Stories  
Folk Song at My Doorstep
by NS Murty

Into the room abetting the street, morning light filtered in like the ghal ghal of silver anklets. That sound resembled the breathing-in of the Seas and the breathing-out of the tides.

For the sound of that light, he woke up in that lonely room. He threw open his doors anxiously. Through the wafting layers of dust and mote, a folk-song disentangled itself, and eschewing rustling leaves, bustling feet, the mad rush of life on the street, filled the room like the overwhelming emotion that sometimes seizes man. It filled his mind's room.

The song then might have appeared to him like a green dew-washed field. That song …embedding words like panicles, poured out its substance into the beads of sweat embracing his feet…had left as mysteriously as it had come, but had nevertheless, left behind the angst of the gullet through which it had come out. The recollection of that song turned his mornings to afternoons, his afternoons to evenings, his evenings to nights, and his nights into guilt daylights...

~*~
That Telangana village girl was very fair. There was glow about her pupils. Her eyes were dark and deep-as-farm-well. She donned colorful Lambadi dress; white plastic bangles covered her hand from wrist to back arm; wore a blouse, red as red could be, and embroidered with small mirror-moons and fancy shapes with variegated threads.

Having been careless to properly tie up her blouse behind, and the shapes on her chest being too big to nestle into the cups of her blouse, and due to inadequate covering, the gibbous moons, the deep navel below, and the green petticoat studded with colorful mirrors, and a pair of unclean silver anklets adorning her feet were visible.

"Where do you come from?" He asked her.

There was a grocery store not far from his room. The girl visits that shop everyday while returning from work to make purchases. There was another lass, about ten years, beside her. The two go to work together and return from work together. If the older one was a date-flower, the younger one was a date-bud.

The village girl did not hear his words.

"It's you, maid! Answer him," the Muslim shopkeeper goaded her.

Then she looked at him. And knit her mascara eyes enquiringly.

"Where do you come from?" He repeated his question.
"Palamuru," she answered looking at the wares in her lap. What she was reminded of, she asked,
"Why? Do you have any work for me?" looking at him now.
"No." He replied rather coolly.

With a careless look of 'then why do you make enquiries?' at his demeanour, might have taken him for a mischief monger or an idle fellow, she minced words within as if talking to her mate. Counting the change she drew out from her navel, she paid up and briskly walked ahead with her mate.

Looking in the direction they left, he asked the shopkeeper,

"Where do they live?"
"Nagamayakunta. In the Nayathanda."
"What do they sing Hyderabadi songs or Telangana?"

The shopkeeper was perplexed.

"Speak about Khavvalis, I can answer. But don't ask me about those Telugu songs, Sahib."

~*~

That evening – When dust and mote were melting into the receding light – He was taking tea in an Irani hotel at a four roads junction very close and to the left of his room. At that moment, the hotel was as chaotic as Nampally railway station. As if somebody was setting her aside, light was quickly receding from the sky. A cool breeze carrying the smell of rain, and very soon, a small drizzle followed.
He looked towards the door beside the cash counter. He did not notice when that village girl had entered. Her mate was by her. They were sitting on their feet. The boy served them two teas and she was sipping the tea leisurely. She might have just returned from work then. Though she seemed to have had a face wash, the dirt did not clear fully.

Then,

Just then, the village girl found her voice. The voice was not suave, but song was.

Angst mingled with the smoothness. Where did the angst originate from!

– Continued

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