My Stories

 Through winter, the air held the sharp scent of mustard flowers, seeping through windows, and clinging to their clothes. By spring, the fields beyond their home blazed gold—swaying, endless. On the dusty patch outside their home, Avi had once scuffed into the earth with her toe: ‘Avi loves Ajji.’  

As darkness makes its soundless way. 

The night stretches into the trees that sway. 

No light. No sound. The whispers, down. 

The magnolia with its shining skirt, abounds. 

And as the dew lays it gentle weight

upon the petals that bend with grace, these glistening blossoms

harken back,

to love, to life, to laughter and loss. 

Then to rise again, a phoenix,

Pearl in green moss. 

“I am not a baby!” Quite a phrase. The dictionary is quite clear on this one—a very young child--and frankly, if truth be told ‘being baby’ never really ends. That is the charm of being our parents’ children."

"... did you know that the Palash tree on which the Flames of the Forest bloom, must shed its leaves completely before these bonfire flowers blaze their glory? He was a bud, waiting. 

  "It is the summer holidays. The sun bakes the earth. Inside my grandparents’ flat the garrulous cooler fills the house with the smell of freshly dampened khus. The water gurgles as it falls, giving the harsh light outside an almost gentle luminosity. But the two overactive children inside do not permit idleness. My grandmother is hard at work, putting together an afternoon full of activities that will keep us engaged." 

"And it got me thinking, we all have near-death experiences as children, even as adults. We are wily, we humans, we constantly evade expiry! But why was I told these and many other numerous passing away or certainly near passing away, stories in such a funny, nonsensical way.  Why was I not told a person becomes a twinkling star with a wide smile after we die? Why did we not creep around the word like it a bristling hedgehog?" 

"When we came for holidays to our grandparents, most evenings we all stepped out for a walk to the Lodhi Gardens, a short stroll away. Whilst Ajoba took the track laid out, Mothima believed in the road non-existent! Through the tombs, up the hillocks, down along the flower beds, saying hallo to the monkeys and goodbye to the ducks, along parapets and out through the roundling gates, we would all congregate at the India International Centre, at one end of the gardens, have tea, eat rotund, crisp samosas and come back home through the well-tiled path."