In a Mood of Nostalgia
_______________________________
THE LAST PIECE
==============
One morbid afternoon
Her husband slept his last
Not to wake up again.
The cry calmed
After thirteen days of flurry
Of feast and fast, hymns and alms.
Thus she became a widow
And lost her right to silk and gold
In the sixty-third year of her life.
The gold she rescued
Time and again from usurers’ grips
Wouldn’t adorn her wrists any more.
Nor the wedding sari
She long preserved in naphthalene
Would ever swathe her body.
Armed with their right of inheritance
The officious daughters-in-law
Accosted the sobbing soul.
And they grabbed the gold,
All by themselves, taking her nod for granted
To the last retrievable piece.
Like an accident victim immobile
She witnessed the marauders looting,
Their qualm killed and compunction crippled.
At the end of the agonising spell
Her wedding sari was only left
Out-of-fashion and undistinguished.
The dilapidated silk
Redolent of unsung glory
Would stay alive till her final journey.
Husband lost to heaven
And sons to daughters-in-law,
She would live a life of destitute now.
Approaching fast the chilly December
A time to scrabble about the wardrobe
For a bundle of benevolent warmth.
She would grab the sari
Perforce, in those freezing nights
To wrap her body, and not to wear it.
-----------------
Visakhapatnam
01=06=1999
-------------------------------------------------------------------
By
A. N. Nanda
Muzaffarpur
17-03-2009
-------------------------------------------------------------------
It's quite a feeling to revisit one's old creation. It's like meeting an old friend that catapults the mood to the realm of nostalgia. The force of longing overpowers the imagination. 'Aha! If only I got back my old muse!' It's like old love, always refreshing, always inspiring. And this is how I can describe my mood as I decide to post my old poem "The Last Piece". It's from my book of poem collections "In Harness" ISBN 81-8157-183-5 published in 2004.
_______________________________THE LAST PIECE
==============
One morbid afternoon
Her husband slept his last
Not to wake up again.
The cry calmed
After thirteen days of flurry
Of feast and fast, hymns and alms.
Thus she became a widow
And lost her right to silk and gold
In the sixty-third year of her life.
The gold she rescued
Time and again from usurers’ grips
Wouldn’t adorn her wrists any more.
Nor the wedding sari
She long preserved in naphthalene
Would ever swathe her body.
Armed with their right of inheritance
The officious daughters-in-law
Accosted the sobbing soul.
And they grabbed the gold,
All by themselves, taking her nod for granted
To the last retrievable piece.
Like an accident victim immobile
She witnessed the marauders looting,
Their qualm killed and compunction crippled.
At the end of the agonising spell
Her wedding sari was only left
Out-of-fashion and undistinguished.
The dilapidated silk
Redolent of unsung glory
Would stay alive till her final journey.
Husband lost to heaven
And sons to daughters-in-law,
She would live a life of destitute now.
Approaching fast the chilly December
A time to scrabble about the wardrobe
For a bundle of benevolent warmth.
She would grab the sari
Perforce, in those freezing nights
To wrap her body, and not to wear it.
-----------------
Visakhapatnam
01=06=1999
-------------------------------------------------------------------
By
A. N. Nanda
Muzaffarpur
17-03-2009
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Labels: In Harness: my old poems
posted by The Unadorned | 1:33 AM
7 Comments:
Hey Uncle Nanda,
Hope all is well with you.
I really like this stanza
"She would grab the sari
Perforce, in those freezing nights
To wrap her body, and not to wear it."
This is what I feel... Sometimes some things in life that was once glorious would ended up as something normal. To quote you... "To wrap her body, and not to wear it"
Situation changes the meaning and value of something.
Respected Sir,
The poem is a philosophical master piece indeed. God has bestowed on you an exceptional quality of creativity for expressing your thought through beautiful literary work. You are a class of your own.
I have linked your blog to the blog of the Orissa Circle Branch Association of IPs & ASPs (http://www.ipasporissa.blogspot.com )to enable interested visitors to browse it.
Your new year message with words that touch the heart was received some days ago by me, Sri G Rath and Sri G S Kar. Thanks for that.
Regards,
Sincerely,
Bipin Mohanty
Hi Melly,
I'm happy to see you back...and at a time when I fell I should be doing more than what I do at present to keep up the momentum of my blog. But then what to do, or rather how to?
I know what's the weakness in this poem: it started like a poem, then flattened into a storyline and then got back its form to stay alive as a poem. My feeling for the poem dissuading me, I have not tweaked it much. Just left as it is.
Thanks, once again, Melly. Iill be visiting your blog soon.
Thanks Bipin Babu,
It's quite a feeling to see you people reading my renderings.
I encourage people linking me and reading, though I've not been able to link many in reciprocation. My target is to cull a respectable tally of contents and then try for increasing readership through "other" methods.
Oh yes, I have seen your blog following the link. It's a productive effort that would definitely make your colleagues net-savvy.
Thanks
Nanda
Uncle Nanda!
Its always awesome to read your work. They keep my mind working. I understand how working on keeping the blog is pretty hard as we are all busy with other things. I myself hasn't been writing as much as I am filled with assignments, quizzes and exams....
Those stuff are like erosion to my mind. I am just really happy to see that you have a new post that is poetry.
Dear Sir,
The poem “THE LAST PIECE ” is very interesting and humorous. The stanza
“Husband lost to heaven
And sons to daughters-in-law,
She would live a life of destitute now.” – what a reality!
The dilapidated silk saree is her only property now to wrap for winter not to wear is thinkable for everybody. The flow of narration of “THE LAST PIECE ” is excellent. Now a days I understood the poems in depth and my mind is attracted by such nice work. I think the success of poems is measured by gauging on its depth of penetration in readers mind.
Thank you Sir
------- N.Subramanian Tirupur
Thanks NS. I, in fact, didn't mean humour through my muse. It's just a feeling for those women that suffer as widows. Reasons could be many, but then they definitely deserve better from their daughters-in-law. It's a simple poem without any big philosophical content. Yet my readers like it as much as I liked creating it. It's my realisation: human relations as the theme in creative writing has always guaranteed success to writers/poets. It's evergreen.
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