The Grove
1.
Shaped by tides, rain smudging
cavalcades of light, my restlessness broke
through as lines. I shifted
to a plateau. The dry
wave beyond the pane stilled
my writing’s flow.
I shifted near a grove.
Here time spreads on gossamer paws
and birds cut life
to size in clear notes.
My writing rooted.
Trees flowered, murmuring
with bees, fruits formed full, fell.
And flowered;
words rose sharp with sap.
Now they say:
The trees will be cut
for buildings to come up.
There goes my view
of my secret life.
Or does vision open
as light departs?
2.
Papaya on red
tablecloth. Brown bread, honey, a glass
of milk surrounded by cobalt chairs. Beyond,
curves green light. This is routine.
But it’s the green
serene
and many-fingered that strokes
headlines into blood, seeds
outrage with its fading, calms
me into courage and as it thickly
sleeps, crickets chirping,
frees me into the sapphire skies
of writing, with my hair flaming.
3.
Books are dedicated to people.
I wish mine to the trees outside the window.
To the mango for remembrance
of old sculptures, and the joy of parrots.
Beyond, the coconut: For fronds that darken
and fall. Next, the chikoo, full of clump brown fruit:
From earth to earth we fall; yet watch how light turns sweet
bitter offering. Behind
the Ashoka, upright with repentance
for its namesake’s ancient killings: There’s
no forgiveness, only loneliness. There’s
the fir; further, the Brazilian Rain Tree:
For transplantations that root.
Last, the neem, patents contested
as white flowers crumble. Each part yields up.
No homage is enough.
4.
The living need to be praised, not the dead.
But this is us: Unable to give thanks until
the grip of life is lost.
As the grove leans into
memory’s changing light
I put aside other living to watch trees stretch
with dawn, night rain turn leaves to glass;
moonlight mirror edges. And sunset spread
sky and bark with darkening bright.
5.
Returning
from vacations we’re used
to moth wings on the floor, geckos’ work.
The centipede ringed with red
ants on the table, a bee crumpled
below the panes, rat
droppings at specific sites.
(No roaches, I used herbal pesticide.)
Lamps misted
by spider webs, the terrace roosting
with doves. While outside glass, leaves
press closer.
Abandoned,
my house lives a hectic life.
No more. Next time we’ll step
on cement dust.
6.
Electricity breakdown. I write
in longhand and the candlelight’s dance. Beyond
the desk on white terrace tiles
steady moonlight spills
between leaf shadows. Though shadow
I am will I learn not to flicker
but shine?
7.
Three stories up and face-to-face
I tell the arboreal cave: Vision
me hope before you are sold. As if it were Krishna’s
mouth, coconuts His glottis, as if this moment were that pause
in the Mahabharata over which He looms. This grove,
this grove becomes the field
where I must face battle, or be lost.
Calm me then to war
for eight aged trees, their time is still not up.
Golden oriels light the dawn. Paired
sunbirds, sparrows, mynas crystallize
from flight. The Three Worlds fight
for territory as long -tongued afternoon intones
Krishna’s story: Into Me all things subsume,
from Me, the Throat devouring, emerge
life’s new forms. Below, at sundown,
a cat pared by decay seeks a fresh
hunting ground. The grove’s greenness parts
for a yawn that carries cold
on its furring. A black moth flits
in to die. Slicing sleep
a frond falls.
Within the month the campaign we’ve started
comes to naught, or not.
8.
The grove stands unaware of its impending slaughter.
I learn the laws of transplantation:
Bare stumps suggest life; those
with leaves do not.( To
continue living – shed the dead.)
The old mango’s searching grip tangles
with sewage pipes, modem lines, foundations.
Relocated, it won’t survive. (Spreading
invites destruction.)
The rules of nature and spirit
clash.
9.
Another day of no
activity in the next plot.
My heart steadies to
the dip of leaves riding
tessellated light.
I had forgotten
this precarious
condition is called living.
10.
In the Himalayas
the jade of the Ganga filling my ears
my husband calls to say: Two were saved.
Below in the plateau
peering three stories below
into concrete and pile
he points: Look there.
Two stumps.