He fumbled with his pocketbook –
The one he stitched his pockets for
A finger wider than was vogue –
To open to the pages “S”.
He slapped his other pockets too
But couldn’t find the thing he sought.
He shrugged and shook his absent mind
And moved the book – now near, now far –
And screwed his cataracted eyes
To follow down the yellowed page
Along a yellowed fingernail
To where he found my father’s name.
He slapped his pockets yet again,
And yet again he couldn’t find
The thing he thought that he had brought,
And scribbled at me in the air.
I passed the pen my father used.
He weighed it, nodding, in his palm,
And, shaking lightly, struck a line
Through S, through u, throughout the name.
He called me to his shoulderside
And, flipping to a sticking page,
He nodded at the stricken names
That filled his notebook page by page.
“My Scrabble friends, my Rummy mates,
My Carrom club – all gone, all ‘Late’.
I always had the best of luck.
I always held the winning streaks.
And look at how I’m winning now:
Just three of thirty-seven live.”
Minakhi Misra 