Sahitya Akademi

5 a.m.Author(s): Usha AkellaSource: Indian Literature, Vol. 52, No. 1 (243) (January-February 2008), pp. 81-82Published by: Sahitya AkademiStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/23347558 .

Accessed: 25/06/2014 05:42

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

.

Sahitya Akademi is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Indian Literature.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 185.44.77.38 on Wed, 25 Jun 2014 05:42:27 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

Is a beat/bead alive? Is your ear the hand through which sounds

drop as a rosary? Is your poem beating its words? Is the poem alive?

Not the Heart's Colour

This morning I watched the rain, its song, its random alphabet on pane, its pulsating streams, the pane warped and straightened, outside the tree melted like an inkblot, like the sorrow of a child,

when the rain stopped the tree appeared again like a sharpened pencil point, I saw two branches with leaves

the colour of dried chrysanthemums, the raindrops were clean, empty,

Why is the heart not like this?

a.m.

The home is a lake at 5 a.m.

The things reflected; *

dried irises with long necks and

dark puckered mouths, the protective plastic's striated shadows

and smooth planes of light, the dark chocolate buffet, the yellow daffodils in oil, olive

and cream drapes, a bowl of cherries

and cranberries, red, maroon, the palette of reds from a hint of colour

to its farthest deepening,

the reflection of a poet writing about reflections.

Wine bottles, their cool tongues curved around

dark secrets, Beaujolais, Chardonnay, Zinfandel, Merbt,

This content downloaded from 185.44.77.38 on Wed, 25 Jun 2014 05:42:27 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

whisper a story of grapes, sun, oak, work, ferment and desire, the wine waiting, the painting waiting in the frame, a woman in the painting waiting for her Beloved, the frame waiting on the wall to be noticed, the wall waiting in the house, the house waiting to be awakened...

by 8 a.m. a family ferments in the bottle of the house, the lake now a kaleidoscope—bits of glass.

□

82 / Indian Literature : 243

This content downloaded from 185.44.77.38 on Wed, 25 Jun 2014 05:42:27 AMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions