My Great-grandmother questioned me once,
When I was burying an unfortunate ant in a soil
Tomb topped with a tulsi leaf on a twig.
She was wrapped in six yards of white
In both life and her lesser brother.
Pallid hair pollen, breeze and shoo they went-
Sterile yet amorous- a snow clad mountain she,
Not in size, (she was tiny) but in earnesty.
Her snow cap was obsidian infused,
Flakes fell so softly like trees in forest bosoms,
Heard by none bar the crickets
Busy in their flop orchestras.
A rapid evolution could have helped all (like the Polynesian crickets) , but
She would have disagreed. She likes things slow.
She jingled the bell so slow, that it rarely did.
She ate the koozhan jack* slow, her prayers were epics.
Only two things she did quickly, turn the beads of her rosary and trust.
Both have left scars.
I did not even see her go,
Or know if she had a tulsi flag sticking out
Like a final goose bump.
~Ajay
7/4/18
*Koozhan is a variety of jackfruit that is more mellow and softer, hence preferred by the elderly
