WHEN A MOTHER DIES...

Premji

When a mother dies,
An inheritance of virtues
Vapourizes like wax...

Feel the vacuum, friend,
And the fumes of burnt out dreams...

When a mother dies,
Caused by an infected child,
Deep within her womb,
Not removed in time,
It's a crime...

When the mother in you died,
Dear Savitha,
My dearest sister...
You were a human sacrifice...
A deliberate sacrifice,
By religious fanatics...

When a mother dies,
I am sure,
She will resurrect some day...

And today, You resurrect again,
In protection of women,
Around the glob...

Dear Savitha,
Your sacrfice could
Review the abortion laws
In Ireland...
You live beyond death...
You live beyond religion...

My salutations,
O! Holy mother....

What is there in a religion,
When life itself is missing?


Savitha Halappanavar, a Hindu of Indian origin, was suffering from a miscarriage when she was some 17 weeks pregnant, and she sought medical attention and treatment at University Hospital Galway. The hospital told them the foetus was not viable, but they could not perform an abortion under Irish Law as the foetus's heart was still beating. During the next several days, Halappanavar was diagnosed with septicemia which led to multiple organ failure and her death.

DOG- BUILDING

 Premji

November 1933... Moscow

“My days are numbered”, Osip Mandelstam, told Nadezhda, his beloved wife, while handing over a sixteen line manuscrpit, scribbled on a piece of paper - already started yellowing like his poetic life - to her.

Being a very intelligent woman and an ardent supporter to her husband's literay life, she started reciting his satirical poem named “Stalin epigram”, in a low but stern voice.

We are living, but can't feel the land where we stay,
More than ten steps away you can't hear what we say.
But, if people would talk on occasion,
They should mention the Kremlin Caucasian.*

His thick fingers are bulky and fat like live-baits,
And his accurate words are as heavy as weights.
Cucaracha’s moustaches are screaming,
And his boot-tops are shining and gleaming.

But around him a crowd of thin-necked henchmen,
And he plays with the services of these half-men.
Some are whistling, some meowing, some sniffing,
He's alone booming, poking and whiffing.

He is forging his rules and decrees like horseshoes -
Into groins, into foreheads, in eyes and eyebrows.
Every killing for him is delight,
And Ossetian* torso is wide.

"Even the walls have ears!", a dry smile appeared on her face when she had finished reading. He too had finished drinking the last drop of bitter coffee, which was less bitter than the Russian creative life. “The Kremlin Highlander... You make us remember his Caucasus Mountains origin! And Ossetian* torso! Osip, how dare you to call him a bastard?”, she laughed silently.

He tried to close his eyes. But, he couldn't sleep for months properly for he had witnessed the Great Famine* during his vacation in Crimiea.

“And, what are you going to do with this?”, Nadezhda asked.

“I will read it out to some friends”

“Osip, don't you know that the species of friends is extinct in Russia?”, cxclaimed Nadezhda.

“I know.. Party's tightening censorship of literature... They will dissolve everything, dear... they will ruin the Russian literature..."

"And the real Russian writers too... the state is going to dictate their brains... what to write... what not to write... and beyond all, the sensorship of Zhdanov* the butcher!", told Nadezhda

"You are right... dear... Writers, who surrender their self esteem to the Union of Soviet Writers and submit to its authority, can enjoy lot of prvelages! Apartment in the cities... datchas (country homes) to kindle the fire of creativity..... more and more publications... expensive clothing... they can enjoy a very special status of "worker-writer"!", his meek nose turned red.

"May be, they can provide a great living for its members.... But, the times will prove, "the most important writers in Russia are its non-members."... See Anna... Anna Axmahtova...", she planted a kiss on his feeble cheek. "Submission is nothing but death! Dear...”

"Already, everything is decided by the party central committee... They control printing, distribution, publishing, radio, film and theater... and every form of art... They have absolute power of veto... Art is only a mode of propaganda for them.... What kind of stupidity is this?”

“Terror... Red art!”

“And that's why the most militant futurist poet was also found dead with a bullet pumped into his heart! Freedom is a strange word even for the one-time propagandist!”

“You mean?”

“Vladimir Mayakovsky*.... Throw Pushkin, Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, etc., etc. overboard from the Ship of Modernity... don't you remember?”

