Wonderful walk through Dharavi Nature Park y’day, the dumpyard-converted-to-miniforest. The kadamb was in bloom, the arjuna in a leaf-and-seed-shedding phase. Made my acquaintance with lots of trees, textures and scents I didn’t know before.

Season’s special: Tadgola, that raw, no-taste fruit of the palm.

Chilled,  a shortcut to bliss. Almost makes up for not being able to eat mangoes. Almost.

Datura, the killer, solanacea

ashwagandha, withania somnifera, the brain tonic

kailashpati

%%%% I typed this morning, no cooking no walk, chapter 25 closed and done, now for the version three of the translation. Long nights of trying to stay awake almost asleep at the keyboard, the TV droning on  slumber antidote, of half an hour here, an hour there, early mornings, keying in over oats, over tea, coffee, ignoring the sweat on your back and the inquisitive crow who’s missed his tidbit… thanks to P who’d ask every other day. “You finished?” “Not yet.” Now for the battle with the *shabdakosh*, the relentless digging for shades of meaning, not this, this, maybe this… Hell I’ll self publish if push comes to shove but I’m seeing this one through, in true Scarlet fashion, “As God is my witness….”

Only in Mumbai would you traipse into and out of two urban villages, walk beneath a highway, take a shortcut to the commuter station and then walk again a good fifteen minutes to listen to classical music from two centuries ago, perfectly rendered at a free concert held in the memory of the truly great.(Ustad Allaudin memorial concert). Only in Mumbai would the old gent sitting next to you say I have no knowledge of musical notes—and then correctly identify every raga presented, and he’d tell you about listening to the national program of music on radio Akashwani every weekend without a break for the last SIXTY years. Yes, only in Mumbai would you have to push your way out at your station at eleven in the night...

While I’ve been a big fan of IWW for years now and forever beholden, I’ve stayed away from facetime. Until now. Yesterday afternoon I sat in traffic (in an auto and then a shared cab v interesting) to reach a new part of town, but it was worth it, bonding with strangers and text over a cup of tea, all discussions pertinent, focussed, the people gentler than on the workshop. Thank you, caferati

An almost-perfect poem in neat copperplate

Tripped

By a word. A single word.

Pulled out from a shabdakosh, a language dictionary

unused tome dusted, the alphabets scrambled for, hazily

magnifying lens scanning the letters, impatient

just a single word

the entire color changes, somber

The cassia 
by the deserted factory
(even windows ripped out)
doesn't care
All it knows is spring

 Reason to celebrate --

The amaltas are blooming

On that stump of an almost white bleached-out tree

Mold on the bark

Dismal, stunted, ignored

Dwarfed by the profusion all around

Yet a sprig, yellow-tipped

profusely yellow, the buds spilling over

A sprig yellow-tipped

Sated by who-knows-what sap

Drawn, drawn from deep beneath

Sings

Spring

It was almost night when I stopped to speak with you,

Exchange a word of greeting

shifting my bag of groceries, eager to step home, hungry.

A casual encounter with a neighbor

When did that conversation move past bhajans that you’d just heard

and meander elsewhere?

Perhaps it was the way your lip trembled

Even though you held your grey head high

Picking at the hem of your simple dress

Looking all around from time to time.

When did that tale step past politeness

To sibling abuse and mental torture?

Too familiar a tale—elder abuse, and yes this my India

My valiant, ancestral India

I listened only too conscious of my grey

And covered up grey

And, yes could money run out

And one’s own turn away

All the whatifs

Rushed down upon me

Trailed me home

Now I wear them, like a second skin.

"Jacaranda. Wo jacaranda hai..." Acharyaji, our park  garden expert told me this morn when I described the awesome carpets of purple.  So beautiful. Yes, I managed a walk on this short a visit also, in that interesting place sandwiched between snooty town and the villages of Khizrabad and Taimur nagar.
Tried not to be impressed at the roads, after all that's all our money being used there while we negotiate potholes with a prayer and light brake.
That child dressed in a pretty pink dress and toothy grin  who tugged at my hemline, "Didi..." Lifetimes!

“Austy, but Krishna’s telling Arjun to go ahead and fight a war!” AM says

“Yes, the sermon on the battlefield. A case of last minute jitters. The decision to fight’s been taken quite some time ago.”

“But…”

“To understand this, you have to go into the back story, the story of the banishment and ‘not a needle-worth of land…', sometimes the only choice is to be brave.’”

AM’s Canadian, a smart kid, trying to come to terms with the Bhagvad Geeta.

Maybe I needed this reminder too. We’re alive only once. Lifetimes will come and go.

Though I caught only the tail end of this tree walk the view of the first amaltas sprig on an almost dry, barren tree was well worth it.

