest. She had thought about that aspect too. She would go about it civilly. There was no love lost in that equation as things stood right now; they were both in it because it was convenient and because they were partners in a shared business. She’d break off the marital ties but keep the business partnership going. She was shrewd enough to realize that while she would couple up with the new love of her life, it would be wise to remain the mistress of her own fortunes and the bills that came with it. Her husband was a practical man and wasn’t given to the egoistic bouts of anger and retribution that came so naturally to so many men concerning their women and their finances. After all, they’d been physically estranged for the last ten years and separated for the last eight. He would understand. She had invited Daniel over for dinner to her house the following evening. She had also asked her husband to come earlier that day to have a chat. She hadn’t explained any specifics; just that she wanted to run something by him. Both men had accepted their respective invitations.
Daniel was on the rebound. He had realized that when he began to respond to the advances of his most vivacious student – 57 year old Dharshini. The age difference notwithstanding, there was an almost predictable old-world doggedness with which this romance was progressing. He enjoyed her company immensely and felt the physical pull of her loveliness, but he was also acutely aware of his prevalent state of mind: He was loathe to commit to anything traditional or long term at the current time. He was footloose after years of being shackled in a loveless marriage and knew that he wanted to remain fancy free for a while. She was a good sort; a convent bred girl of conventional values. She was definitely not the sort you conscripted for your rebound shenanigans. And now she’d invited him over to her house – the ultimate gesture of commitment to a promising potential mate. Daniel sighed resignedly. He had to back off.
The next day, Dharshini got the text message an hour before her husband was due to arrive. It was simple and to the point. Daniel couldn’t make it for dinner; he was tied up somewhere. Also, he wanted to assure her that he was committed to their friendship but nothing more. He was sure that she already knew this but as a rule he liked to keep things above board and crystal clear for the benefit of all concerned. He hoped she had a good evening and that he looked forward to seeing her at the next dance class.
She looked at her phone for a long while, the screen darkening and then lighting up when she pressed on it, the words misting over and then reappearing alternately. At first she felt only numb; then injured and somewhat misled and betrayed. There was no anger however; just a strange sense of dejavu. Like she’d seen this pattern before; knew it from somewhere. In a disconnected, detached way, she’d visualized it play out numerous times before as she’d walked away from each one of her ardent entourage of devotees; only this time, she was at the receiving end. She blinked in disbelief and amazement and even managed to smile ruefully in a momentary pang of realisation and mortification.
She finally put the phone away and looked at her watch. Her husband would be here any minute now. They’d have some coffee and she would ask him if he was selling his grey Toyota Aqua. He had spoken of putting it on the market and it was time that she acquired a new carriage for herself.
Dharshini got into her red Honda Fit, wincing in pain. The visit to the orthopaedic specialist had become essential after a week of agony; her whole right leg throbbed like the devil! She knew she had weak knees, troublesome joints and yet, she’d whirled about that room like her behind was on fire! God! Hormones … or was it the lack of them … she thought wearily, the thrill and the motivation of that performance both now squatting in her head like large stupid birds, staring blandly at her. She grimaced as she gently pressed the accelerator, and drove into the Galle Road traffic.
Dharshini, known fondly and unfondly as Dharshi by her various circles of friends and frenemies was 57, bold and beautiful. The perfection marred, just as all sublime things tend to be, in this case, with osteoarthritic joints. Still, she carried herself with the easy confidence borne of almost always standing out in a room full of people. The occasions where she was upstaged, were few and summarily forgotten under dutiful bouts of social amnesia; both, by her and her coterie of cohorts. She was hands down, the alpha of her group, a fact that nobody could deny or indeed, had the temerity to.
