Finding College Street in the Old Man's House Gate, Amsterdam

If you are from Kolkata and looking for a bit of the old College Street in Amsterdam, you have to visit the Oudemanhuispoort or the Old Man House Gate or simply The Gate. 

While our tour guide, Jacob took a sharp turn and disappeared into the doors between the Oudezijds Achterburgwal and Kloveniersburgwal near the Staalstraat, we stood looking deep into the muddy canal water - just to see if there was any sign of the drowned bicycles Jacob was mentioning. The group of tourists that Jacob was in charge of was a diverse set of humans with only two things in common – they were all very tall (excluding me) and all spoke English as their native language (again, excluding me). The fact that they were all intrigued by Amsterdam is a given, so I do not count that shared interest. Armed (?) with long legs, they all walked ahead of us. 

Midget Bangalis, me and my friend had to run and catch up with them every time. And most of the times, we were too lost in our admiration of the sights and sounds to even realize that we had been left behind.

So we ran after them again. Only this time, the scene that greeted us inside the large heavy doors was something slightly familiar. Bookshops. In carts, in cabinets, in makeshift stalls by the road. We had come to a unique book market inside a college square! A closer look revealed that most of the books were secondhand. Two steps ahead, we approached a covered alleyway smelling of weed and old paper. We had entered the Gate!

The Gate dates from 1602 and the building inside has been remodeled several times. The place served as a hospital for poor old men and women. In 1786, the walkway was turned into a covered alley (just behind the gates we entered) with eighteen little shops for rent to gold and silver smiths. They were called ‘winkelkasten’ (‘winkel’= shop and ‘kasten’ = cabinet) because they were too small for a shop and too big for a cabinet. In 1879 when the nearby ‘Botermarkt’ (Butter market) was shut down the book merchants from that place 
restarted their book business in one of the ‘winkelkasten’ in The Gate. Since 1879 the Oudemanhuispoort is home to Amsterdam’s best known daily book market. And in 1880 the University of Amsterdam claimed it as its own.

Here, you'd rub shoulders with University of Amsterdam professors thumbing through volumes of Homer and Nietzsche. On week days you'd find students leafing through cheaper versions of revised latest editions. Some would end up buying, some just spend the day browsing. We saw a few locals buying. And the rest were tourists like us. Most books are in Dutch, though quite a few were English editions. Like we found and bought Salinger and Murakami (translated :) ). Five euros for a book. And mine was a present. 

The book sellers looked as ancient as the Gate themselves. Silver haired, wrinkles lacing their smiles and frowns, they looked like fairy god fathers waiting to weave their magic spell on you. And what magic theirs was!

There is an interesting but a sad story about one of the popular booksellers in the Gate, Barend Boekman (1869-1942). In 1939 he celebrated his seventieth birthday, along with his fiftieth anniversary as a book trader in the Gate with his fellow booksellers. But he was a Jewish Dutch at the wrong place and the wrong time. Along with 100.000 Dutch Jews, Barend Boekman and his wife were deported to the German concentration camps. Both died in the gas chambers of Auschwitz on September 14, 1942. 

Menno Hertzberger(1897-1982), another Dutch Jewish bookseller, who survived the Second World War has written Barend's story in a small book, “Barend Boekman van de Oudemanhuispoort” (Amsterdam, 1955) to remember and celebrate the life and time of Barend.

The book, I hear, is now a collector’s item. 

A dead bird. A lesson of a life time.

“Ma, will he live?”

“Let’s hope he sang his sweetest and flew high and free all his life. Something we cannot even imagine doing.”

“Why do you say it like that?”

How do you tell a hopeful child that a bird he had hoped to save had just breathed its last in the ball of your palm? How do you introduce death as a finality to a small person who is just starting out his life?

Well, you don’t. Because life is the smartest teacher of all and has a way of handling such unanswerable questions. So although mothers are supposed to know it all, sometimes silence is the best response to uncomfortable questions they cannot tackle. Like I did this morning, when I knew, our little bird was beyond help.

