Soup of the Day

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It is just another Tuesday,

A silent corner stares

At you –

Bowed down over a book,

Bubbles popping in your soda

Your shirt, only one shade lighter

Than a dark blue.

 

It is just another Tuesday,

A silent corner stares

At you –

Biting into your cheesecake

Your smile widens as it melts;

A lover sitting right across you

Impatiently waits.

 

It is just another Tuesday,

A silent corner stares

At you –

Running your fingers across

The fabric of the white tablecloth, smiling

At the slightly older man who orders

The main course for you.

 

It is just another Tuesday

A silent corner stares

At you –

You put up a hand, I move.

“Hello, Sir! Did you take a look at the menu?

What would you like to have today?”

“What is the soup of the day?”

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Asmita Bhattacharya 

M.A. Batch of 2020

 

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Your bowl of Ramen

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I have come to believe in friendships

As situated in time

This new knowledge

Comes dressed in pain

And the realisation that you are precious

That if you make me a bowl of Ramen

It will be one of only so many

You ever get to make me

This discord with infinity

Grips me like a tide

I’m a piece of cork

Always coming under the wave

Its tidal push, moving me away

Moving you away

As we talk about the Hogwarts halls,

And the lost boys of Narnia,

We spill laughter in broom cupboards

But You and I

Are always already moving away

...

I see friendships now,

Like a bowl of Ramen

Sprawled all over the Globe

Such that You and I

Can go where you and I may

But our memories looped like

Ramen strings are crossing seas

To come home

In this daily moving away

It’s just a matter of time,

Before you and I

Will have just this ramen left

To be tied together in a string

A simple memory

Of two girls sipping on Ramen

On a summer noon

Perfect strangers now

On opposite ends of the sun

 

Ahona Das

M.A. Batch of 2020

Beef Eater

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After months, I felt happy when 

I heard the news of death of a cow. 

Baba left immediately with his skinning weapons,

Grandma followed him with a huge basket 

And I ran behind them with full of merriment

Like I ran home after the last school bell. 

 

With immense labour and skills Baba was skinned the cow,

Grandma fought with birds, dogs and beasts 

And in the basket of meat, I gathered heaps and heaps.

 

As shepherds smell like sheep

I smelled like the dead cow

After I reached the school.

 

Behind their elbows and palms 

They hid their mouth and nose 

As I sat behind the other kids.

Then, as usual, they abused: 

Dirty Mang, beef eater…

 

My belly was empty so I was not ashamed. 

But I was very much raged when the master 

Asked me to stand outside in the flaming sun.

 

With my unfettered thirst and hunger,

In the warhanda, I reached the pot of water,

And they abused me again: 

Dirty Mang, beef eater…

 

I stepped a little back, 

And with my all might, hit the pot with a brick

And ran away to eat the dead cow’s delicious meat.

 

Suresh Gaikwad, CES, PhD

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