I walked down a Tamil street
Drunken of the elements
Cold gushing gales inebriate
As it poured cats and dogs
On the west beyond the Ghats

Winds and clouds embraced
Each other in passion
In the rain-shadow where I trod
It drizzled as the sky bristled
Unshaven above looming dark
Pretentious of a downpour

Jutting onto the street
On my meandering path
A Devi temple stood
Painted gaudy green and red
Where the destitute waited
Extending their shrivelled palms
For sporadic drop of alms

And there sat this old woman
A bag of bones
Mass of wrinkles with grey hair
Like a puffy summer cloud
Cotton candy on a stick
Hung in the present without a past
Untouched by time gazing past

I sat beside her
Called her my mother
For she couldn’t be anything else
For a man out on the streets
Drunken with soulful forlornness
Sweetened by monsoon rains and winds

I fed her my morsels
Gave her the coins
She smiled in wrinkles
Just enough for a son
As I walked back
In drunken ataxia
Soaked in tears
To my temporary shelter
Of worldly impatience
And frowning grimace

The nest of the heart
Now has a hatching egg
Of hopeful awareness
That the Mother is around
Every which way one turned
To remind us of Her presence
Come home Mother in countless numbers
And bless us your wandering sons