All that We Write

My toys are ageing. My coltish Equus The aged camel With dropping neck And stooping desire, Stares haggardly. I hold them dear. And clean the dust of snippets Of my infantile patrimony. The circle around my eyes Turn sombre As slumber of melancholy grows intense; My withered skin of forehead Pities the rust and moss I gathered so far in rolling Thus, I hold my toys And croon, Age and innocence is such a boon! 9 February 2021 © Swarnadip Chatterjee

       During my tenure as an academician, I found one of my students of class VIII extremely adorable. I left the institution in 2016 and expressed my feelings for her with an oblique diffidence. What followed was disgraceful. And, I am no Coetzee. Moreover, by that time I knew why being an academician is only respected by those who hardly have an experience about the dynamics of this profession. So, this was not something out of the blue. But the actual story is not about this girl or me being disgraced by a few unmindful fellows, but triggered by an accidental rendezvous(?) with her this evening. I came to Park Street to spend some hours at Oxford Bookstore as per my frequent custom during weekends for the last thirteen years. I watched Bada Din by Anjan Dutt this Christmas and while doing so, I was trying to figure out what still had remained of Park Street in the 1990s. I stood in front of the garment shop, called 'Perfection' for a while, and then...