Mirrored body, mirrored soul

Mirrored body, mirrored soul

A hole in the heart

A fever in the limbs

Solitude long spent

Feckless desires bring

 

Mirrored body, mirrored soul

Somewhere in the cosmos

She sends out a plea

A force of energy

Rings of reiki

 

Mirrored body, mirrored soul

Conspire oh universe

Create you mad world

Time stand still

Reveal yourself to me to thrill

 

Mirrored body, mirrored soul

Head in haze

Illusions magnify

He studies her

She trembles

 

Mirrored body, mirrored soul

Body leaves mind

Fighting desperate senses

Energy resonates energy

She revels

 

Mirrored body, mirrored soul

Whole is the heart

Fingers entwine

She kisses him hello

He smiles goodbye

Conversations on a Bridge

Noise around them, between them, through them

Laughing crowds swirling decibels of sweet sounds

Violet sunset held still by a million flashes and clicks

Plaintive tunes skimming gentle waves, wafting over warm breeze

That swells and ripens with a thousand voices

Flames dance and shadows hide as

Strangers surge, a child breaks free running towards nothing

Towards everything

She is breathless

He says ‘I love you’

She laughs.

Conversations are for another time.

Enigma

Lilting voice speaks passionate words

Mind dispels images frame by frame

Heart bleeds pathos

Eyes hide angst

Anger imprinted where tears once flowed

Soul expands and constricts with seasons change

Hand once held hand; now let go

Feet restless, legs dance

Lips read lips

A thousand words of hope

Then thoughts go blank

A jumbled sense of existence

I am an enigma to me

In Retrospect

A patch of sunlight

Illuminates

A bruise on the writing desk; a scar on the heart

Now faded into solemn memory

Once ugly, now respected

Through long and warm summers

A love nurtured; heart hammering soft words and reckless promises

Millions of invisible letters now soaked into wood

In retrospect, I would if I could.

Mrs. So-and-So

Her home always smelled of carbolic soap. The furnishings were a mismatch of home-tailored cushions and curtains impeccably starched and ironed. If a curtain didn’t do its job well enough, it was ripped apart and converted into upholstery.  Clothes were treated no differently. Hand-me-downs were the general norm for the siblings and when they became too short or too tight, her deft hands would add or remove pieces of cloth to fashion shorts from trousers or frocks from old kameezes. It was as if she had dedicated her life and time into ensuring that every rupee spent would go the longest way it could. Nothing was ever wasted or thrown away until every thread lived out its life.

I was fascinated that the family lived out of suitcases permanently, having run short of cupboard spaces. It was a labor of love. Half a dozen suitcases piled neatly on top of each other in reverse order of size, with edges perfectly centered. A closet of unimaginable organization, identified by color and size. Inside each suitcase were piles and piles of laundered salwar kameezes, all smelling of carbolic soap and other detergents. The entire family had perfected the art of selecting an outfit, and gliding it out of the make-shift closet without upsetting the intricate system.

She would spend many afternoons in the sunny verandah of our home with her knitting in hand and my mother for company. They always addressed each other as Mrs. So-and-So and never by their first names. Without the comfort of a common language between them, they designed clothes, shared memories, remembered old songs and developed a deep friendship that crossed cultural boundaries and overcame language barriers.

Our houses became second homes for each other. On Sundays we would all get together around a 5 inch TV screen (that was part of a 3-in-1 music system) in her home and watch an old faded movie, while fighting for head space. After the first couple of weeks, each of us had a place and chair assigned for efficient TV viewing. We celebrated birthdays, summer vacations, religious and non-religious holidays, graduations, home-comings, promotions and weddings; and bemoaned setbacks as one large family. And so our friendship grew and we were often spoken about in the same breath.

As the neighborhood continued its routine life of work and school and mothers holding fort, a newcomer in the form of a young child was rumoured to having been seen in one of the more reticent families. The gossip spread through the usual channels – whispers across hedges while drying clothes and maids wagging their loose tongues.  The real story emerged finally with tremendous persistence and we found out the young girl had been rendered orphan recently and was sent to live with her uncle and aunt, who apparently didnt take very kindly to the intrusion.  The unkindness of the situation took a cruel turn over the weeks and the child’s treatment  horrified the neighborhood – that she was hosed in the backyard for a bath or she had to pitifully catch her washed laundry as her aunt would pull them off the washing line with a stick. We were loathe to know what other forms of abuse manifested within the four walls.