“Yes... Poor man was so by disillutoned by their impossible control... dictatorship, and taking away every form of freedoms.... and their constant surveillance... Zhdanov* was right after him...”

“Gorky! The loyal-most proleterian writer of the USSR! That one time prodigal son is back behind everything...”

“Gorky means bitter in Russian... bitter... bitter...”, he stared into the noticeably earlier autumnal night, which was growing darker and darker! 

“Its safe there in my memory”, she plunged the poem into the fireplace!

(*"Ossetian torso" refer to the rumor that Stalin was born from a person of Ossetian ethnicity rather from his official father, Besarion Jughashvili, who was a Georgean!)
April 1934 

Boris Pasternak closed his eyes listening to “Stalin epigram”, recited by the Osip Mandelstam who had abandoned poetry for several years as a protest towards the totaliterian tendencies of Joseph Stalin.

“Boris, please tell....”

But, Pasternak didn't allow him to complete. “Osip.. I didn't hear this, you didn't recite it to me, because, you know, very strange and terrible things are happening now: they've begun to pick people up. I'm afraid the walls have ears and perhaps even these benches on the boulevard here may be able to listen and tell tales. So let's make out that I heard nothing."

“Yes... You heard nothing... But, I heard them crying... children and women dying out of hunger... I saw people eating each other just to survive... Millions of Russians in Ucraine perished... not in the war-time, my friend... But through artificial hunger, organised in vast scale by Stalin against the Ucrainian population. The Holodomor... "Extermination by hunger"”
“Osip, do you want me to get shot?”

“Boris, did you not see those posters printed by the Kremlin Caucasian : "To eat your own children is a barbarian act””

“Yes”