A month or so ago, Dharshini had signed up for social dancing classes. She’d heard rumblings of this venue of perspiration and contortions being the place to meet “Good” people. “Eligible” was of course not what she was looking for; after all she was a married woman. Not entirely happily, and not quite cohabiting with her somewhat estranged spouse, but still to all intents and purposes, secured in sacred wedlock. That fact had been conveniently relevant thus far in keeping at bay, the droves of ill suited middle aged and senior hopefuls who constantly vied for her hand and her heart. She had developed a rejection strategy all her own: with every new admirer, although she knew from the outset how it would end, she would only gently, gradually pass on that knowledge to him; after exacting a few lunches, a trip or two for herself and her girl friends and maybe even a bauble or two, in at least silver. It was a sweet, harmless enterprise she always thought coyly, where both parties benefited. She was not one given to dwelling on the aftermath of a broken heart; her moral due diligence ended with her making it resoundingly clear at some point, that she was only ever a friend. And that even if there was some misunderstanding that she hoped that her most recently crushed courter had enjoyed their camaraderie and that they’d continue to be genial with each other. She’d bestow her most beatific smile and come away contented and cheerful, warm in the glow of a problem solved and her moral compass pointing truly heavenwards.
It was on the Dance floor – that battlefield of laborious leg work and fitful grace, that she’d met Danny. A 45 year old divorcee, Daniel had recently moved back to Sri Lanka after a 10 year stint at marriage and business in Brisbane, Australia. Both had come crashing around him about a year ago. He’d decided then that home was where the heart really was and had, bag, baggage and a dog, returned to his hometown of Colombo. He had always loved dancing and was quite consummately professional at executing the lusty, physical moves of the salsa, bachata and the waltz. In an effort to forget the last decade, he plunged into everything that had defined him before he moved abroad and that ironically, went against many of his predilections now. And so, one of the first things he’d done was to sign up as an instructor at his old social dancing school. A decade ago, he’d been one of their more popular teachers with an avid throng of female admirers who were obliged by their fluttering hearts to sign up as students too. It was a lucrative scheme for dashing Danny and a two hour theatre of titillation and thrills for the dancing brigade. Danny had in fact, met his ex-wife at that very school. She had no talent for the Waltz but had sure-footedly danced her way into his heart. That was really the only time they had ever danced for the sheer pleasure of it. After matrimony settled them into its no-nonsense folds, she realized that she quite despised the art form and he realized with some alarm and then resignation that that fact was the least of his marital woes.
Like the other women, Dharshini too had found herself responding to the agile charms of her dance instructor. He had, on more than a few occasions, taken her as his partner to demonstrate to the rest of the class, a particularly complex move full of wild, rousing acrobatics. She came away from these twists and spins breathless and reddened with exertion and excitement. She was sure he too felt his heart strings being jiggled and jostled in all that animated physicality and closeness. He was different though. He wasn’t smiling too readily at her; or babbling; or otherwise showing any signs of being under the influence of her enchantment and allure. Traditionally she was the pursued and the besotted men did all the labour-intensive pursuing. He was congenial but just distant enough to show that he was in control of the situation and if this … this thing… had to go anywhere, it was for her to make the first move. This realisation was both heady and new. She had smiled to herself. There was something else that was new here too: her heart after ages, was beating for someone else!
And so Dharshini had thrown herself into her Salsa and Bacahata lessons, three times a week. A fortnight into the enterprise, she had slipped and fallen on the tiled floor, landing directly on her knees. In the heat of the moment and in the insular glow that now surrounded her at every class, she didn’t feel the pain nor the ominous creaking of her joints every time she bent her knees or leaped deer-like out of her partner’s arms onto the hard floor. She went to bed in a haze of contentment and love. She even felt a random gentle wave of affection rise for all her other unfortunate suitors who had gone their own way. I hope they’re all happy just as I am, she’d thought charitably, big-heartedly. And with that she drifted off into a dreamless, restful sleep.
‘Why was I jumping like a monkey on steroids? Why? Why?’ Dharshini complained bitterly to Sabeena on the phone the next morning. Her mid morning phone chats with one or another of her friends marked the start of every day. She always came away feeling invigorated, light of load and rearing to get on with the rest of her day. Sabeena too came away from the phone call, her inner calm now quite shattered by the torturous raving and ranting of her bossy but well-meaning friend.
The morning after her fall, Dharshini hadn’t been able to bend her right knee at all, and had thought it was best if she stayed in bed. These restful, placatory measures had often worked when her joints occasionally rebelled in the tropical rains and humidity. This was the first time, however, that she’d subjected them to such pounding, ceaseless torture. For two whole weeks! They were obviously going to act like petulant, griping grande dames. For Dharshini, her ankles and her knees were like a twinsome of spinsterly companions that had set up permanent residence on her person. While everything else felt youthful and sprightly, these joints never matched up. They creaked and complained at the slightest intrusion of weather or activity and it took large doses of rest and relaxation to get their grumbling soreness to settle.
The pain had not subsided even after a week of missing classes and tending to her knees. She had finally decided to see her orthopaedic specialist. The doctor and she shared a love-hate relationship on behalf of her joints which he quite practically considered his wards too. He knew that Dharshini only ever came to him when things had gone from bad to worse and when he’d have to resort to strongly advising, cajoling and then threatening, to have her be more compliant. She knew that the good doctor meant well but he was always so grim and pessimistic; always making her feel old and doddery.
‘Mrs. Gunaratne, have you been trying to run relays lately?’ he asked feeling her swollen right knee. She grimaced and mumbled something unintelligible. The universe and he both knew what she meant.
‘You have weak joints Mrs. G. There is hardly any cartilage left in your right knee and the gel* injections are soon going to be insufficient to keep it going. It’s knee replacement surgery for you if this goes on’, he said darkly but also with some satisfaction. He was really quite at his wits end with patients like Mrs. Gunaratne who refused to take supplements, had congenital osteoarthritis and were always up to some joint-jarring misadventure.
‘Doctor Herath, please just give me the injection and I promise to take the pills. I have to go soon. I have another appointment’, Dharshini said somewhat testily. But not too aggressively. He was after all the best orthopaedic surgeon in town. And when it was absolutely necessary, he would be the one to endow her with a set of new knees. She always balked at the idea of surgery and not even the prospect of agreeable, maiden knees could dispel her horror of the surgeon’s scalpel.
* Gel injections: One of the more effective treatments for arthritis is gel knee shots — also referred to as viscosupplementation or hyaluronic acid injections.
You Are Too different Too controversial Too weird Too quiet Too absent
You Are Too passionate Too frigid Too pushy Too gregarious Too reserved
You Are Too opinionated Too invested Too indifferent, disinterested
You Are Too much but You Are Also not enough
These arrows used to fly East and west Between the bazaars and the mosques Down and up From my beating heart To my silent mouth, forging Right angles containing me In burnished boxes glittering bright But in the moorings Of all these paradoxes writhing out Like strident dirges from treacherous lyres Howling of brimstone and hellfire Now I hear only one thing I only hear that one constant thing
YOU ARE!
In the refrains that ring Thunder and break I hear it sing:
YOU ARE!
In all that cacophony In the clarion calls of propriety Pounding, rounding endlessly From the steeples of society That is all I ever hear now
🌸 YOU ARE! 🌸 YOU ARE! 🌸 YOU ARE! 🌸
Yes I am! I finally am! This is me And that is all I ever need to be.
The cursor blinks expectantly Compellingly, unyieldingly Something stirs my inner calm With tongs charged with electricity I see them bare their tungsten teeth Serrated, set and bite-ready They start to pick at the soft glow That cloaks my core delicately The zen shades come quickly undone One by one efficiently, unerringly Until the luminosity Of the buzzing pliers hits My chakras humming quietly The glow transforms to garish light I’m overtaken, panic strikes My heart leaps up, it’s on the run Blood rushing, pitching oxygen To my eyes and my extremities I blink once, twice and then again As the cursor straight and stark Marks its time ominously I tap-tap-delete-tap feverishly Fingers on the dread-locked keys But there is no hidden gem That flows from this cataclysm On the page in front of me I look up, I take a breath The screen retreats into its depths Some days it really is just best To give the grim cursor a rest.
