The Sriyali River

The morning rain ceases after a long night.
The cloud-covered sun yet to appear.
The aroma of the rain-soaked earth
beckons to me to remember something. What?

Getting off the bus
I walk on the bank of river Sriyali.
Not a soul around.
Frogs croaking. Clouds sailing by, feather-like, and marvelling at their beauty through tiny puddles.
The silence of these woods no stranger to me.
Trees standing tall in melancholy, like watchful guardians, like fathers and their fathers.

Years have passed by, like the hover of butterflies on a long morning.
As I walk on the bank of Sriyali, everything that was once lost (or so I’d thought) rushes back.

I’d come by here with my mother to fetch water
And to the distant town
crossing the river with my father
and the village picnic
with family and friends.

And today, like every time, Sriyali greets me and whispers in my ear, you are the boy of my village crossing the green paddy field. I remember you, child.

The village is not far away,
Bada kiari, Pata danga, Chhamana left behind.
All have been lost in the years of dispute.
Dates after dates in the civil court.

Father passed away with only a long sigh at the end.
The land never to be ours.
Time, it seems, pilfers away little by little until you have nothing.
Why is time so unkind? Can you tell me?

As I pass the temple gate
guarded by two lions, paint peeled off from years of sun, wind, and rain, their broken tails, as if wounded in fierce battle
to protect the temple from the invaders.
With their cloudy eyes (what haven’t these eyes seen? What have they yet to see?), they smile at me
and welcome me to the village once again.
You are the boy of our village. We remember you.

As I kneel before the village God, the almighty of the universe, whom not time nor death can touch for he is the creator and destroyer himself,
I dream of my childhood and a youth that slipped by so quickly.
Might have been mere days. Oh, but those golden old days.

Yet, now, unannounced comes old age.
One always believes it won’t come for him, but alas, it does.
Weren’t you always around the corner? Always following me where I went.
Why hide? Why pretend?
Show yourself now.

I wonder if our lives aren’t quagmires—there is nothing to barter with time, nothing to exchange for him to leave us be at least for a while before one can say, “Oh, God take me along with you to heaven.”

– Edited by Satwik Mishra

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