“Ossetian created great famine to suppress Ucrainian Nationalism... not to exterminate the "kulaks" alone...”
Boris Psternak watched him moving away, like fire-ball, in the darkness...
“A handful of grain, meant prison for seven years... That was the law in 1932... Intolerance is the signet of power!”, he told himself.
“A bullet is reserved for every word of dissent”, Big Boss sharpened his moustache with wax...
~~~@~~~~~

Notes"

* Osip Emilyevich Mandelstam was a Russian poet and essayist who lived in Russia during and after its revolution and the rise of the Soviet Union. He was one of the foremost members of the Acmeist school of poets. He was arrested by Joseph Stalin's government during the repression of the 1930s and sent into internal exile with his wife Nadezhda. In 1938 Mandelstam was arrested again and sentenced to a camp in Siberia. He died that year at a transit camp.

* Vladimir Vladimirovich Mayakovsky (Влади́мир Влади́мирович Маяко́вский) (July 19 [O.S. July 7] 1893 – April 14, 1930) was a Russian and Soviet poet and playwright. He is among the foremost representatives of early-20th century Russian Futurism.

* On the evening of April 14, 1930, Mayakovsky shot himself. The unfinished poem[4] in his suicide note read, in part:* Zhdanov enlisted with the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (Bolshevik) in 1915 and was promoted through the party ranks, becoming the All-Union Communist Party manager in Leningrad after the assassination of Sergei Kirov in 1934. He was an endorser of Socialist Realism in art
* Boris Leonidovich Pasternak; (10 February [O.S. 29 January] 1890 – 30 May 1960) was a Russian language poet, novelist, and literary translator. In his native Russia. By the time of his death from lung cancer in 1960, the campaign against Pasternak had severely damaged the international credibility of the U.S.S.R. He remains a major figure in Russian literature to this day. Furthermore, tactics pioneered by Pasternak were later continued, expanded, and refined by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn and other Soviet dissidents. 

*Great famine: The Holodomor (Ukrainian: Голодомор, "Extermination by hunger"; 'Морити голодом', hunger-extermination[2]) was a man-made famine in the Ukrainian SSR between 1932 and 1933. During the famine, which is also known as the "Terror-Famine in Ukraine" and "Famine-Genocide in Ukraine,"[3][4][5] millions of Ukrainians died of starvation in a peacetime catastrophe unprecedented in the history of Ukraine. It was organized by Joseph Stalin!

FISSION, FUSION AND ELIMINATION

premji

Thiruvananthapuram Railway Station…

Like a huge fortress made of rock and concrete, she has been protecting the fast moving steel beasts for the last 150 years!

It was the early hours of the day, and I had been waiting there as a worn out bogie of an endless “human-train”, starting from the ticket issuing window… Thirty five minutes had already been gone!

Five guys, stood ahead of me and the ticket issuing clerk, a woman in her fifties, desperately tried to locate the keys on the worn-out keyboard. The black and white computer screen resembled her event-less life.

“The train will depart within two minutes….”, an aged man cried out from behind. “Please speed up… Madam”

She didn’t care that at all, as she had been there behind the window for more than ten hours, that too as the continuation of previous day’s night shift. If her parents could have got a chance to rename her, sure, they would have called her “Ms.Sleep”!

Five windows, for issuing tickets, remained closed.

“Indian Railways is running under huge profits now…just by downsizing its employees!”, she murmured out of anger. “They are exploiting us like slaves.”

“Why employees alone? They are exploiting us too… And what kind of profit? They make profit just by cutting down the expenses for passenger safety, from 38% to 11% of total revenue!”, a noted activist shouted from rear.

