Tigers Forever
May there always be tigers, Lord.
In the jungles and tall grass
May the tiger’s roar be heard,
May his thunder
Be known in the land.
At the forest pool, by moonlight
May he drink and raise his head
Scenting the night wind.
May he crouch low in the grass
When the herdsmen pass,
And slumber in dark caverns
When the sun is high.
May there always be tigers, Lord.
But not so many that one of them
Might be tempted to come into my bedroom
In search of a meal!
The Snail
Leaving the safety of a rocky ledge
The snail sets out
On his long journey
Across a busy path.
The grass is greener on the other side!
For tender leaf or juicy stem
He’ll brave the hazards of the road.
Not made to dodge or weave or run
He must await each threatening step
Chancing his luck
Keeping his tentacles crossed!
Though all unaware
Of the dangers of being squashed
He does not pause or flinch—
A cartwheel misses by an inch!—
But slithers on,
Intent on dinner.
He’s there at last, his prize—
Rich leaf-mould where the grass grows tall.
I salute you, Snail.
Somehow, you’ve made me feel quite small.
The Snake
When, after days of rain,
The sun appears
The snake emerges,
Green-gold on the grass.
Kept in so long,
He basks for hours
Soaks up the hot bright sun.
Knowing how shy he is of me,
I walk a gentle pace
Letting him doze in peace.
But to the snake, earth-bound,
Each step must sound like thunder.
He glides away,
Goes underground.
I’ve known him for some years:
A harmless green grass-snake
Who, when he sees me on the path,
Uncoils and disappears.
Once You Have Lived with Mountains
Once you have lived with mountains
Under the whispering pines
And deodars, near stars
And a brighter moon,
With wood smoke and mist
Sweet smell of grass, dew lines
On spider-spun, sun-kissed
Buttercup and vine;
Once you have lived with these,
Blessed, God’s favourite then,
You will return,
You will come back
To touch the trees and grass
And climb once more the windswept mountain pass.
Butterfly Time
April showers
Bring swarms of butterflies
Streaming across the valley
Seeking sweet nectar.
Yellow, gold, and burning bright,
Red and blue and banded white.
To my eyes they bring delight!
Theirs a long and arduous flight,
Here today and off tomorrow,
Floating on, bright butterflies,
To distant bowers.
For Nature does things in good order:
And birds and butterflies recognize
No man-made border.
Slum Children at Play
Imps of mischief,
Barefoot in the dust,
Grinning, mocking, even as
They beg you for a crust.
No angels these,
Just hungry eyes
And eager hands
To help you sympathize …
They don’t want love,
They don’t seek pity,
They know there’s nothing
In this heartless city
But a kindred need
In those who strive
For power and pelf
Though only just alive!
They know your guilt,
They’ll take your money,
And if you give too much
They’ll find you funny.
Because that’s what you are—
You’re just a joke—
Your life is soft
And theirs all grime and smoke.
And yet they shout and sing
And do not thank your giving,
You’ll fuss and fret through life
While they do all the living.
The Whistling Schoolboy
From the gorge above Gangotri
Down to Kochi by the sea,
The whistling-thrush keeps singing
That same sweet melody.
He was a whistling schoolboy once,
Who heard god Krishna’s flute,
And tried to play the same sweet tune,
But touched a faulty note.
Said Krishna to the errant youth—
A bird you must become,
And you shall whistle all your days
Until your song is done.
For Silence
Thank you, Lord, for silence;
The silence of great mountains
and deserts and forests.
For the silence of the street
late at night
when the last travellers
are safely home
and the traffic is still.
For the silence in my room
in which I can hear small sounds outside:
a moth fluttering against the window pane,
the drip of the dew running off the roof,
and a field mouse rustling through dry leaves.
These Simple Things
The simplest things in life are best—
A patch of green,
A small bird’s nest,
A drink of water, fresh and cold,
The taste of bread,
A song of old;
These are the things that matter most.
The laughter of a child,
A favourite book,
Flowers growing wild,
A cricket singing in a shady nook;
A ball that bounces high!
A summer shower,
A rainbow in the sky,
The touch of a loving hand,
And time to rest—
These simple things in life are best.
