Bird of Heaven

The roughed-out doodled sheet is lying unattended on the table. The husband’s glance falls on it as he passes by. Curiosity piqued, he takes it and asks, ‘What is this?’

I shrug. It is an instinctive response that doesn’t mean much.

‘You made it?’ he asks, saucer-eyed.

I nod and smile, feeling very self-conscious.

‘How did you do it?’ I notice the streak of disbelief in his voice.

‘One stroke at a time,” I say, taking the paper back from him.

‘But it looks so complicated.’ He can’t wrap his head around it. He turns it around a couple of times to figure what it is.

‘It isn’t so complicated when you do it one stroke at a time. Isn’t that how dreams are realized and goals are achieved? Isn’t that how milestones are reached? One step at a time?’

As he looks on, still stupefied, I explain to him that when I began, it was just a small patch of doodle signifying nothing. Then as the sketch slowly grew on the paper, bit by bit, something seemed to emerge out of it. It made me follow a blind instinct that led me to a certain shape. I soon realized I could indeed convert this random, mindless doodle into something meaningful.

‘Thus, this!’ I say waving the paper in front of him.

‘And what exactly is it?

‘Umm… I think I will call it Bird of Heaven, perhaps?’

‘And where did you learn to do this?’

‘Nowhere. Just improvised on the kolam (rangoli) drawing skills that I acquired as a kid. It seems there is this new art form called zentangle. I don’t know how to zentangle, but I know how to draw kolams.’

Then I add, ‘Actually, there is nothing miraculous about it. No rocket science or genius involved. I just drew on my old skills, put a new spin on it, developed bit by bit, and voila!’

He gives me an acknowledging smile and taps my head. ‘I know what you mean. Good luck on your plans for the new venture. It looks challenging at this point, but I know you will get there, slowly, one stroke at a time.’

‘Yes, I will,’ I say, tracing the plumes of the Bird of Heaven with my finger. ‘All beginnings are often insignificant. Just a dot, a line. And when you persist, it becomes a whole new picture. You don’t know how you made it, but you did, after all. Is this what ‘no looking back’ means?’ I ask reflectively.

I understand, I do

It was late morning on Easter Sunday. I rang the bell at an acquaintance’s house and waited. There wasn’t much movement inside, making me wonder if the people in the house had not returned from the mass yet. I rang again. It took a while to be answered.

‘Who is it?’ It was the full-time maid, Lincy’s voice. I replied. She had joined the family only recently, but knew me well.

‘Happy Easter,’ I said happily, as soon as she opened the door. She greeted me back, with a mild smile that didn’t quite reach the corner of her eyes. There was something missing in it, but I don’t make much of it at that time.

‘No one in the house?’ I asked, noticing the calm behind her. It was clear that there was no one in the house.

‘Yes, there are. I had a son. He passed away a year ago. He was the sole earning member in my family. He used to take care of the whole family. I have a daughter and a grandchild. Exactly a year after my son died, my son-in-law abandoned my daughter, and married someone else. She and her child are now with my husband. That’s why I am here doing this job. Why do all misfortunes come together?’ Her voice broke into shards of pain.

I stood gasping, watching the middle aged woman begin to sob and give details. The quietness in the house from where she had emerged seemed to deepen and assume a sinister quality. ‘No, Lincy, you must not cry on a good day like this,’ I said, lowering my voice deliberately to soothe her rising anguish.

‘There is no good day in my life. No Christmas, no Easter. I have only this sorrow. I can’t even weep here openly. I do it when I go out to dump the garbage every day.’

I felt a lump in my throat. I am a mushy, emotional thing. It takes very little for me to feel the sting in the eyes. People’s sad stories can rob my sleep. It can throw me off balance.

Empathy, at times, can be severely punishing. It can make one feel utterly helpless and incapacitated. And on occasions, it makes us adopt their pain. It can be very debilitating. But that cannot take away from our responsibility to offer succour to those who need it, can it? But then, what does one say to a woman who is telling a life tale of such acute distress?

Every pain is extreme and unparalleled for the person enduring it. The cruelest thing one can do towards them is to philosophize and undermine their feelings. A lesser evil is to compare it to other people’s dire conditions in an attempt to assuage this person. The ‘you are better off than millions of others’ maxim that trivializes her woes.

So I cut all the crap and said with the deepest sympathies that I was capable of expressing in that moment, ‘I understand your pain.’ I put my right arm out in an attempt to give her a gentle hug.

‘Oh, I am sweating, and will be smelling,’ she said, trying to avoid my embrace and wiping her tear-streaked face on her sleeve.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ I said, and gave her a hug. I caught a faint smell of raw fish on her. It was probably the closest witness to her story. I heard her whimper on my shoulder and fought to hold my tears back. I had no means to mitigate her pain. All I had was a sparing expression, ‘I understand.’

But that seemed enough to her. A minute later, she gave me a smile, held my hand gratefully and said, ‘Thank you. Please pray for me.’

I promised her I would. As I began to walk away, she called out from behind, ‘Don’t tell these people about it. I haven’t told them anything.’

It was shattering to think that she was spending her days without giving the people she worked for (and lived with) a hint of what she was suffering silently. I didn’t seek explanations for it.

Later that day, when I heard of the bombings in Sri Lanka, I added several anonymous people in my prayer along with Lincy. I wished I could tell each of them, ‘I can’t change the situation, but I understand your sorrow. I do.’

My words would have travelled and touched their lives in ways unknown surely?

Let there be light

I stare at the screen, trying to fix my next round of Filter Kaapi. I don’t feel inspired to write a story. Speaking anything now seems superfluous. Such have been the events of recent times.

I fidget uneasily as my thoughts steer towards the state of the world and the human condition. A collage of nasty images clogs my mind. Of blood-rivers, broken roofs and battered lives. Wherever one turns, there is a myriad of miseries. Mankind’s collective pain slowly creeps up and cramps my gut.

Sometimes, nothing makes sense. Neither words nor silence.

I linger in the numbness for a while, and then, in a sudden moment of awareness, I get dislodged from my passivity. I must take responsibility; there are no excuses.

It doesn’t help to merely shake the head and sigh when there are transgressions of this scale. I cannot pretend as if I have no role to play in all the evil that’s unfolding around me. As if my slate is clean and the mayhem is someone else’s doing.

Propelled to act in a moment of remorse, I punch in forcefully – THE WORLD ISN’T A MESS. I AM.

I haven’t learned to love enough. Without boundaries. Without self-interest. Without reason. My love is still narrow and meandering. Not vast and gushing. I haven’t stepped out of my confines and known the universe. I haven’t evolved enough to feel the oneness. I have failed the world. Miserably.

To set things right, I must become the ocean, I must become the sky. I must become the heartbeat of every bloom and butterfly. I must sweep into my arms every grain of sand and dissolve without resistance, like salt in water. I must be infinite in my capacities. Breaking, disintegrating and then coming together again.

I must know this for certain – life begins only when cells unite. Life sustains only when the united spirit thrives.

As I stare into the screen, oblivious to the surroundings, I realize that this terrible chaos I see around me springs from my innate blindness. I have no one else to blame. Awash with guilt and shame, I make a promise to the universe –

I shall do my bit to clean up the clutter. I shall strive to love, to forgive, to bond and to transcend the boundaries. Truthfully, without faking and putting up false claims. If I can’t love fully, I will not harbour despise at least. Help me clear the spite, bleach the stains and sanitize my inner space. And in moments when I lose sight and err, fill me with light, and inspire.

As I wind up without writing a story today, a line from an old wisdom alone repeats in the head – ‘Dhiyo yona prachodayat.’ (May He enlighten our intellect.)