“Friend… we live in a liberalized world… what counts here is profit!”, she said calmly.

“Sir… will you please get me a ticket to Kottayam?”, a forty year old country guy requested the man who stood ahead of me.

“Hey… you… move back…”, a policeman shouted from the other end and the he moved away desperately.

“Here is your ticket”

“Thank you Sir… thanks a lot”, he collected the ticket happily.

“Please collect the money…”

“No thanks… Pinku”

“Pinku! Sorry Sir… I cannot reco…..”

“Can’t you recognize me? O.K… now, look at my eyes”

“Premji…O! My God!”, Pinku shouted aloud.

Fortunately, we got two seats, immediately opposite to each other and the metal wheels of Venad Express started rolling swiftly.

“Twenty years… we haven’t met… at least even once… for the past twenty years…”, Pinku started talking aloud, in a language: neither Tamil nor Malayalam.

Innocent men always talk aloud!

“The innocence in your eyes… that’s your biggest asset… dear Pinku”

“Thanks… So, what are you doing now?”

“Teaching numb-skulls”

“Great… do you write stories now-a-days?”

“Not much…”

Thirty years back… a Sunday…

It was around noon and the burning Sun was at the peak of his glory. We had been playing football at the beach since morning. Another Sun was burning with maximum intensity, deep inside my stomach.

“Premji, let’s go home”, Pinku told.

His home… it resembled the shack of the old man, portrayed by Hemingway! His father owned a Catamaran and Mom made a living as a fish vendor.

“We don’t get very tasty fishes like this”, I told his Mom.

“We don’t sell tasty fishes outside, you silly fool”, Pinku told while putting a huge piece of fish in his mouth.

A huge heap of fish bones piled up before us.

“Premji…which material is the “whitest” on earth?”

“Titanium dioxide.”

“That’s science”, Pinku registered his protest.

“I don’t know”

“These fish bones!”

“No… your eye-white!”, I couldn’t ignore the sea of innocence in his eyes.

Pinku was marginalized to the outskirts of my life later when he had been forced to elope with a wonderful girl from some other caste, at the very beginning of his twenties.
“Pinku, where do you live now?”

“Somewhere near Tirunelveli… I too have two sons like you… the elder one is doing degree course in Computer Engineering and the other guy is still in school.”

“That’s really great!”

“I didn’t get a chance for higher studies… that’s why; I still have to wrestle with the Sea!”, he remained silent for a moment. “Premji, do you still have those softwoods in your farm?”

“Yes… Do you need them?”

“Yes… I like to own a Catamaran. I will pay you…”

“O.K… we will do barter business… Come with those rare fishes… with the whitest of all bones”, I laughed.

“Impossible… my friend”, his face turned gray… and he remained silent for sometime.“Premji… Do you know the place where I reside now? My son is being kicked out from the Government Engineering College… do you know: why?”

“Is it?”

“Because we reside at Koodankulam”

“Near the Nuclear Power Plant under construction?”

“Yes… My son… he was leading a very powerful group of bloggers against the nuclear lobby… he was thrown out from attaining higher education… He was getting foreign aid; it seems, to undermine national interests…”

“How sad! What a silly argument…”

“Don’t worry boy… We have the Sea… our Mother Goddess -- I told him…”

“Then?”

“Sorry Dad… They will kill her too… The coolant water and low-grade waste from the Koodankulam Nuclear Power Plant are going to be dumped in to the sea which will have a severe impact on fish production and catch. We have nowhere to go… deeper poverty and misery… they will be our future assets… It will affect the food security of two states too… Kerala and Tamilnadu --- Premji… It was his reply”

“I am sorry Pinku… Every democracy fights a shadow war against her own people… Our nation is also no exception… May be, now it is more direct…”

