By Sadho Ram
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| Saroj Devi, my mother! |
12 years ago, today was the day, when surrounded by many a strange faces, a few stranger feelings and a wailing-like-a-child father, in the midst of cold August wind blowing calmly over the shaved off head of mine and graveyard dogs howling afar, and night sky covered with heavy clouds.. clouds seeming as if ready to burst.. pour.. come down, and those strange faces moving, changing shades.. shapes and chattering along the sides of Bhāgīrathī river at Jangipur town, I put fire in her mouth at the stroke of midnight while she lay, like a tired traveler after a long and tedious journey finally given a bed to rest, on her pyre made up of sandalwood logs.. and watched her body burn into cinders.. 12 years it's been today. And 12 years is a long time for a soul to wander. Hope her soul has found its place and now rests in peace!
May peace be bestowed to her soul my friend .
ReplyDeleteThank you, ISISTEK.
DeleteThe memories will remain like how the blessings will continue to be - forever.....
ReplyDeleteThanks, Rakesh.
DeleteMujhme Shabd abhi bache nahi jo andar ubhar rahe hai, Bas itna kahunga ke Allah unki Rooh ko Sukoon de...Jo sukoon tumhe unhe yaad karke aur unko tumhe Dua dene me milega.
ReplyDeleteAs I commented on your Blog -
ReplyDeleteAs a rationalist averse to all things supernatural & mystical, I see no point in hoping for a re-incarnation or a reunion for eternity in heaven (or hell) with our loved ones. But as a lover, rather a junkie of nostalgia, I always seek solace in the fact that our loved ones never really died. They may die physically, but they are very well Alive in our thoughts, in our memories.
Like our parents & grandparents who will always be alive till we are alive, through their pictures, through the stuff they gifted us on our birthdays, in the faint memories of the times when they held our hands to help us walk or used to bathe us when we were toddlers, or the times when they helped us lean how to write alphabets, or when are dads played Horse for us and made us sit on their backs, or in the memories of the times we relished all the delicious food our moms cooked for us or the scoldings our parents gave us when we misbehaved, or the times when we were all excited to show our school progress report to make our parents feel proud and also those times when we were embarrassed to show it to them, or the times when we persistently demanded such & such thing from our fathers and various other memories of our lives.
Also, as someone who grew up in a middle class household, I remember those nights when either my dad or mom kept awake all through the night and used a hand fan or a newspaper to blow air so as to make me sleep properly during the horrible summer months in Northern India when there were acute power failures and we couldn't afford a generator (I'm sure this holds true for many of us) Yes, our loved ones will always be alive and with us through their memories.
And in my case, when my dad (a pantheist himself) accepted my atheism and beef eating (you wont see that happening in 90% Indian families) or when my dad was ok with me chucking up my lucrative IT job to instead struggle as a writer.
The flames may have extinguished their bodies, but nothing will ever take away their love as it's immortal. I can't take away your pain but I hope I can give you as much love as I can so that those wounds (that can never be healed) don't hurt much.