

From the balcony
It must have been the same view that held the Muthuvan gaze two centuries ago. The tree line, the undulating hills and the Western Ghats segued into…

A tribal woman, heavily pregnant, leaned against the iron gate sliding it open and walked into the health centre. Her gait was strained as she had broken water. Too weak…

The last time I came to Jharkhand was when 'selfie' was, forget the culture it is today, nowhere in the lexicon-horizon even. It was seven years ago to make a…

There was more to it, and she was trying to get it talked out. After a time, she quit trying. Why don’t you dance?, Raymond Carver.
For most part of the…

They are all Meeras
Fairground
Throbbing notes twanged out from a three-string kamaicha. Wood-ringed fingers tapped on a ghara. A sadhu with the longest dreadlocks sat like the sachem he was surrounded…

It’s like your first dinner with a date – you take a while to gather gusto. Except for the food on the way you know little else. You look around…

There is not much difference when you look at Bahraich from half a kilometre in the sky and from street level. It is a tumbleweed cluster of shanty dwellings, lean-to…

Heritage plays a temporal trick – it can make history feel within reach. I walked up the pathway leading to Lahori Gate, entrance to Red Fort, where friends waited. On…

Butterfly, butterfly
Fly in the sky
Butterfly, butterfly
Flies so high
Butterfly, butterfly
Lands on my thigh
Butterfly, butterfly
Motionlessly lies
Butterfly, butterfly
Gracefully dies
(Full transcript of poem ‘Butterfly, butterfly’ by Adryan Bates.)
Peter Smetacek
For a life that rarely…