Landescapemoving

I was indulging myself yesterday, reading from a diary I kept
during my 1998 trip to India - I would take snapshots with my pen
rather than my camera -here is a little something that I wrote while
sitting on a train - another small piece I am dedicating to friends who
recently experienced for the first time the joys of parenthood - only
children (of whatever age) have the gift of stopping time in its tracks.


Landescapemoving
I sit looking out on to the landscape moving, the rich greens and waters rippling in the train's wake. I experience for a while a timeless contentment. Opposite, a small boy stands up from his train seat. His mother looks out onto the landscapemoving. He trails his fingers along the padded back of the seat, and pokes his mother's midriff bulging out between blouse and sari. She reacts, irritated, and scolds him with a glare. Chastised, he strives to win back her favour. He places his hand on her arm; she brushes it away and deepens his sense of rejection, by once more peering out onto landscapemoving. His face is hurting, and his eyes betray the fear of love lost. The scene is played out again, his seeking hand cast away brusqely, her eyes cast fixedly on landscapemoving.

And then she is there again, smiling into his face, and visibly, physically, the visceral hurt lifts from him, and he is all talk and animation, roused from the lethargy of his rejection. And she not only smiles, but she listens; how she listens, shaking her head from side to side in agreement; oh what a smile of adoration, of respect even, for his words, his gifts. She is stoking his arm. They are both animate - as one. The scene is bursting, it's everywhere, the flash of her nose ring, his swaying gently into his mother's folds, green sari and bangles. She listens, looking ahead of her, absorbing his words with all that she has, and nodding her head. And then when he pauses, she turns towards him, screws up her nose and bursts forward again in laughter. She smiles and laughs with him, at his words, at the world outside reflected through his eyes. She laughs as she would with no adult, for it is the joy of a child, timeless but for the present, that it is his gift to her. Their hands are clasped. She looks out again, and he turns over her hand, and traces his finger in her palm. And now silence, and theprofusion of motherson love is still tangible in their distant stares onto landscape moving.