“Every fish, you are going to eat in future, will have black bones… there are chances… you may get boneless fishes too!”

“Like boneless politicians…”

“Premji… You reside here in Thiruvananthapuram… just seventy kilometers away from Koodankulam… If anything happens, you people are going to die like dogs… Then, why don’t you fight against this injustice?”, his question slammed upon my soul like a thunderbolt.

Marie Salisbury, a pretty woman in the beginning of her twenties, got up bit late on that day as her White-house internship was over by the previous night. Being the one and only daughter of wealthy parents, she had been living in an expensive apartment near to the White-house from the very starting of internship. She was welcomed by a short message on facebook, that too from her former boyfriend.

“Hi Marie… please check this link… http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=30372

She clicked on it, lazily as wealth and laziness are eternal twins! The new tab was opened swiftly.

AMERICA'S FALLUJAH LEGACY: WHITE PHOSPHOROUS, DEPLETED URANIUM: THE FATE OF IRAQ'S CHILDREN… Those Laboratory Mice Were Children... by Karlos Zurutuza

Unfortunately, Marie could see only monsters, made of thousands of tones of depleted Uranium and White Phosphorous, wandering through the 'BUSHES' of White-house.

Postscript:

Fallujah was one of the least affected areas of Iraq immediately after the 2003 invasion by the US-led Coalition. The U.S. military first denied that it has used white phosphorus as an anti-personnel weapon in Fallujah, but later retracted that denial, and admitted to using the incendiary in the city as an offensive weapon. Reports following the events of November 2004 have alleged war crimes, human rights abuses, and a massacre by U.S. personnel, including indiscriminate violence against civilians and children. This point of view is presented in the 2005 documentary film, Fallujah, The Hidden Massacre.

politics of pregnancy

premji

Who cares for her shattered dreams when she is
Brutally raped on the very first night?
Who cares for her preconception health when,
For him, the only activity is making her pregnant?

Who cares for her repeated abortions
Which results in cervical damage,
Which in turn makes her unable to carry
The weight of a later pregnancy?

Who cares for not to satiate his excessive lust
When she is pregnant, which can cause
Abortion and maternal mortality?

Who cares for prenatal care that can keep
Her unborn baby and herself
Healthy during pregnancy?

Who cares to relieve her excessive work load at home
And her ever expanding stress to provide
High-quality child care for her five or six other children,
From earlier pregnancies?

Who cares for her signs and symptoms of anemia,
Her fatigue, increased heart beat or palpitations
Paleness of inside of eyelids, gums and nail beds
Desire to eat indigestible or peculiar foods?

Who cares for her backache, increasing weight,
Change in her centre of gravity and powerlessness?

Who cares for her malnutrition, poor health,
Lack of education, overwork, mistreatment?

Who cares for her dental hygiene, her broken teeth,
For the baby grows within is another tyrant
Who grabs Calcium, even from her teeth and bones?
Who cares for her cramps and muscle spasm,
Heartburn and indigestion , insomnia?

Who cares for her needs to go to the toilet frequently,
As the growing baby reduces her bladder capacity?

Who cares her inability to get comfortable
When she has neither clean water nor safe sanitation,
And necessary support either from health services?

Who cares not to tense her,
Already she is suffering from all sort of
Tension and high blood pressure?
And her mother-in-law terrifies her again
The consequences if the newborn could be of a girl!
Sad, woman is the greatest enemy of
Another woman, in the most needed times!
If she dies, none is worried...
For he can marry once again!
More dowries, more sex and more kids!

Who cares for her post natal depression ,