***************************

We were out on our morning walk today, when we spotted a bird, fluttering its feet up in the air, in a bush tucked under a tree. It appeared to be in pain and when I picked it up, a passer-by said: “Shot kheyeche, bnachbe na” (meaning, the bird had been electrocuted by a naked wire over the tree, where it was apparently sitting and will not live). Another guy, who was on a bicycle and had stopped to see what it was all about, said with a wise nod, “Ektu jol deen toh, dekhun bnache kina” (meaning, give it some water, see if it helps).

There was a tube well right next to where the bird had fallen. Ishaan pushed the handle hard and pumped out some water. Using my fingers I managed to drip drops into its tiny beak.

“Let’s take him home, ma. We have a dropper, right, which we use to give Neopeptin to Gabloo? We can use it to give him more water. Once he gets better, we will set him free.”

“OK, but we would have to break into a run then. We must be quick. Can you match my pace?”

As we ran, the bird cried out. A few times. I have never felt the tender warmth of a bird on my skin before. It was soft, fluffy, and I could still feel the life running through it. It was so tiny and so smooth, that you wanted to protect it. You wanted to shield it with all your might. As it chirped, our hopes rose. It must be getting better.

Soon afterwards, its head fell on one side and the eyelids drew into a closed yellow shutter. It was over. I knew.

I still ran. I never felt so cheated, so humiliated in my life. Helpless too. Here we were proud humans, pretending to act saviour to a dying bird. How dare he die on us, how dare he sneak past our efforts like that? How was I supposed to face my child? How would I tell him that I could not salvage the little bird’s life, he had so fondly rescued?

We reached home. I am sure death has a smell of its own, for Gabloo, who runs to me, every time I come home and begs to be picked up, stood still watching me carry the bird in.

“Didi, pakhi ta toh more geche” was Moonmoon’s verdict.

I watched my son’s eyes as they gradually welled up. Wordless tears rolled down his flushed cheeks. Despite all the ultimate conclusions being drawn around him, I saw him quietly pick up the plastic dropper. He tried to force the stiff beaks apart to dribble in some water into the dead mouth but soon realized that it was of no use any more. 

He asked me if he could take a picture of the bird to remember him by.

Then asked me if we could bury him with dignity. I nodded a yes.

Together we went downstairs, hand in hand. We buried the little singing bird. Wrapped in a fresh clean tissue roll. Somewhere, where no one will ever trample him, no one will walk over his sacred grave.

I do not know if it was co-incidence or providence, but we had gathered a few Shiuli flowers in the early hours of our walk today. Never knew the flowers would come to such great use.

To honour our little guest. His visit was short. But he had made for some unforgettable memories for a mother and her child.

Eid Mubaraq, everyone!

Let’s celebrate the gift of life – as long as we have it.

Hair colour, here she comes!

There is a beauty parlour right outside my society gate. I have seen it grow from a modest single room affair to a three-cabin luxury, if you will. I am an old patron. I land at their glass doorstep for a random hair-oil massage, a quick pedicure or that odd facial. I am habitually slipshod about skin and hair care and my most frequent beauty treatment is a shampoo at their salon. Especially during the winter months. Feels nice to lean my head back, rest my shoulders on the padded backrest, shut my eyes and feel the warm jet of water caress my head before dollops of shampoo work up the lather.

The technicians have a way with their fingers, I must say. They press the right spots on your temples, pull the right strands of hair, twist them with the right pressure. And they have one more way of therapy available for those willing – they keep you awake with their constant chatter. As I told you, it is a humble haunt for women who aren’t willing to travel too far and wide for services locally available at affordable rates. Definitely not a place for posh socialites. And unless it is a month away from Durga Puja, and every woman wants to look her best, you won’t find the place too crowded.

I am an avid and shameless nosher of human conversation, not that I intentionally eavesdrop or anything. But when there are words flying around to catch and cuddle, I don’t let the chance slip. I think the same goes for them. They draw their energy from the women they have been trying to beautify for ages now. Naturally they ask a lot of questions. Unassuming, unpretentious, and unboring, they lack the typical sophistication of the beauticians at the classy spas who talk in whispers and never look into your eyes. They will ask you how long have you been married, was it a love marriage, how many kids did you bring to the world, where do you work, what do you do. I have always fuelled their curiosity with more than the information they have asked for. Indulging them to ask more. They have readily given in, with encouraged smiles.

