Misty afternoon cooled by capricious breezes
on a rooftop terrace, I watch bicycle rickshaws
pedestrians dogs and and occassional car
negotiate the monsoon rivulets running
the narrow, twisting roads of 500 year-old Howrah.
To the south, steel undulations of second bridge
span the famous Ganga and show the road back
to Kolkata. But I am out of the city today
visiting the extended Basu family--
mother-in-law, husband, daughter, neice,
nephews, dalmation, brother-in-laws, sister-in-law
(and mother by telephone) -- a wealth of relations
each warmly extending Nomoskar.
Today is Viswakarma Puga-- celebrating technology.
All taxis, rickshaws, locomotives, city buses, bicycles
garlanded with marigolds
banana plants tied to fenders
honk in jubuliation.
It is appropriate that the telephone
technician did not arrive this morning as scheduled
and perhaps significant
that my computer keyboard
is slowly dying letter by letter.
Now on the roof top after a sumptuous Bengali meal
carefully prepared by Maitreye
the nephew has launched
his first kite. Quickly it climbs the sky
thin-paper skin stretched over bamboo bones.
Soon three-- ten-- thirty seven-- kites
swoop into the rain-cleaned air
white black purple and yellow
one with a red heart
one with a crescent moon-
rush to engage one with another
in quick ariel pursuit of skillful dives and arching swoops
and sudden reversals until snap
string severed, one kite limps to earth or tree branch.
One rupee per kite
45 kites for a dollar.
This is the best technology
hand sky color wind
fused in lovely dance
and partners joined by such a slender thread.