Mrs. So-and-so received the updates at first with great shock that turned into sorrow and then to rage. Always one to speak her mind and stand by her principles, the neighborhood got a glimpse of her feisty spirit over the unfolding episodes that were a disgrace to mankind.  After weeks of watching and waiting, the spirited lady could hold back no longer. Barging into the home of the accused, she gave the family an ultimatum to clean up their act or be truly sorry. She threatened to take away the child and call the cops. True to her courage, she was also ready to open her own doors for the child and bring her up as her own. The family cowered in shame under her wrath and promised to make alternative arrangements. The neighborhood sighed in collective relief.

When Mrs. So-and-so and her family moved away years later, we were distraught. We wrote long letters and waited impatiently for the postman week after week. Over the years the impatience turned to acceptance and we moved on with our lives and connected intermittently.

It has been several decades since. But for me, the smell of carbolic soap always flashes the memory of a stand-up lady.

In Pursuit of Cleanliness

Dar es Salaam was a haze of bright sun, incessant rain, murderous mosquitoes and a constant threat of malaria that left me fazed and bewildered. My stay in Mikocheni was going to be an adventure beyond comparison. I had recently quit a 50-hour-week job in India and was completely unprepared to deal with a full-time role as wife and mother. To help me cope with domestic chores was Witness. We called her Whitney.

She eyed me with unmasked curiosity on the first day and shook my hand with a shy smile. And so began her three-month-long employment with us – one of quiet resignation and tireless pursuit of cleanliness.

She would walk in the door at 7 am after a quick chat and angelic smile with the ‘askari’ or security guard that manned the compound of five or six villas. With the slim skirt abandoned for a convenient and colorful wrap, the handbag and umbrella safely tucked away, Whitney would begin her onslaught on the villa.

She knew no English and I had a pocket-book of Swahili. Any communication effort on my part would send Whitney into giggling fits at the end of which she would look at me and demurely murmur ‘yes’ that was accompanied by a slow batting of her eyelids. For the most part we stuck to sign language and guesswork.

The guesswork often took hilarious turns. In pouring rain Whitney would wash the verandah and clean the front yard despite my futile protests. In Whitney’s simple logic, the yard had to be washed and cleaned at 11 am. It was a question of routine. Another time, my instructions in broken English, even more broken Swahili and inadequate gestures to ‘heat the rice’ resulted in Whitney sitting cross-legged on the kitchen floor, eating a mound of rice that was our lunch. It was impossible to scold and easier to laugh it off. An errand to the shacks across the road to buy bottled water or onions would result in our daughter dissolving into peals of laughter at the sight of Whitney returning with the shopping piled dangerously on top of her head. The washing machine was her undoing and she battled with knobs and settings in ever-growing frustration. As a technical writer, I was helpless for the first time in explaining how to work a machine.

As babysitter, Whitney turned into a child herself. I would hear stories of her singing and dancing to Bollywood hits (Hindi strangely enough came more easily to Whitney than English) and of much merrymaking. On a couple of occasions, the babysitter would be fast asleep and the child would be immersed in TV. But I trusted her.

I never got to know where Whitney came from, how long she trudged from her home to ours or about her family. She probably embodied a thousand other African women who earn a few thousand shillings and support their families. A photograph of her in the Tanzania album revokes memories of a holiday long gone.

The Many Lifetimes of Shibui

Ageless, timeless

A troubadourin, wanderlust, a spirit

A foundling, a disciple, a teacher

A dreamer, ever detached, always connected

She roamed across freely

Jumping latitudes

And seeking truths

 

For Shibui

What was, what is, and what then

All merged into one mystique

A seamless plain

The sky stretched between those plains

The rivers flowed into the next

The mountains occupied the spaces in between

 

The prophets, the messiahs, the stoic, the learned

Wise men that patterned stars

The Awakened and the dead

Warriors that wore helmets and slayed

Who showed paths to open paradises?

And lights out of dark caves

 

In search of angels

They lead Shibui through unknown forms

They lead her through many minds

She sought and searched

Through soaring sea gulls

Through euphoric tunes of love and celebrations

Through moving images

Still frames

Through words, verses unwritten

 

The poets said her children were not her children

They spoke of god’s debris

They used parallels, and anthology

On souls that grew and embraced

She battled with first and second mind

Sometimes fearing her own compassion

 

She dreamt for her and for others

Restless, restful, heeding, uncaring

Sometimes fettered, sometimes unbound

When duty compelled

When perceptions demanded

Through judgements and justifications

When ignorance was traded for bliss

 

She asked the prophets why

She gave up, she returned

She lost, she sometimes found

Was her life destined?

Or were the equations always balanced?

Through simple formulas of this and that

 

And through them she would see

The pilgrims found their swords on rough paths

The warriors through dawn breaking on deserts

The old woman through the devil walking into villages

Her life long over, as she waited to pass

 

The alchemist in the quest for treasures of love and wisdom

As he climbed five mountains

And prayed to his gods

Through lifetimes and experiences

In search of the truth

She walked with them

She spoke to them

And learned of love and truth

That cowardice is not just about lack of courage

But of unfulfilled dreams

 

Life is an illusion the great master said

She learned that destiny was a choice which

Weaves through all of her lifetimes

To choose her path and finally see

What the purpose was meant to be.

Walkabout

If you are a woman, chances are that 8 out of 10 times you would have had a weight-related conversation with 6 out of 10 girlfriends in the last 6 to 8 weeks. (The numbers are pretty random but if you want to be freudian about it, then subconsciously you want to be a skinny 6, but you would settle for a great 8 or a normal 10. The reality being that  you’re landscaping towards a 13, which is not even a standard size anyway). Roughly half your conversations are filled with words relating to calories, kgs, metabolism, carbs, vanity sizes, belly, thunder thighs, mean skinny bitch etc. I caught a friend on GTalk after ages and her third line was ”babe I’ve put on so much weight, I have no idea how to deal with it”. And of course the conversation from there on swung back and forth among despair, hope, frustrations, laughing at one self, being aghast and finally rock hard resolutions for rock hard abs.

Well at least I have several genuine reasons for piling on a kilo by the year for every year I’ve been in the middle east (a balanced 1:1 ratio?). The blistering heat 8 months a year, the overall zero walking culture, the long work hours, exorbitantly expensive gyms, and the blistering heat 8 months a year. The flippant ones are eating chocolate at the drop of an emotion, opening a bag of chips at the end of a yawn or between flipping channels. The self-reassuarance that its the absolute last chocolate/chips for the last time has kept me in decently good stead over the years. But desparate measures call for well desparately creative measures and hopefully these ‘alternative therapies’ will help me tide over the 40s with a little more grace and a lot fewer unrealistic promises:

Get signed up for a mega make over for free: With myth-busters and truths jogging side-by-side like ”ten body flaws and how to hide them” and ”How Terran learned to love her feminine figure” to ”top 10 wardrobe mistakes”; Trinny and Susanah of the Great American Makeover re-style dowdy, podgy women from the great mid-west to look hot and wanted….for the rest of their lives…..with this amazing make over from hair to skin to underwear to a brand new sexy wardrobe. The once-ignored-now-reborn women look smug and Trinny and Susanah are famous. I could happily be one of them in those perfect story.

Vanity Sizing- I recently bought a pair of jeans from American Eagle that were a size 6. I fell off the floor considering they fit perfectly. I haven’t been a size 6 in 30 years I think. That’s vanity sizing for you. But there is a flip side. You buy a size 12 all along and then one day in that very same store that you’ve been loyal to forever, you figure you need a size 14. The vanity goes up in smoke. Just because the brand found it more profitable to get the clothes made in Bangkok where teeny tiny women with teeny tiny hands make tiny clothes and label them UK size 12. The secret is in continuing to buy the 12s but to move the buttons an inch closer and to hell with the misaligned zipper.