As none to take care of the newborn and other kids,
She has to run for office and other workplaces
With heavy breasts, pain and bladder infections?

Who cares that every pregnancy weakens her a lot
As she need some time to recover her health...
And on the very day she can spread her legs,
By force, he starts his activities again!
He knows how how to starve the newborn
Just by emptying her breasts!

When things are like this,
Every religious clergy flays
The limiting of the family size by birth control!
Christians wish for a Christian world
Muslims dream for a new world under Islam
Hindus, Buddhists, Jews and
Every religious fanatic dreams of the same!
They offer gifts for women for bearing
More and more children
For more children is their cheapest weapon!

When will they dream for a HUMANE WORLD?

Healthy children need healthy mothers.
Healthy mothers need healthy food,
Loving husbands (optional!) and caring society
For true world is made of love!

നിരാകാരന്റെ ചിരി

പ്രേംജി

ഓത്തുപള്ളിയ്ക്ക്‌ വെളിയിൽ വെയിൽകാഞ്ഞുകിടന്ന നാസറുദ്ദേ‍ീൻ മുല്ലയെക്കണ്ടതും അള്ളാപ്പിച്ച മൊല്ലാക്കയ്ക്ക്‌ പെരുവിരൽത്തുമ്പുവരേയ്ക്കും കലി കയറി.
'പള്ളീക്കേറാത്ത വെലാല്‌'
മൊല്ലാക്ക പിറുപിറുത്തുകൊണ്ട്‌ നടന്നകലുന്നതുകണ്ട്‌, കുഞ്ഞാമിനയും അപ്പുക്കിളിയും ഓത്തുപള്ളി വിട്ടിറങ്ങി മുല്ലയെ തട്ടിയുണർത്തി. പ്രഭാതത്തിലെ സുഖനിദ്രയ്ക്ക്‌ ഭംഗം സംഭവിച്ചുവേങ്കിലും കിളിയുടെ നിഷ്കളങ്കമായ മുഖം കണ്ടതും മുല്ലയ്ക്കെന്തോ അതിയായ സന്തോഷം തോന്നി.
'മുള്ളോ, ഓട്‌ കദ പദഞ്ഞുതാ', കിളി ചിണുങ്ങാൻ തുടങ്ങി...
'എന്താ ക്ലിയേ, അനക്ക്‌ സുഖാ? മുല്ല ആരാഞ്ഞു...
കിളി അവന്റെ വലിയ തല കുലുക്കിക്കൊണ്ട്‌ ചേറ്‌ നിറഞ്ഞ പല്ലുകാട്ടിച്ചിരിച്ചു.
'കുഞ്ഞാമിനേ, മൊല്ലാക്കാണ്‌ ഇന്നത്തെ വെള്ളേപ്പോം കറീം അന്റെ വകയാ? മുല്ലകിളി പറഞ്ഞു.
'മുല്ലാ, ഒരു കത പറഞ്ഞ്‌ താ, കുഞ്ഞാമിന മുല്ലയ്ക്ക്‌ സ്വസ്ഥത നിഷേധിച്ചു.
'എന്തു കഥയാ അനക്ക്‌ വേണ്ടത്‌? ഹോജരാജാവിന്റെയോ? ബദരീങ്ങളുടെയാ? റബ്ബുൽ ആലമീനായ തമ്പുരാന്റെയാ?'
'അതൊന്നും ബേണ്ട'
പിന്നെ?
'ജന്നത്തിന്റെ കത പറയീൻ'
'മുള്ളോ, കദ പദയീൻ...'കിളി വീണ്ടും ചിണുങ്ങി...
'ജന്നത്തെന്നുവച്ചാൽ എന്താ?'
കിളി വാ പൊളിച്ചു.
'സുവർക്കം', കുഞ്ഞാമിന തന്റെ ശബ്ദകോശം തുറന്നു...
'മിടുക്കി, സുവർക്കമല്ല സ്വർഗ്ഗം' മുല്ല കഥ തുടങ്ങി. 'പണ്ട്‌ പണ്ട്‌ പണ്ട്‌ റബ്ബുൽ ആലമീനായ തമ്പുരാൻ സ്വർഗ്ഗം പടയ്ക്കാനായി അഞ്ച്‌ തരം മുത്തുകളെടുത്തു. എന്നിട്ടെല്ലാംകൂടി തുടക്കവും ഒടുക്കവുമില്ലാത്ത ഒരു നൂലിൽക്കോർത്തിട്ടു...ഒന്നാമത്തെത്തരം മുത്തിന്റെ പേരെന്താന്നറിയാമോ?'
ഇല്ലെന്ന്‌ ഇരുവരും തലയാട്ടി അറിയിച്ചു.
'ഒന്നാം മുത്തിന്റെ പേര്‌ സത്യം', മുല്ല പറഞ്ഞു.
'സത്യന്നൊരു മുത്തോ?' കുഞ്ഞാമിന കയർത്തു...
കിളിക്കൊന്നും തിരിഞ്ഞില്ല. മുല്ലയ്ക്ക്‌ വല്ലായ്മ തോന്നിയെങ്കിലും കഥ നിറുത്തിയില്ല...
'രണ്ടാം മുത്തിന്റെ പേര്‌ സമത്വം...' മുല്ല തുടർന്നു.
'സമത്തമെന്നാലെന്താത്‌? കുഞ്ഞാമിന നിഷ്കളങ്കമായി ചോദിച്ചു.
'അതോ, നീയും ഈ ക്ലിയും ഞാനും തുമ്പീം തേരട്ടേം എല്ലാം പടച്ചോന്റെ മുന്നിൽ ഒന്നാ'
'ഇതൊരു പൊട്ടക്കതയാ', കുഞ്ഞാമിന കയർത്തുകൊണ്ട്‌ ഓത്തുപള്ളിയിലേയ്ക്ക്‌ മടങ്ങി. മുല്ല വിഷണ്ണനായി.
'കഥ തുടരുക മുല്ലാ,' കിളി വ്യക്തമായിപ്പറഞ്ഞു.
മുല്ലയ്ക്ക്‌ അദ്ഭുതമൊന്നും തോന്നിയില്ല.
'മൂന്നാം മുത്ത്‌ സാഹോദര്യം...നാലാം മുത്ത്‌ സഹിഷ്ണുത...' മുല്ല ഒരു നിമിഷം ശ്വാസം കിട്ടാതെ പിടഞ്ഞു. 
'അഞ്ചാം മുത്ത്‌ സമാധാനം' കിളി പൂരിപ്പിച്ചു.
മുല്ലയ്ക്ക്‌ സന്തോഷംകൊണ്ട്‌ തന്റെ ഹൃദയം വലിഞ്ഞുപൊട്ടുമോയെന്ന്‌ സംശയം തോന്നി.
'തുടക്കവും ഒടുക്കവുമില്ലാത്ത ആ നൂലിന്റെ പേരെന്താ? മുല്ല ചോദിച്ചു.
'സ്നേഹം' കിളി പറഞ്ഞു. 
'ഇനിപ്പറയൂ, ആ സ്വർഗ്ഗത്തിന്റെ പേരെന്താ കിളിയേ?'
മുല്ലയും കിളിയും ഒരു നിമിഷം പരസ്പരം കണ്ണുകളിലേക്ക്‌ നോക്കിയിരുന്നു.
'ഇസ്ലാം'കിളി മൊഴിഞ്ഞു.
തന്റെ എല്ലാ അലച്ചിലുകളും സാർത്ഥകമാകുന്നതിന്റെ ആനന്ദത്തിൽ മുല്ല ആകാശത്തേയ്ക്ക്‌ കണ്ണുകളുയർത്തി... പടച്ചോനേ... എല്ലാ വേദനകളും നിനക്കുള്ളതാകുന്നു...എല്ലാം നീയാകുന്നു...
'വെലാലെ നീയീ വിഡ്ഢീന്റൊപ്പം ചുറ്റിത്തിരിയാ...' കാരപ്പൊന്തക്കാട്ടിൽ നിന്നും മടങ്ങിയെത്തിയ അള്ളാപ്പിച്ച മൊല്ലാക്ക കിളിയുടെ ചെവി തിരിച്ച്‌ പൊന്നാക്കി. അയാളുടെ ക്രോധത്തിന്റെ കനലിൽ നാസറുദ്ദേ‍ീൻ മുല്ലയുടെ ദേഹം ചുട്ടുപൊള്ളാൻ തുടങ്ങി.
മൊല്ലാക്കയുടെ വിരൽത്തുമ്പിൽ ചെവിയർപ്പിച്ച്‌ ഓത്തുപള്ളിയിലേക്ക്‌ മടങ്ങുമ്പോൾ കിളി തിരിഞ്ഞുനോക്കി. മുല്ലയുടെയും കിളിയുടെയും കണ്ണുകൾ വേദനയ്ക്കിടയിലും കൂട്ടിമുട്ടി. അവരുടെ ചുണ്ടുകളിൽ  അലൗകികമായൊരു പുഞ്ചിരി വിടർന്നു. നിരാകാരന്റെ ചിരി.