The road has cracks.
I notice them as I walk, head bent.
Do cracks mend I wonder as I carefully sidestep them.

I am the head boy today
For I lead and many walk behind me.
They say in school, the head boy has strength of character.

I don’t feel particularly strong
As I carry the funeral urn,
A tiny circumference that is carrying my entire world away.

I have learnt too that
The area of a rectangle is my mother’s body
Being carried away and I, a corner holding her up.

In this way, she left-
And now my road has cracks.
Or do I notice them only because my eyes are blinded.

The mighty mountains too have cracks.
Cracks once narrow but now grown to rivers,
Rivers that flow out to meet a sea like the Bay of Bengal.

In Hindi class Bengal could be Ben+Gal
And I am no girl
Therefore I am carrying the funeral urn and not crying at home like Granny.

They say the Ganga is a life-giving river
They said so in geography class
They however did not tell me that it would wash my mother away.

With not a trace of her
Not a trace of her will remain
Once this little urn leaves my grasp and floats away forever.

They say love is forever
No, it is diamonds that are forever
Hard and unyielding their warmth turned cold.

But then that is all I have left of her,
Her diamond engagement ring,
They say she has left it to me in her will.

She left
Was that her will?
The road has cracks.