It’s those under-things that matter – I can’t imagine why I haven’t spent less time and money in the business casuals aisles of M&S and more in the I-will-share-victoria’s-secret aisle. Where for every flaw there is that perfect lycra-stretch to squeeze, shape and mould the flab. So you can then run back to the previous aisle and buy that amazing red dress and show off your fake curves.

I could also move to Alaska where I”ll never be in danger of having to wear anything single-layered. I could have mind-expanding experiences – lady travels around the world in search of perpetual freezing weather.

Or I could just go a-walkabout.

Stone.Cactus.Cat.

The new iPhone has opened a brave new world. And has reaffirmed that dropping the ‘droid has been a kind act towards myself. I can now tread the social media world with less clumsiness and more aplomb. In fact I have become so bold that I have revived a previously timid and dull avatar on twitter to becoming Vooonda – the bold sidekick. Much like the phoenix rising from the ashes. (Why Vooonda is a sidekick and to whom will be revealed in good time). Voonda had been sailing smoothly @ 6 tweets per morning when someone else’s follower commented on how that someone else was ”following a girl with a pretty DP and only six tweets”. Stalkers and digital mind games.

Apart from the obvious excitement of having TED, HuffPost, CNN and WordPress at my fingertips, and the calorie counter pinging alarming notifications about my calorie balance for the day; the camera has been more fun than I imagined.  It almost goads me to observe my surroundings better and appreciate my walks more. And to of course post those observations effortlessly on my wall.

 For four mornings in a row I have captured eclectic images.  Snowdrops was today’s inspiration – a beautiful white winter blossom that drooped in gorgeous bunches. I picked up a couple of fallen flowers on the green grass beneath and loved that their scent was mild. I almost didn’t click fast enough for Stone.Cactus.Cat. The latter walked in from nowhere as if in a cameo and posed under the tree. The stone and cactus lent to the frame like perfect props. The picture composition was well, a lucky shot. The Tree in Silhouette was tricky. I am too short to take long shots across garden walls and the dog was straining at the leash. Still, the inspiration for that morning was liked by one person (!) – a lone bare tree against the backdrop of tall, poplar-like willowy trees behind a high garden wall. It brought to mind the famous children’s story about the selfish giant who lived in this huge garden and didn’t let children play in it. The Dark Side of the Moon was taken during a late evening walk when a large silver moon shone above the dark desert while the planes could be seen to the left queuing for landing.

My eyes are now set on digitally capturing the hundreds of pigeons in a flutter on the desert sand as they feast on scattered seeds.

Heartache

He stared at me from across the road. It was a look of utter curiosity, extreme playfulness and an endearing indignance. Love at first sight for me. I begged him to stay put and to not – – even for a moment  – comtemplate crossing the road to meet me. It broke my heart to say that, but what could I do? I had mine on leash and to have another romping around her would be chaotic. I am not that strong physically or emotionally. He watched puzzled as I turned round the corner. It was so not like me to walk away without lavishing my love. I did come back later and look for him but he was gone. I fretted the entire day, trying to believe in humanity that would not do what I dreaded most.

This morning my worst fears were confirmed. His picture was taped to all the trash bins. I felt sick to the stomach. I don’t know his name but that look on his face would be forever etched in my memory. A look that said ”take me home with you”. The kind lady who took him in for the day said he was absolutely terrified of the traffic around him. He was dashing into gates looking for a familiar face, a loving voice and the comfort of his home. She couldn’t understand how people walked past him without a shred of compassion. She had contacted all the shelters and in the meantime was sparing no effort in trying to unite him with his family. This evening he will be put up for adoption. And hopefully be re-homed with people who will cherish his spirit and honor his unconditional love. I thanked the lady for her kindness and blessed her wonderful heart.

For every sad story such as this, there may not always be a happy ending. And that’s the most terrifying thought for me.  But there are amazing people out there who are picking up the pieces for others, with nothing to gain except the sight of a wonderful creature free from pain and hurt.