Persistence

Munnar and Thekkady

These pictures are from a trip I did back in February. I traveled across the entire district of Idukki in Kerala. I did the beautiful hill station of Munnar, the Eravikulum National Park, the remote villages of Nedumkandam and Ramakalamettu, the Periyar Wildlife Reserve, parts of Thekkady.

It's been a while since I did the trip but surprisingly my memory of the people and places hasn't blurred with time. I still remember the friendly local with the bushy moustache who sat next to me in bus. He didn't speak a word of English but explained everything through sign langauge. I remember the boatride on Periyar river at the crack of dawn. I remember the spicy fish curry I had for lunch and the look on the face of the hapless french lady whom I mistook for the watchman and asked for a matchbox. I remember the mountain goat that stood in front of me and refused to acknowledge my presence and the tea gardens that from a distance look like comfortable green carpets.

I might go back again someday. I have heard the Kurunji, which blooms every 13 years, is a sight to behold.

Persistence

As I chased my shadow in the darkness,
I slipped and fell through the elevator door,
And I have lived here ever since.
Everything stays the same in here,
As we go up and down the tower.
At an arbitrary floor we stop for a while,
To let summer flies inside.
They are welcome to stay,
Hum to the tune of the disenchanted fan,
That breathes out a wind of monotony,
In a black and white persistence.

Beside me is a board of buttons,
Like happy faces that smile at each other.
Each one speaks a different dialect,
Of a foreign language,
But I am sure they say the same thing.
Above the board the speaker coughs and sputters,
The same song over and over again.
Even when I question the speaker I get,
The same words, the same sounds,
Through dayish night or nightish day.

The light shines with a bored brightness,
And if you stare at it for hours,
Shapes lose their shape,
And sizes lose their size.
The floor plunges to an abysmal depth,
And the ceiling jumps to an unimaginable height.
It is then that I hear the knock on the door,
Of the stranger waiting outside.
Within the elevator, I exist,
Locked and trapped in measured space.
He always waits outside.