Memories

In the twilight’s deepening stillness I sit by my window and look outside The sprawling fields of paddy awaiting harvest, Take me to those fields where I roamed as a child Like the blind, when pass their fingers Across the Braille script, are led To an amazing world of information, As I move my hands through the grooves of the past Before me opens, lovely vistas into my childhood! Those days flitted away so fast Without leaving much impact But now I yearn for the pleasures past And loving faces that used to peer from the drapes The bright silhouette of my mother’s face Haloed by the aura of sacred love The stern but loving face of my father The guardian and bread winner of our home The naughty pranks of my siblings Whose merry laughter made our little nest ring Scenes I courted once so avidly crowd upon me As on a tinsel screen, in endless succession Of the days when my heart never knew any sorrow And I remained an alien to life’s pressures As I lose myself in the upsurge of memories Of those whom I shall never see any more I loathe to tell myself… never shall come again The same ecstatic joy of innocent childhood!