The little salon is a stage set for drama of all kinds. Petty jealousies have unfurled between the girls before my eyes, professional rivalries breaking out - "Why does she sit all day when I work my ass off? Why can't she bring me the wax before I ask for it? Why didn't anyone shut the fridge door properly?" Sometimes I have heard unsavoury gossip about someone they commonly know, also witnessed a genuine camaraderie between some of them, smelled the home-cooked food they had brought for lunch in steel tiffin carriers, neatly arranged at the top of the little white refrigerator that stores gels and creams. Over a period of time, I have grown a strange sense of familiarity with the gang of girls.

After all, these are the women that you let touch yourself.

Hair, nail, skin.

And possibly your deepest sense of being women and belonging together to a tribe of workers.

So when my mother complained that her hennaed hair was all lacklustre after a long hospital stay and that her well earned greys were all showing, I decided to take her to the girls for a treat. I think it is good to mention here that my mother has never been to a beauty salon before. I must also quickly run to add that she was vehemently opposed to the idea that I take her to one for services, which would not only dig an unnecessary hole into her daughter’s purse but also infuse the world with deadly carcinogens. The henna that she has been using on her hair was all natural, she insisted, plucked from her own garden, mashed in her mixer and applied with a blue flat brush. With of course, my father supervising.

Also, having lost a lot of weight, she was suddenly conscious of strangers. But I stood my ground and took her in. The girls at the parlour were forewarned of her arrival and they were ready with all possible colour catalogues for the hair. After rejecting all the shades, declaring all as uncouthly garish, Ma sat down with a frown, silently fuming at my reflection in the mirror facing her:

“I told you, this is not a place for me”.

I saw panic in the girls’ eyes. I saw one of the senior technicians pick up a mobile and run out of the parlour. Shortly thereafter, walked in the owner of the place, sweaty and obviously hassled. She was busy preparing for the Janmashtami puja at her house, when she had got this SOS call from her assistant. With the patience of Job, she catered to my mother herself, asking Aunty-ji what exactly she wanted. My mother explained in broken Hindi that she wanted her hair to look as natural as possible, but not in any shade of black. Stirring in two different colours in a plastic bowl, the good lady had finally and confidently found a hair hue miracle.

My mother sat through the 40 minutes with a grimace. I was looking at the clock and telling my racing heart to stop acting up. After all, even if she hated the colour, she could never hate me, now could she, her last born? But with the Sanyals, you never know. We are a clan of raging ancients. We belong to an era when righteous anger was considered noble and an honest annoyance never disguised in phony smiles! So I was taking a huge risk and I knew it. All I said out loud was:

“Ma, we can always re-do if you don’t like it, right?”

Which was again greeted with a stony silence. The minutes hung heavy like wet clothes on a weak line. The good lady who had mixed the colour and supervised the application, was now standing near the wash basin to see the results. She was wiping her forehead repeatedly. Two air conditioners were fanning us with all their chilly might.

Soon, the colour had all drained away and there my mother sat with a wet mop of mane, trying to get a glance into the mirror and take stock of the disaster. She got ready to exclaim and chastise my foolish decision. I did not give her that chance. I screamed:

“Ma, you look so fabulous! Who would think you have been so critically ill!”

The girls knew their cue too.

“Mashima, bhishon bhalo lagche! The hair looks all natural too!”

They chorused in perfect unison. Suddenly the salon was filled with complimentary chatter and mother was looking all confused and unsure. Two of the girls flipped out a pair of blow-dryers and positioned themselves behind my mother’s chair. They attacked her tresses with the same alacrity with which James Bond aims his guns. My mother’s reaction:

“I don’t like it at all. It is too dark for my age.”

When she was leaving, the girls asked my mother the secret to her flawless skin at this age. My mother turned and answered:

"Coconut oil. All through the year. Not the stuff you sell here."

Well, friends, here she is, with her hair braided in a homely fashion.