I had a dream last night You were in it Fuzzy, unclear But the hook was there That had plucked you from somewhere Inside my head or maybe From some deserted place in my heart It wasn’t an act Of which I was aware I had no say In the furtive way You appeared around me again Even if you were phantasmic, chimerical In that time, you were real A swaying, decaying bridge coupling The physical and the figmental
It left a bitter aftertaste In my mouth when I awoke I brushed my teeth With renewed vitality (My dentist would be happy at least) I spent the day going over the locks I had put around certain memories These escapes Even in my dreams Made me restless, agitated me When I was awake Tonight I will have my dose Of vitamins and minerals (They promise all sorts of well-being) So that when I dream The bolted doors inside of me Keep holding their integrity
But even if they lose their might Releasing spectres of the night I know that in my waking hours In dissecting and determining The cryptic whys and wherefores Of night-garish visages Invading, distressing me These dreams, these unbidden images Have already lost their sting They have shed their whipping wings To fly at me when I’m asleep Through all of my monster-proofing And so deep down inside Something tells me that tonight I will dream of other things.
I see the sea, a mottled grey As she holds on,just barely To a hazy vestige Of her tranquil turquoise sheen It was just an hour ago That she wore her majesty Cloaked in all her blues and greens But even she This creature of serenity Has her days when she shifts Off her axis of evenness When she fusses and fumes in choppy tones Sending currents of fear through mortal bones Her discontentment carried in The surf that comes crashing in To where I stand holding my breath In my bare feet, toes inward-crept She sloshes, washes over me Her touch, gritty-soft As she caresses me Tough-lovingly For behind her fearsome gaze And beneath her maddened mien She’s still the nurturer, the queen.
The streets cook in the yeasty sun The concrete melting in little mirages In the corner of my eye, I see The vegetation sizzle on the sidewalks The tops are over-done, burnt The undersides stick to the earth In a grotesque masquerade Of some now forgotten vital bond Roots and soil cling together Like dogged carcasses to the bone The street dogs lie half dead Parched tongues loll out now and then A sluggish scrape against the grit And they escape Back into the desert caverns of their mouths I pick my way along the street Shimmer-sharpened by the heat I feel it reach Hellish fingers through my soles Heat-divining for my soul I hurry on but Hades’ torrid lick Is already on my swollen lips His hoary sizzle has found its mark My tar-seared feet slow to a crawl My essence drips out in burns Upon oil-scorched temples and brows Down my thighs and my neck I cannot move another step I sit on a steaming bench To drench the rest of me In the quenchless, wrenching sun.
July has come round again Another birthday It’s been twelve whole years Since you went away A decade and two years it’s been And I want to tell you how these years Have touched me After you said your last goodbye
The first two were unhappy, desolate I had regular nightmares I’d go to sleep thinking of you And of those last few difficult days The ritual memory was oddly cathartic Even as it hurt, cutting deep Ripping my heart out every night Before I lay me down to some semblance of sleep
And then through some blessed interlacing Of our two realms you came to me in a dream You were well again You were whole and you were happy And I held your hands Even as you held mine We laughed with joy as we whirled around
And since then My broken heart has gently Laced its red-blue pieces together With gold and purple lines I now find you in visions and dreams That are more serene So real, that when I awake You are somehow still around A heartbeat away, an echo warm and sweet A lingering touch upon my cheek
I look at your picture on my phone My heartstrings wrap around your form It’s the next best thing to perfection In our world of love and loss And so here you are shimmering Lighting up my memories again Twinkling eyes smiling away Making me catch my breath As I whisper dearest, a happy birthday.
Mahvash Mohtadullah 