before the rains, 11

it was a pleasant evening.

the sun is gone, the sky is dark, half, and stray dogs are chasing squirrels in the lawns.

when we were young, he says, when we were young, she and i would wake all night during the rains. i’d tell her ghost stories and we’d push buckets into corners where water leaked down from the roof.

she loved the sound of thunder. loves, i mean.

when you see her, tell her
a white bird followed you. tell her it’s still on her terrace. that it won’t go. that
it means she’ll travel far: tunisia, istanbul...

she loves to travel far.

she won’t believe all of it, but she might just believe one half.

besides, it might make her laugh
again

before the rains, 10

and the poor man must have made up his lines for her, sitting there.
must have thought she’s waiting, that she’s kept an exact count of days in a diary, or on the bathroom wall. or wherever girls keep count.
i hope i never age like him. my heart’s just a pump man; I hope it never catch his pains,
and never acts funny before the rains.

before the rains, 9

what an evening that was!
if i shut my eyes, i can play it right back again.
this man’s sing-song, his happy, fun, sad, wrong, ramble, and
swoosh the wind over the park in waves, you know, very soft, and sounds of birds doing it in the bushes, in the jasmine bushes –

walking through that corner always smelled like walking through women in a night party.

and yes, a crow

on the head of a ten feet cactus, frowning and cocking his head at

me. cloud

before the rains, 8

you’ll go riding with the winds and the truckers,

and girls waiting for boys on the kerb and women waiting for husbands at windows will look up at the sky

they’ll pretend they’re not trying to catch your eye.

it’s that season.

all men go home in this season.

and i go walking in the park, many circles

before the rains, 7

and after that day, he never called me by my name. it was always hi cloud, you look tired cloud, it’s hot cloud – need a bit of you cloud. and much later, on a december evening, he returned a thousand rupees he’d borrowed. the money was in a white envelope with a

thanks cloud.

that day in the park, i am surprised though.

cloud, he says, can u carry a message for me? not very far, though it’s far for me.

i know where she must be. in another busy street, another cramped flat. same old place, but a different corner

of delhi

before the rains, 6

we only met at the park, you know, weekday mornings, weekend afternoons, or sometimes at shambhu’s shack, getting our stock of late night cigarette’s. me, two packs of charms and he, a pack of benson and hedges. lights.
i am sure he didn’t read me right. because a while after calling me good boy, he leans to my side of the bench and says

i want you to tell her for me.

even if you don’t actually tell her. i want you to.

better you, on your royal enfield, beautiful, jobless, wild, young, every girl’s dream, and reckless like

a cloud who loses his way

than someone like me who does not