A woman, who has never worn any make up, never had a beauty treatment in her life. Tell me honestly, would you say she has been fighting for her life in the ITU, pipes and channels dug into her body to help her make it through?

Isn't she beautiful, my mother?

You don't need me

You need
Sound of feet shuffling the living room
Setting a house in order too soon 
Silk sari changing to satin pyjama 
Like costumes in a bedroom drama
Singsong shower drowned by a voice
Humming tunes of your choice
Pink toothbrush sticking out of toiletries
Red handbag brimming with vagaries.

Clang of bangles gold and glass.
Some obedience, some sass.
A waist to fill your empty arms.
Breasts to claim your solitude farm.
Shampooed tresses to perfume your pillow.
A pleasing frame forever mellow.
A hand to serve homely dinner.
A trophy at parties, a clear winner.

You need
A lover limitless like the sky.
A mistress penetrable like the earth.
A woman ageless like the seas.
A filler for your available voids.
A perfect piece to finish your puzzle.

You don't need me.

Loneliness kills, did you say?
Imagine how i could have died every day
If my mirrored nights hadn't brought me
Back to my self.

Now, my Shams smiles at me,
And I smile back at him.

© Sudeshna Sanyal

My Barsey miracle with Soma's Camps

Remember The Canterbury Tales? Pilgrims going to the shrine of Saint Becket in the Canterbury Cathedral from Southwark in England in the Middle Ages, who meet at an inn and spend the sojourn together taking turns to tell stories? Well, no you don’t, of course. As for me, I had to read Chaucer’s masterpiece as part of my post graduation syllabus, our professor, Dr. Sajni Mukherjee retelling it with her characteristic humour in our JU first floor PG classroom. Since then, I had often wondered how it would feel to travel as part of a motley clique and had also conjured up mental images of faces very similar to that of the pilgrims. Real life, however, is different from fiction, but it did spring a surprise lately, when I joined a trekking expedition with Soma’s Camps - to journey through the Rhododendron sanctuary of Barsey in the Singalila Range of the Himalayas. The range forms a natural border with Nepal in the West and is one of the most sought after trekking routes because of the views of the Mount Everest and the Kanchenjunga it offers. So though not strictly a religious pilgrimage like the Canterburians but definitely one of a kind, if you consider yourself a worshipper of Nature. Nature there was – in abundance – the flora and the fauna waiting to overwhelm you at every bend and corner.

Will come to that in a bit.

Red Rhododendron

A chance encounter with a high school senior (Director of Soma’s Camps) in the Gariahat Westside shopping mall. A hesitant confession from me with a sigh: “You know, I have always wanted to trek, but never got a chance.” A reassuring pat in the back from Soma with “Why don’t you come with us?” And then a squeal of delight and a resounding YES! A string of correspondence and a house visit later, I found myself stationed at Sealdah with a backpack stashed with a sleeping bag and antibiotics to ward off hill diarrhea. It was pouring that evening and I thought maybe this was Nature’s premonitory warning. I reached the station and was introduced to a number of new faces – none of which resembled the Canterbury pilgrims.

Our group

There was an elegant school teacher, a witty mathematician and a college professor with his sweet natured daughter. A software developer travelling with his son and his Canon 5D Mark III. A peal of laughter drew my attention to a gang of three girls just past their teenage – talking animatedly through their doe eyes. A very sombre school girl, who was responding in monosyllables, only to reveal in due course what a cheek she hid under that initial reticence. Our trek lead was ably assisted by her two lieutenants – a post grad student of history, who never tired of helping us through the trek; and her own son, who kept the prank quotient of the group high all the time. And then there were me and my son.

On the way

We boarded the Kanchankanya Express at 9 in the evening and hastily polished a home-cooked supply of cauliflower paratha and keema curry off our palms, eating without plates. Soon it was time to turn off the lights and turn in for the night. A seven-hour car ride to Hiley was waiting for us next morning. I have a long history of motion sickness and the challenge for me was simply to not fall sick in the drive up the winding terrain. At the NJP station we had a hearty breakfast of aloo paratha and French toasts. Kids had already bonded well and were fighting over a bottle of coke. Dreading the sharp hairpin bends ahead, I popped a Zopher while praying to mother Nature to not let me down this time. I do not know if it was the company or the medicine, but for the first time in my life I did not feel the urge to puke the pristine mountains wet with watery vomit. Yes, you get the picture, right? Ugh!

