The Tramp

It isn't that hard, now that I come to think of it. Just some minor replacements in pronouns. And a somewhat tedious task of making the verbs agree with the subject(or its new found 'singular'ity). Besides they were never really plural. Only in my mind. Only in my thoughts. Thankfully, I won't have to replace real 'we's and 'us'es. Only hopes of them.

Every night they lose at poker to older
men, who know what to do with their faces.

Life without hopes of a hope is slightly fluffy. And heady. Somewhat like wading through knee deep water with your eyes closed and ears open. To the Big City Noises. If you are reading this now, you probably think I am sad or depressed or even frustrated. Believe me when I say I am not. I am only barely conscious of a reality that does not feel anything like it. You know what I mean? Suppose I played something really corny( which I do anyway) and got a call to the Grammys. And when I go to collect my prize Norah Jones walks up to me and says-I adore you for your musical genius! And before I am out of the daze I get a call from the Nobel academy saying I got the Nobel prize this year for my outstanding innovations in the field of Solid State Physics. This is followed by two years of tours, lectures, felicitations...and that feeling within, that I deserve none of this. That I ought not to have gone through all this. That feeling of wanting to scream. Thinking to yourself if you didn't really deserve a normal life.

I crave for a life with gifts for your goodness. And punishments for your mistakes. Proper punishments.

" We'll have our own house," Ammu said.
" A little house," Rahel said.
"And in our school we'll have classrooms and blackboards," Estha said.
"And chalk."
"And real teachers teaching."
"And proper punishments," Rahel said.

This was the stuff their dreams were made of. On the day Estha was Returned. Chalk. Blackboards. Proper punishments.

They didn't ask to be let off lightly. They only asked for punishments that fitted their crimes. Not ones you spent your whole life in, wondering through its maze of shelves.

Lights on the ceiling.
Every inch of it.
On the walls.
On the floor.

I am not much seen. You would easily mistake me for my surroundings. Or the other way round. I am very fluid. I am a lot of things I was. And a lot of things I never will be. I will get into your head. Through your ears. Like an air horn. Your nostrils. Like a dark syrup. Your eyes. Like a bad dream.

The chameleon on the window vanished
without seeming to move. So are we
looking through the chameleon now
as we gaze across the pasture?