After days of dry monsoons
the clouds finally decided
to emerge out of their patience.
Giant droplets had
begun to paint the dry earth
of the courtyard in fragrant patches.
Everything was getting washed,
looking all new; thirsty nature
was seeping into a cool sigh of relief.
The tin canopy of the verandah
rattled with a staccato drumming,
water streaming down its folds
in dancing parallel lines, framed
by the old wooden doorway
swaying this way and that
with the breeze through the trees
to the tune of the tin roof with
the flash and boom of the thunder.
The rich aroma of ginger-pepper tea
brewing in the next door’s kitchen,
unhesitantly fusing with the petrichor
made me waft back through the years.
Those old, unhurried Hindi film songs
on the radio, with my mother
humming along as she cooked.
Just then, the neighbours’ kid,
must’ve been five or six;
wobbled out barefeet into the rain,
a rainbow umbrella in one little hand
and clutching something else
in the other with great care.
It was a little glass bottle.
With much concentration,
she undid the cork and kept the bottle
on the driveway tile, under the rain.
With the best patience a toddler can muster,
squatting down next to her precious glassware,
waiting for the rain to fill it up, she looked like
a bright bobbing flower in the grey twilight,
a little pause of innocent colours
as one tired season ushered in the new one.
The bottle now full, focusing gingerly, with
her little tongue out, she put the cork back in
And ran back inside, shouting with excitement-
‘Maa!’
I heard a faint sneeze and sniffle in reply.
And then in the most joyous of voices I hear-
“See, I got you a bottle full of your favourite
rain!”
