Mother

why would one bear

if one cannot love

how would one love

if not with zeal

One of these days sitting high on pot I started talking about my childhood. Till that fateful moment I had always looked back and thought that I had a perfect childhood, but that is not the case I guess. I probably share my childhood with a whole lot of other folks, who had a similar background as mine. A generation trying to come to terms with the world around them and they bear children without thinking what would happen to these lesser mortals.

The feeling of being in-adequate,

The feeling of being insignificant,

The feeling of something being wrong,

I grew up with all of them.

 The memory that has been disturbing me most after that pot session is the beating sessions, why would someone hit a child, a child doesn't know better, a child cannot think from an adults perspective. I remember living in encompassing fear of violence, I remember waiting for the next session to happen. And somewhere down the line it just stopped mattering anymore, I still had the fear, but that never stopped me from being what I wanted to be. The vision that overwhelms me is a 6-7 year old scared kid, who is being thrown around and beaten black and blue, with all that she could lay her hands on, belt, slippers, hands.

I can feel the slaps

As they landed hard on my face

I can feel the buckle of the belt

Leave its marks on the body

But the most vivid of the remembrance

Is of her face

Which was so full of hate,

At having borne someone

Who won't understand,

The plight that was hers

The scarlet red face

The expression of annihilating anger

The way she said

"oh dead one, why don't you just die"

The moments when I will pray for death

But would be too scared to die

The way I will console myself

"she will miss me when I am gone"

The way I feared her all through my childhood

And I did leave her, she doesn't know it maybe, maybe she craves for me, on my part I understand why she was the way she was. I even think that the violent sessions were maybe on periphery of sanity. I know she wanted me to be successful, her definition of success. I know she never tried to understand me, she didn't have to.

But the screaming and ululating kid still haunts me, the scarlet red on her face and the fear and horror, with which I waited for the next dose to be served, still haunts me.

They say Mother is the supreme giver of love, a love so pure that you can go hide in its warmth.

I never had that recluse, ever.

 -- The allure of Solitude lies in it being perennial