The culvert and the tree

The tree, at the corner of the locality,

And the culvert underneath its branches wide,

Twin companions to a forlorn mourning me,

Recovering temporarily from a loss

Permanent, of a father loving, now

No more, his broad visage haunting

My young teenage troubled sleep,

A man simple and honest, reading romantic poetry,

During his free time, travelling with his

Favourite Wordsworth and Keats,

In green meadows and verdant vales,

Seeing daffodils dancing and

Hearing song of the solitary reaper

And the enchanting nightingale,

The man always smiling, bearing the angina pain lightly,

My dear dad, battling life, never giving up,

In an India of late70s

Teaching us the finest values, his three kids,

And instilling in me, a love for great arts,

That fine man---suddenly gone forever,

To reside with gods,

And this pain, this yawning void,

 Left behind due to a lingering

Bereavement forever living

In an aching heart;

I, a thin sad lad,

In perpetual mourning,

Always---in remembering mode

Of the joys of his endearing company,

Now gone, this great man,

I came often here, sad and battered,

And sat on the lonely culvert,

And the tree, on long summer nights,

And early winter evenings, cold and desolate,

Smiled and whispered,

Here we both sat---Father and I,

And he told me about richness of life,

Alone sat I, bereft of his soothing presence,

And heard the old tree talking to me,

Like a caring companion that understood well

Mortal pain, loss and shortness of human life,

The culvert---solid and broad---like the lap of

A father departed, comforted my anguished heart,

I sat stock still and watched people go by, and felt

As if rocked by a pair of invisible hands broad and gnarled,

The hands of a working honest man, now living in

The glittering stars, and remembering him,

As the cold gloom descended upon the quiet

Environs,

Often, unseen and unheard by the cruel world, I cried.

 And then, the magic would happen---

Years ago, a cold wind would spring up

From the heavens and blow down,

The old gnarled tree would fan my

Pale-thin face with its hands

In order to dry those big tears,

And calmly whisper in my ears,

Weep not, my solitary child,

Those who get enthroned and totally,

Consecrated in a caring, full and

 Longing heart, their scented shrine,

Never fade away and die.

After the brief communion,

Cleansed, my pain dulled,

I would leave both my friends,

The red-bricked culvert and the

Neem tree behind, to be hugged

By a sweeping December mist,

And perhaps, visited by some

Other grieving mourner,

Seeking this solitude divine.