They threw away the last bowl of payesh she'd ever cook. The soft sarees neatly hung on the wooden aalna smelled of winter afternoons in the sun. Of dried mango pickles. Of jowan and paan. Of crispy Lobongo lotikas.
As she burned on the banks of Ajay, a gaping darkness stared into the eyes of an old man. The couple on the wall smiled. He smiled back. She did too. (Like they had, fifty years back to the hooded camera.)
Only her smile bellowed in whiskers of smoke that drifted across the river.
The little goat she fed every afternoon stood motionless at the bamboo gate. Its head tilted. Searching eyes. Long after, it went its way.
It's difficult to sleep when the person who loved you the most burns brightly in the cold. In the drizzling rain.
