Monday, April 13, 2009

the banyan tree

O you shaggy-headed banyan tree standing on the bank of the pond,
have you forgotten the little chili, like the birds that have
nested in your branches and left you?
Do you not remember how he sat at the window and wondered at
the tangle of your roots and plunged underground?
The woman would come to fill their jars in the pond,
and your huge black shadow would wiggle on the water like sleep
struggling to wake up.
Sunlight danced on the like restless tiny shuttles weaving golden tapestry.
Two ducks swam by the weedy margin above their shadows,
and the child would sit still and think.
He longed to be the wind and blow through your resting branches,
to be your shadow and lengthen with the day on the water,
to be a bird and perch on your topmost twig,
and to float like those ducks among weeds and shadows.
r.tagore.
i find comfort under the shade of his dreadlocks.
swinging like a child, holding onto his nappy roots
loosely landing in the leaves below.
i smile at
the simplest things
banyan trees
and small scrapped
knees.

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