The Making Of A Poem: Part I

Donut Revenge 1982
by Jean Michel Basquiat

I wrote a poem yesterday. Before inflicting it upon you, I believe it is my duty to explain the story behind it. “A poem begins as a lump in the throat, a sense of wrong, a homesickness, a lovesickness.” So said Robert Frost. I have been suffering from all these maladies for the past few days.

I was homesick. I talked to my mom last week. She said when she goes to sleep at night she doesn’t know whether she would be able to get up in the morning or not. That made me extremely sad. The next evening when I called, she was in a baraat, a wedding procession, of a neighbor’s son. “I am sitting in a car. Many others are on foot, dancing to the music.” This made me even more miserable. I missed the band-baja-baraat.


I was lovesick. Woh chup rahein to mere dil ke daag jalte hain… Now I don’t want to reveal my latest crush and cause heartburn to the earlier ones.

I had a lump in my throat, which made my husband ask, “Gala daba doon kya?”

“PJ,” our daughter said.

“Who is PJ?” the father asked.

“Ha ha ..." I couldn't control my laugh. "Don't you know what PJ stands for? Have you forgotten your cousin, Pooran Joshi?”

And the sense of wrong troubled me to the hilt on Sunday, February 20th. It so happened that a family friend invited us for a museum visit and a picnic outing at a children’s park. I excused myself, saying that I had to complete a blog post on the Middle East uprisings, but the day didn’t turn out the way I had planned.

In the morning, while having breakfast in the patio in our backyard, a big bird dropped some food on my head. The food had already passed through the bird’s intestine, so it kind of smelled foul. “Why don’t you wear an underwear?” I shouted at the bird.

“Do you go to toilet in your underwear?” the bird shot back.

“Give me tissue paper,” I asked my husband.

“But the bird has flown away.”

“I want it for myself.”

“Why waste tissue paper?” he retorted. “Go and take a bath.”

The worst thing in this world is to be told to take a shower that too on a Sunday. But there was no escape from the father and the daughter’s relentless nagging.

After cleaning myself thoroughly with shampoo, soap, and hot water, barely had I walked two steps out of the shower area with a towel in my hands, when I slipped on the tiles, and fell flat on my face. My nose and lower teeth took the impact. For a while, I remained on the floor, using my breath on the towel as hot pack for my nose and mouth. After recovering from the shock, I tried to get up. My knees hurt badly. I went near the mirror and watched my face closely, and oh my God, I was horrified. My face didn’t have any outward injury. Now, no one was going to believe that I had a fall. You don’t fall everyday. It was a huge disappointment to not have any lasting injury mark.

My lips looked slightly swollen, as if they had received Botox treatment, and there was a small cut on the inside of my lower lip, which I knew would be dismissed as a self-inflicted bite.

All in all, I didn’t feel too much discomfort either, but was not inclined to do any housework. My husband and daughter grudgingly cooked, laid the table, and then called me to lunch. When I went and sat on my regular seat, the chair collapsed like Tunisia’s ruling family. I had a premonition that other chairs would also collapse if I sat on them. This time I fell on my hips. Again, there was no serious injury. Instead of inquiring about my well being, my husband began a discourse on weight loss.

I lost my appetite after finishing lunch. Then I declared myself bedridden. And to my surprise, I started feeling pain in lots of places.

And then suddenly, tabhi achanak, I received a phone call from my friend….

Continued….

(Disclaimer: The second half of the bird joke is not a product of my fecund brain)