 After a few hours we stopped at Jorethang – a transit junction for tourists on their way up. A quick lunch of momos and thukpa later, we were in another car to Hiley. A talkative Sherpa who drove us shared his insights of the local life. The sight on the way was a treat no less. Quaint old cottages - some wooden, some concrete, some with pink curtains, some green, some flaunting a dish antenna, some with broken furniture visible on the porches made it clear that it was a mixed economic zone. Then there were apple-cheeked kids with snot lined noses in school uniforms smiling and waving at us. The flowers made for a Technicolor canvas on both sides – orange, yellow, red, white, cream, violet, pink – laced within the sylvan frame of lush green trees. The restless Teesta dashed across boulders. We also crossed Rangeet, a tributary, nonetheless tumultuous in its course. What struck me on the way was the beautiful contrast between arid and fertile slopes of the mountains. Some were really bare and fallow. Some as bountiful as an overflowing harvest.

We arrived at Hiley after sun down to be greeted by a team of jolly innkeepers. Four round shaped huts lining the ridge of a mountain formed our haunt for the night. It was a nameless inn/hotel. Or a homestay of a kind. One hut would house the men, the other, women. And the rest of the two huts served as the kitchen and the dining room. Piping hot tea and biscuits welcomed us in, followed by crisp pakodas. We crowded the kitchen in search of warmth since a sudden drizzle had brought the temperature shockingly down. The story telling session started in the Canterbury tradition as a modest dinner of roti, sabzi and chicken was being cooked in the adjacent kitchen. One of us shared an anecdote from his travels in Tadoba where he had a classic twin fall with a friend right in front of a tiger. Another of us recounted how he had almost experienced a ghost in one of the hostels of the Ramkrishna Mission. This, I guess, set the tone for the bhooter golpo (ghost stories) that would accompany us for the rest of our trip.

Hut at Hiley

We had a difficult night, finding the perfect posture in bed for the maximum heat. For the first time, I had strangers as bed fellows that night. Snuggling close to them, I drifted off to sleep dreaming of sharing a cup of tea with some serious looking red pandas. And a voice much like Master Shifu’s was asking me to wrap a scarf around my neck. At the crack of the dawn I opened my eyes to a gorgeous sight of a sunrise backlighting a golden range of mountains. All aglow orange in the soft first rays.

The gateway to Barsey

The gateway to Barsey was right next to our stay. We had to trudge across the forest for 4.5 kms to reach the Sikkim Government’s Trekker’s hut, where we would stay the next two days. Off we set for the sanctuary. Despite the sunrise, it was a damp day, the sun quickly hiding behind clouds after a brief appearance, the vestiges of the previous night’s rainfall still fresh on every leaf and moss of the walk. It was a welcome relief from our tropical scorch. 

The trail

Clouds were creeping into our path, almost gagging us at times. We went haltingly, admiring every lichen, every petal, every insect, every tiny spider web on the way. The gravel road is canopied by trees and their mossy branches. With the thick foliage shading the course, the road took a dark mysterious look. The path isn't paved for regular traffic. At best two people can walk side by side, and mostly it was a single file road with a leafy green gorge on one side, and a hilly forest slope on the other. I had one consolation that even if I slipped and fell, the rhodo roots would break it to preserve me as a hanging human specimen to the hill monkeys. But on the other hand, signboards warned us of Himalayan black bears and I could also turn fast food in a matter of minutes. I mumbled to myself that bears and the pandas are reclusive by nature and all I had to do was break into a song to keep them away. I made a mental note of the melody to scream if the situation demanded it.

