The Sound of Distant Ankle Bells …
Memories of those delicate tinkling bells,
casually fastened around calloused feet,
take hold of my waking moments,
and fling my thoughts back to a distant time,
where folk-songs were heartily sung,
joyful, yet hopelessly out of rhyme.
I barely saw her, a construction labourer perhaps,
hauling bricks, cement, anything, on a scorching Delhi day,
while in the semi-shade of a Gulmohar tree, her infant silently lay.
A cacophony of thoughts such as these swirl around,
yanking me away from the now, to my cow-dung littered childhood playground.
Now, a lifetime of displacement has hushed the jangling chorus of the past,
to a faint trickle of sounds, as distant as an ocean heard inside tiny sea-shells,
and,
I know, that the orchestral nostalgic crescendo, rises, dips, and swells,
as tantalisingly near, yet a world of time away, as were the tinkling of her ankle-bells.
Amazingly beautiful piece sir
Beautifully penned too
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Many thanks yet again my friend Nirant – your generous words are deeply touching.
I am not “sir” at all … Just Afzal.
Diwali greetings to you and yours.
Namaskaar and peace ✌
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Pleasure always for beautiful stuff Afzal 🙂
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Peace and light, my dear friend Nirant
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💞💞💞
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✌👍✊🌻
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Your poems are always been an inspiration and thought provoking, a read treat. Peace and love and more power onto you. 👍
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Thank you Aquibbhai
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you’re very kind and generous my friend Aquib
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