No Step Between Us

Today,
on his sixtieth birthday,
my brother from India
called me
to exchange
pleasantries.
 
During the conversation
he said
that while Mummy ji
was a mother to all of us,
with me, she was also
like a friend.
 
This made me
introspect.
 
~*~
 
Society called her
my stepmother.
 
Perhaps relationships
need such words
to explain themselves.
 
Love does not.
 
She had
five children
of her own—
 
two daughters,
three sons—

yet somewhere
within that little home,
there was room
for two more.
 
Me and my younger sister.
 
And somehow,
her children too
never learned
the arithmetic
of mine and yours.

They simply
loved us then,

and after
more than
half a century,

they still do.

Perhaps blood
makes us relatives;
but something
far more mysterious
makes us family.

There was a step
in the name—

never
between us.

Image courtesy: rajGuru Notes