Skip to main content

Waking Up Early (a poem)

Stumbling out of bed in the dark
I think to myself if this were Noah's Ark
I'd have surely stubbed my little toe
On that grubby wooden floor.

As it is, walking sight unseen, I must confess
My muscles are tight, my nerves a mess
Is that the door and or that the bench?
Ouch! I just stepped on his metal wrench.
 
Tip-toeing I go, knowing not where I step
Did I wake him, I cannot help but fret
The curtain's closed to the still light
But there's a glow so pearly, what a sight.

Waking up at dawn, this I love to do
But not falling over assorted shoes
Or stepping on scattered toys
Left carelessly by our son, that incorrigible boy!

Making it to the kitchen safely is a feat
A steaming cuppa coffee is my early morning treat
The aroma rising in that hour
I cannot wait, to sip and savour

But hark, what is this I hear?
A sleepy cry, a voice so familiar
Amma, he calls, Amma, come here.
How does he do it without coming near?

What is this sixth sense in children, one that defies logic
It wakes them up like that, it's some kinda magic.
But when a little boy presses his face to my cheek
To say Amma I love you, I really cannot speak

Love is like that, love is everything you see
Sometimes he irritates the hell out of me
Sometimes I long for solitude, to well, just be
But in my heart I know he wakes up early, to be with me

 
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Wasteland

Something happened over the past two days. Our next door neighbours, or rather one particular family (like all metrizens in this cramped city, we live within literally, touching distance of the others in our neighbourhood), have decided to demolish their home. Fine, so what, you ask. They see how valuable land now is. Who can blame them? But along with their home, they have also decided to kill off the two trees -- a mango tree and a coconut tree -- in their compound. I used to look at those trees from my kitchen window. The mango tree, in particular, was a welcome sight. Bunches of ripe green fruit used to hang heavily from it. Looking at it, I'd think of my home in Kerala -- of the time when I was a little girl in a white petticoat helping my father pluck mangoes as they slowly changed from parrot green to a golden reddish-yellow-orange shade. That was our annual summer ritual, you see. My father plucked mangoes using a long stick with a hook or a 'kokka' (in my collo...
Post a Comment
Read more

Morning scenes

The wind blustery Skies grey blue A light so muted Birds are quiet too We walkers go Sidestepping Couple-dancing No touching Looking or meeting Glances…Oh no!   Masks dangling From chins Below noses Hanging from one ear Or sometimes Fitting so properly Covering everything So no one can see Or know What we’re really like.   Runners running Soundlessly Iron determination Seeping through So much so   That dogs being walked Know they cannot Wag tails Or even Bark a greeting.   Two men Creating content One breaking into Hair flipping, body popping Dance Faithful friend filming In fits and starts As a security guard Sips his chai Utterly bemused.
Post a Comment
Read more

Life lessons from little people

Sometimes children say and do the darndest things. And help you learn something new about life and living.... When little man was just over a year old, he ate a cockroach egg. Or at least, he tried to. But my husband noticed and hurriedly got it out. Baby probably had a taste, though. Ugh. Why did he think he could eat something like that? I realised children don’t subscribe to our notions of ‘good’, ‘bad’ and utterly yuck--till we actually (like I did), have a mini meltdown and yell that they absolutely cannot just pick up shiny, brown objects, just because said objects look interesting! But then children are so open in their approach to life. So trusting, for one thing. For a long time, when he was a baby, he would happily exclaim "Ajja" or ‘Ajji’ (Kannada for ‘grandfather/grandmother') whenever he spotted a white-haired gentleman or lady. He would hold his arms out with a winsome smile. The recipients would coo and respond in kind. Till, my husba...
Post a Comment
Read more