By the time we reached the trekker’s haunt, my nose had turned a brilliant red in the frost and I had lost sensation of the lips and the fingers. We were at 10,000 feet above sea level and the incessant rain was not helping with the temperature. The high point of that day was the lunch the hosts served. Hot steaming rice, dal, papad, cauliflower curry and eggs cooked in the Nepali way. And the wood fire lent a subtle smoked flavor to the spread. Washing hands in lukewarm water after the meal, we crept upstairs into the dormitory – a polished wooden thatch above a large rectangular hall provided with a window with a broken glass pane. Beds of one mattress each were lined up one after the other on the floor. A bright red flower poster stuck on with red cello tape was trying its best to shield us from the cold outside. After looking at live flowers all through the trail in such great numbers, straining your eyes as its printed version was kind of strange though. We realised there was no electricity and soon we would have to depend on the two slim candles that the hut manager provided. It was a perfect setting for a horror movie, the candle light creating eerie shadows of the most innocent stuff and lending a spooky touch to the huge hall. At one point I realised I was speaking in whispers, from under the borrowed blankets. And the ghost stories continued unabated - you couldn't figure if the goosebumps on your skin were because of the chill in the air or the thrill in the storytelling!

The kids had begun setting up their tents outside. Their excitement at the prospect of sleeping under the skies without a solid roof was kind of infectious. We cancelled the next trek to Gurastal because of two reasons. One, it was raining hard. The uphill climb would be dangerously slippery. Two, the rare species of the purple and yellow rhododendrons that grow up there, weren't in season this year. Instead we marched to a bird watchers’ tower around 2 kms away. Just that our noisy giggly party seemed to scare our winged friends away, for we saw none at all. All we could see was cloud and the dark green forest as far as our sights went. On our way back we munched on khakras, raisins and chocolate biscuits brought in by Soma's teams (no wonder even after all that walking and climbing I lost not an ounce of body weight!). Kids enjoyed like never before, sometimes jumping on one another, sometimes breaking into a mock fight with bamboo sticks. At 4 in the afternoon we recorded the temperature outside – 8 degrees it said. Someone said it would go sub zero in the night.

I shivered in anticipation.

We met good people at the hut. Three families of three – a group of nine. Then a team of four surgeons with a shared passion for photographing the Kanchenjunga. The doctors had come hoping to capture the mighty peak in the moonlight. It was going to be full moon that night, so if all went well, and the clouds dispelled, it would be a rare sight to remember. However, being seasoned trekkers, they took a look at the sky and shook their heads sadly. “There is no hope. This cloud is not going anywhere. There is no point staying.”

And they packed their bags and left. Their disappointment was contagious. Some of us started feeling a little jaded with the constant rains and the dark skies. Fierce winds had started blowing as well. A silent prayer went round my mind, as my teeth clattered in the freezing cold – will the winds drive the rain clouds away tonight?

We turned in early that night after a dinner of roti, aloo-matar and chicken curry. At around 3-4 in the night, a small voice called “Maa, I have to pee.” A friend volunteered to accompany my son to the toilet outside. Soon afterwards, we heard the sound of boots running up the stairs as if in a great hurry.

“Get up, you all. Look out the window! Right NOW!” said a voice with tremendous urgency, which quickly rattled us out of our slumber party.

We rushed out of our sleeping bags, blankets and duvets to reach the broken window. By then someone had opened the pane and we were all staring bewildered at a silver Kanchenjunga! Never did I imagine that all along the peaks were so close to us. It seemed as if we could run and reach the peaks in a matter of minutes. The clouds were gone. The sky was clear. And there stood the third highest peak of the world under a starlit sky. We ran downstairs and scrambled outside in our windcheaters. Looking at the peak and the stars, I suddenly felt so small, so inconsequential. We puny mortals with our Lilliput frames, our petty egos, our unending complaints, wants and desires – all looked funny in comparison.

All of a sudden it started making sense to me – the trek, the rain, the cloud, the winds – as if part of a predestined design. This year, the Rhododendrons were almost half as much in bloom as some other years. I had come expecting hills breaking out in multi-hue blossoms. I had visualized pink, red, white, yellow rolling mountains and valleys around. I had heard stories of the sanctuary turning the hills into full-bloomed colour pots and here I was looking at the flowers alright, but not exactly in the magnitude I had hoped. Would I ever have the opportunity to be back here to witness the hills changing colours as the rhodos went full bloom in future? I wasn't so sure.