Granny’s Proverbs
A hungry man is an angry man,
Said dear old Gran
As she prepared an Irish stew
For the chosen few
(Gran’dad, my cousins and me).
But then she’d turn to me and emote—
‘Don’t be greedy, or your tongue will cut your throat!’
And if I asked for more of my favourite fish,
‘That small fish,’ she’d say, ‘is better than an empty dish!’
Like Manu, she taught us to honour our food,
She was the law-giver, seeking all good.
Gran’dad and I, we’d eat what we were given
(Irish stew and a tart)
But sometimes we’d sneak away to the bazaar
To feast on tikkees and chaat
—And that was heaven!
We Are the Babus
Soak the rich and harry the poor,
That’s our motto and our law;
We are the rulers of this land,
We are the babus, a merry band,
Under the table, or through the back door,
We’ll empty your pockets and ask for more!
We are the babus, this is our law—
Soak the rich and harry the poor!
In a Strange Cafe
Waiter, where’s my soup?
On its way, sir, loop t
he loop!
Straight from our famous cooking pot,
Here it comes, sir, piping hot!
But waiter, there’s a fly in my soup.
That’s no fly, sir,
That’s your chicken.
The smaller the chicken the better the soup!
Please take it away.
I’ll just have the curry and a plate of rice …
The curry’s very good, sir, full of spice!
Waiter, what’s this object that’s floating around?
Just a small beetle, sir,
Homeward bound!
Never mind the curry, just bring me some bread,
I have to eat something before I’m in bed.
What’s on the menu? Hungarian Goulash?
I suppose it’s served up with beetles and mash.
Isn’t these anything else I can eat?
Yes sir, you could try the crow’s feet.
Highly recommended and good for the teeth.
All our best guests
Are most happily fed here.
And where are they now?
All happily dead, sir.
Remember the Old Road
Remember the old road,
The steep stony path
That took us up from Rajpur,
Toiling and sweating
And grumbling at the climb,
But enjoying it all the same.
At first the hills were hot and bare,
But then there were trees near Jharipani
And we stopped at the Halfway House
And swallowed lungfuls of diamond-cut air.
Then onwards, upwards, to the town,
Our appetites to repair!
Well, no one uses the old road any more.
Walking is out of fashion now.
And if you have a car to take you
Swiftly up the motor-road
Why bother to toil up a disused path?
You’d have to be an old romantic like me
To want to take that route again.
But I did it last year,
Pausing and plodding and gasping for air—
Both road and I being a little worse for wear!
But I made it to the top and stopped to rest
And looked down to the valley and the silver stream
Winding its way towards the plains.
And the land stretched out before me, and the years fell away,
And I was a boy again,
And the friends of my youth were there beside me,
And nothing had changed.
A Song for Lost Friends
The past is always with us, for it feeds the present …
1
As a boy I stood on the edge of the railway- cutting,
Outside the dark tunnel, my hands touching
The hot rails, waiting for them to tremble
At the coming of the noonday train.
The whistle of the engine hung on the forest’s silence.
Then out of the tunnel, a green-gold dragon
Came plunging, thundering past—
Out of the tunnel, out of the grinning dark.
And the train rolled on, every day
Hundreds of people coming or going or running away—
Goodbye, goodbye!
I haven’t seen you again, bright boy at the
carriage window,
Waving to me, calling,
But I’ve loved you all these years and looked for you everywhere,
In cities and villages, beside the sea,
In the mountains, in crowds at distant places;
Returning always to the forest’s silence,
To watch the windows of some passing train …
2
My father took me by the hand and led me
Among the ruins of old forts and palaces.
We lived in a tent near the tomb of Humayun,
Among old trees. Now multi-storeyed blocks
Rise from the plain—tomorrow’s ruins . . .
You can explore them, my son, when the trees
Take over again and the thorn-apple grows
In empty windows. There were seven cities before …
Nothing my father said could bring my mother home;
She had gone with another. He took me to the hills
In a small train, the engine having palpitations
As it toiled up the steep slopes peopled
With pines and rhododendrons. Through tunnels
To Simla. Boarding school. He came to see me
In the holidays. We caught butterflies together.
