Goodbye, Anbu
It is no use to stretch out my hand to reach you tonight, Anbu, for the mist that separates us swallows up my arm. In vain I strain my ears to catch the accents of your voice, for the streets are busy with traffic and the wind distorts your name. 'Avu', 'Abu', 'Anva'—not you, not you, not you.
I have gone through many corridors into the innermost room of my house in search of your company. Reaching the sitting-room where you were last, reading beside the fire, I find your book laid down on the open pages, with your glasses beside it where you left them. I thought you must have grown tired of reading so much about the things that are today's news, teaching yourself the mechanisms of a life you were not intended to take part in. Why, you didn't even trouble to wind the clock your father gave you, or put your coat on when you went out into the garden. You must have been happy going out there by yourself for the first time without having to worry about the person watching over you.
There is so much air for you out there, Anbu, so much pure air to wash you and heal you! So much space for you to think in! So much light for you to read by! All kinds of birds, plants and insects for you to study, and flowers for you to name. That life you read about so lovingly in your books, the newspaper cuttings so carefully sent to your family in India—all these are given back to you for you to see and enjoy in their real colours. All is light and easy, now that you can walk alone out there in the stillness without the fear your heart may fail you with the strain.
Why do I have eyes if I cannot see you ?
What are my ears for if I cannot hear you?
You kept picking things up and putting them down
Not because they bored you as they bore us who have lived
with them too long
But because there were so many things to touch
Because there were so many things you wanted to bless
Because the things knew they belonged to your hands
And the newspapers wanted to tell you their problems
And the radio wanted to confide in you
And the clock implored you to still its unquiet beat.
There was little time given you to understand it all
And yet you have made me believe there is enough time
For everything that most matters to happen.
Whether it will go on happening without you
Whether anything really needs to happen any longer
Is a question you are no longer concerned to answer.
It is foolishness to ask.
Tomorrow will almost certainly arrive for most of us
Bringing with it a number of difficult problems
And possibly resolving one or two others. Only one thing is sure,
That there will be a light, if we can see it,
Shining on the fields and on the surface of the river,
And there will be water streaming continually from the source
Within us and without us and in the bright silence
Where you are walking fearlessly amongst a sparkling myriad of
animals and flowers.
Page(s) 284-5
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