I had no idea that Nature had planned a different gift for me. I had seen the Kanchenjunga on earlier trips too – once from Gangtok, and the other time from Rishyap. But those sightings were of a distant kind. Never had the peak touched me like this. Now as the sun came up, the stalwart stood close to us, letting the sun touch its glory one by one with its rays. Orange, pink, yellow, white – the colours took turns as the rays hit the snowy crown. The cameras were out, working double shifts. Some were trying to identify which was Kabru, which was Pandim beside the Kanchenjunga. 

I stood looking at the towering heads for a long time, perched on a stone wall, trying to seize the moment for later. I knew my mission was done. In life so many our goals are thwarted, so many hopes broken. And we are handed down things we never asked for. It is only when you are close to nature, you realize the divinity in its plans – plans so different from the human ones, so more powerful than ours. You are never in control – no matter how hard you try to imagine otherwise. I learned my lesson. It wasn’t ever going to be flowers for me, but maybe a coarser terrain, a miracle carved out in rock and snow. 

Our trek leader, Soma Majumdar Paul

I had had my miracle.

Thanks to Soma’s Camps for facilitating this 

miracle for me! And taking such good care of first time trekkkers like me.

Note: I have not named any of my fellow trekkers in this story as I wasn't sure they would like that.

Photo courtesy: Debjit Biswas

© Sudeshna Sanyal

Writing herself

A lost manuscript is a woman once loved.
Once written.
Caressed with chappy fingers.
Nestled between sweat soaked pillows.
Of the poor poet who lost it on the tram line.


Now she doesn't know who wrote her.
Doesn't know who loved.
Crumpled in an old tin trunk
She writes herself.
Unpublished.



© Sudeshna Sanyal

The man undressed

Come let me shave your beard
Alumwash the cuts and burns
Let us watch together
The white and black
Children of your chin...
Run down the local drain
Merge with memory of pain.


Come let me undo that saffron turban
That sacred thread snaking around
Your fair fat body arrogant
Remembrance of a quiet boy
Initiated into top class convoy.
And wipe off the sandalwood paste
Your believer's forehead in haste.


Let us fold aside the skull cap that sat
Snug on your namazi head
While the sun burns uniform your face
Blackened brows now mere history
The pride of grinding it five times on the floor
That you wore so well, no more.


Instead let me clothe you naked
And play a game of 'guess who'
Or let us just go as we like
Undressing the raw man that lurked
Behind the fez and the turban.
For we are all going to die one day
It makes sense to live today.

 © Sudeshna Sanyal

One for the road

Sometimes do look back
At a life almost lived
And a death almost died
Along the shores of forgetfulness
Wilful or by chance....
Roads once travelled
Alone or holding hands
Gently going on ash grey
By-lanes.


Remember names scratched
On strangers' doors
Metal and wood.
That screamed to outlive
Time's kind erosion.


You have survived
Scratches and bites
And succumbed
Slow to your own
Rhythm.


Keep going. Keep going.
Until you become the road.

In Milan, Italy

© Sudeshna Sanyal

On being deaf

The red earth that was Kalinga
Panipath and Plassey
Is fiery Godhra today.
Our Gaza Sudan Libya
Passengers of death...
We are.
Stranded.

Burn a church
Shoot a girl
Burn books too.
Raze a mosque
Flatten a temple or two
You are scared
Aren't you?

A snake called Sabarmati
Winds through tunnels of gore
And green intestines of revenge.
The yellow air fills
With charred human smell.
All in a day's planned fell.

Where is your turf?
Where do you fight your wars?
How do you kill your hostage?
Your neighbour, kin
Shell shocked to silence
Or locked in an iron cage
While the camera rolls
And the fire rage.

I will play ghazal on the stereo
Or some Tagore full throttle
Oh drown the newshour now.
The coffee is made, the cries grow.
Or shall we play noisy monopoly,
Who cares for so much human folly
For I must master the art of pretense
And carry on as if it all makes sense.

Photo: Internet

© Sudeshna Sanyal