‘Next year,’ he said, ‘when the War is over,
We’ll go to England.’ But wars are never over
And I have yet to go to England with my father.
He died that year
And I was dispatched to my mother and stepfather—
A long journey through a dark tunnel.
No one met me at the station. So I wandered
Round Dehra in a tonga, looking for a house
With lichi trees. She’d written to say there were lichis in the garden.
But in Dehra all the houses had lichi trees,
The tonga-driver charged five rupees
for taking me back to the station.
They were looking for me on the platform:
It had arrived on time, upsetting everyone’s schedule.
In my new home I found a new baby in a new pram.
Your little brother, they said; which made me a hundred.
But he too was left behind with the servants
When my mother and Mr H went hunting
Or danced late at the casino, our only wartime nightclub.
Tommies and Yanks scuffled drunk and
disorderly
In a private war for the favours of stale women.
Lonely in the house with the servants and the child
And books I’d read twice and my father’s letters,
Treasured secretly in the small trunk beneath my bed:
I wrote to him once but did not post the letter,
For fear it might come back ‘Return to
sender …’
One day I slipped into the guava orchard next door—
It really belonged to Seth Hari Kishore
Who’d gone to the Ganga on a pilgrimage—
The guavas were ripe and ready for boys to steal
(Always sweeter when stolen)
And a bare leg thrust at me as I climbed:
‘There’s only room for one,’ came a voice.
I looked up at a boy who had blackberry eyes
And guava juice on his chin, grabbed at him
And we both tumbled out of the tree
On to the ragged December grass. We rolled and fought
But not for long. A gardener came shouting,
And we broke and ran—over the gate and down the road
And across the fields and a dry river bed,
Into the shades of afternoon …
‘Why didn’t you run home?’ he said.
‘Why didn’t you?’
‘There’s no one there, my mother’s out.’
‘And mine’s at home.’
3
His mother was Burmese; his father
An English soldier killed in the War.
They were waiting for it to be over.
Every day, beyond the gardens, we loafed:
Time was suspended for a time.
On heavy wings, ringed pheasants rose
At our approach.
The fields were yellow with mustard,
Parrots wheeled in the sunshine, dipped and disappeared
Into the morning mist on the foothills.
We found a pool, fed by a freshet
Of cold spring water. ‘One day when we are men,’
He said, ‘We’ll meet here at the pool again.
Promise?’ ‘Promise
,’ I said. And we took a pledge,
In blood, nicking our fingers on a penknife
And pressing them to each other’s lips. Sweet, salty kiss.
Late evening, past cowdust time, we trudged home:
He to his mother, I to my dinner.
One wining-dancing night I thought I’d stay out too.
We went to the pictures—Gone with the Wind—
A crashing bore for boys, and it finished late.
So I had dinner with them, and his mother said:
‘It’s past ten. You’d better stay the night.
But will they miss you?’
I did not answer but climbed into my friend’s bed—
I’d never slept with anyone before, except my father—
And when it grew cold, after midnight,
He put his arms around me and looped a leg
Over mine and it was nice that way.
But I stayed awake with the niceness of it
My sleep stolen by his own deep slumber …
What dreams were lost, I’ll never know!
But next morning, just as we’d started breakfast,
A car drew up, and my parents, outraged,
Chastised me for staying out and hustled me home.
Breakfast unfinished. My friend unhappy. My pride wounded.
We met sometimes, but a constraint had grown upon us,
And the following month I heard he’d gone
To an orphanage in Kalimpong.
4
I remember you well, old banyan tree,
As you stood there spreading quietly
Over the broken wall.
While adults slept, I crept away
Down the broad veranda steps, around
The outhouse and the melon-ground …
In that winter of long ago, I roamed
The faded garden of my mother’s home.
I must have known that giants have few friends
(The great lurk shyly in their private dens),
And found you hidden by a thick green wall
Of aerial roots.
Intruder in your pillared den, I stood
And shyly touched your old and wizened wood,
And as my heart explored you, giant tree,
I heard you singing!
The spirit of the tree became my friend,
Took me to his silent throbbing heart
And taught me the value of stillness.
My first tutor; friend of the lonely.
And the second was the tonga-man