Delighted to announce the publication of a Prose poem, Sun addict 2, 
on Ink Sweat and Tears, a poetry ezine.
 http://www.ink-sweat-and-tears.com/

RIP Ruth Prawer Jhabvala.

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/books/2013/04/ruth-prawer-jhabvalas-stories.html

I read  *The Judge’s will* last night, and still haven’t been able to shake off the story.

So much to be thankful for, small things sometimes, no I didn’t know I had voice and delivery…

The Valley Scribe, the newsletter of the California Writers Club- San Fernando Valley, features my story Verbal Acoustics, in its April issue. One version of this tale was one of my earliest subs to the IWW Practice group. A big thanks to Kathy Highcove for this opportunity.
http://www.cwc-sfv.org/ValleyScribe/2013-04/The%20Valley%20Scribe%20-%20April.pdf

AAfrica… the five year old, a neighbor’s daughter, squealed pointing at the continent. Noorth America, South Americaaa, Asiaaah…

Where does all this excitement about the world go?

Where does the thrill of learning go?

Does getting older mean we stop learning?

I got a autographed many-hued world as a gift.

Is this email not displaying correctly? View it in your browser.

obit. Pure Slush Vol. 6 is now available Pure Slush is proud to announce the publication of the long-awaited obit. Pure Slush Vol. 6 one year in the writing! 87 years in the living! 22 writers in 32 stories give their own personal recollections of Webster Murphy Allen 1925 - 2012 the man and his mysteries, the wine and the whining, the wheeling and dealing, the laughter and the tears, the ecstacy and the espionage! Who was he really? For a taste of obit. click here  US$13.00 plus shipping   Click on the cover image above to order or click here  Featuring the work of William Henderson, Michael Webb, Jaylee Alde, Meghan K. Barnes, Mira Desai, Jennifer K. Dick, Teresa Burns Gunther, Kyle Hemmings, Gill Hoffs, Joanne Jagoda, Joyce Juzwik, Jen Knox, Maude Larke, Matt McGee Gwendolyn Joyce Mintz, Matt Potter, Martha Rand Sally Reno, Dusty-Anne Rhodes Andrew Stancek, Susan Tepper and Erin Zulkoski.

random shed, Ranibaug

ceiling, Bhau Daji Lad Museum/ Victoria and Albert Museum

Mahua tree ( i think)

HRH The Queen

Reena Kallat's winning installation-- stamps made of changed road names

A cannonball tree/ Kailashpati

Obit, an anthology from Pure Slush is at the press-- I have a story in it.
Pure Slush has  created a book around the detailed obit of a fictitious New Yorker, Webster Murphy Allen (http://pureslush.webs.com/webstermurphyallen.htm). Submissions were invited around this theme, drawing from his life.
http://pureslush.webs.com/atasteofobit.htm

Other writers contributed stories about the same person, about different parts of this character's life, etc. They took incidents or ideas or traits or other characters mentioned in the obituary ... and sometimes their stories refuted them. Stories could be wholly about the obit's subject or maybe only in passing.
My story has my somewhat-big-city-India imprint, and I’m sure the tales of the other authors reflect their lives as well.
Can’t wait to see my copy.

One more beautiful morning exclaiming over trees, touching sundry trunks and branches. This time, the tree group,TAW,  walked through Rani Baug, or the Victoria and Albert gardens and zoo or the Jijamata Udyan—I don’t care what they call it as long as they preserve it and not turn it into one  silly amusement park.

http://www.saveranibagh.org/aboutus.php

Amazing amazing trees. Felt so good to recognize a few- the tivar, the brownia,  the sita-ashok, the ficus, cajuput-- they felt like old friends. Saw so many new trees, including rare ones that have grown over a century.

This has been an incredibly tough post to write.

I was reading one of the better personal advice blogs, Trent’s simple dollar or Raptitude, I forget which, and the post was about looking back at mistakes (life mistakes, blunders, not minor misses) And picking three lessons that one has learned from them. So I thought and thought and winced and thought and well, here we go:

1. I should have trusted my gut feel. The writing on the wall IS as one reads it, and no, that’s not delusional. No one can know your interests better than you. I should have, but I didn’t., and that undermined my confidence. And it would have given me more time with the parent, time that’s irreplaceable now.

2. I should not have been passive, or what’s that term, passive aggressive. But talking back is not so part of my nature. Or defending turf. I tend to give up, compromise to keep the peace.

3. I could have strengthened my own resources. There is one part of me which says I’ve done ok. There’s another part that says I could have done much much better, sharper, been more PROACTIVE rather than merely riding the wave. 

Neat thing, this.