probably the only reason i noticed him was because they have renovated palghat railway junction and the platform is one long stretch of gleaming tiles and empty space. a most unlikely railway station and a great place to meditate :-)
it was one of life's unhurried journeys and there were few takers for it. it was tough then to miss this solitary figure slowly receding away from me. painstakingly dragging himself along the platform floor, for nature had been capricious when giving him limbs. he would cover a few yards and then rest, looking back as if he was waiting for someone, and then begin his journey again.
i would be lying if i said that my heart was bleeding for him for it were really ice-creams that were occupying my mind - ice-creams that i really really really needed to buy, and now! so i dutifully rushed past him, and deed done, turned back with two ice-creams in my hand. thats when the heart did assert itself - "he'd probably like an ice-cream too". i was looking for some signal from him that he thought it was a good idea too and would accept the gift but he turned his face away at the last moment. unsure, a little afraid of rejection, i let hesitation triumph and walked past with my rich (and fast melting :-) booty.
the ice-cream was fabulous but he'd grabbed my attention by now. the breath synced with his slow dance and wondering why i had hesitated. and then, just as the train was rolling in, the 'signal' came. an unknown hand reaching out to offer him something, and his own stretching out to complete that arc of love.
and then before shobhana could say "deepak!" i was off like a rabbit, or maybe like a guy who'd just remembered something he should have done. ice-cream bought, i stride towards him purposefully. much to his alarm! the transformation from alarm to smile was a sight to behold! the way his face lit up when he saw my outstretched hand and the chocobar - what a heart filling smile :-)
and then when we were about to board the train i chanced a look again. and the image was one for the ages. one long empty platform, softly lit by the afternoon sunlight and in silhouette a solitary figure slowly unhurriedly savouring his sweet treat. where is that camera when you really need it?!
this mondays poem comes courtesy alka who wrote in after reading about indhu to share a beautiful poem by Ellen Baas.
If You Knew What if you knew you'd be the last to touch someone? If you were taking tickets, for example, at the theater, tearing them, giving back the ragged stubs, you might take care to touch that palm, brush your fingertips along the life line's crease. When a man pulls his wheeled suitcase too slowly through the airport, when the car in front of me doesn't signal, when the clerk at the pharmacy won't say Thank you, I don't remember they're going to die. A friend told me she'd been with her aunt. They'd just had lunch and the waiter, a young gay man with plum black eyes, joked as he served the coffee, kissed her aunt's powdered cheek when they left. Then they walked a half a block and her aunt dropped dead on the sidewalk. How close does the dragon's spume have to come? How wide does the crack in heaven have to split? What would people look like if we could see them as they are, soaked in honey, stung and swollen, reckless, pinned against time?
Poem: "If You Knew" by Ellen Bass, from The Human Line. © Copper Canyon Press, 2007.
i don't know if and when i will see my "friend" again. but if you do find yourself on palghat railway station one day and you get this sudden inexplicable urge to buy and share some ice-cream with someone, don't hesitate! it may turn out to be among the tastier ice-creams you have had :-)
much love, d&s | 
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