The Eyes and the Story....

My friend Tiku Tikuli, is a versatile blogger and an amazing published poet, and she posted on FB, these photographs of coconuts in various stages.

There is a reason we  look to the "eyes" of the coconuts.  Sometimes they look like 3 eyes, and one of the eyes is supposed to be soft and pierceable, so you can let the coconut water flow, like tears.

 Sometimes , it looks like a face from a century ago, where the tears are all dried out, and all that remains is a helpless suffering , but a stoic face, getting ready to face the world.

Brings back vignettes of what one heard of lives of widows , hundred years ago...

Written in Marathi, and then a translation of sorts  into English....

कोकणातील पावसाळ्यात कुणा एका नारळी पोफळीच्या बागेतल्या एका उंच झोका घेणार्या नारळाला आपल्या आजीनी सांगितलेली शंभर वर्षा पूर्वीची गोष्ट आठवते … एक प्रथम-पुरुष-अनेकवचनी सनातनी संतप्त शेंडी, सर्वत्र फिरणारी करडी नझर , झेलले जाणारे  औपचारिक शब्द , आणि कुणा एका सुनेवर आणि तिच्या सौभाग्यावर कोसळलेले आकाश आठवणींचे दागिने मनात जपत आलंकृत आयुष्याचा भीषण शेवट , एका अंधार्या खोलीत भेदरलेल्या अवस्थेतेत वस्तर्याच्या हालचालीत झालेला केश्सम्भ्हाराचा सत्यनाश , आणि बिथरलेल्या घाबरलेल्या लाल आल्व्णात गुडाळून सुरु झालेले बिनप्रकाशी आयुष …. तो बागेतला नारळ आपल्या शहाळ्याला आणिकच जवळ घेतो, आणि म्हणतो, "शेंड्या नको आणि डोळे नको, तू अशीच हिरवी रहा आणि समुद्राकाठी लहान मुलां मध्ये आपले माधुर्य वाटत रहा … "

Wild windy Kokan Monsoons, and a tall Coconut Palm leaning into the wind, suddenly recalls a story told by its grandma a hundred years ago.... A conservative upper class raging tempered proud owner of a "shendi"' given to declarations in the royal "We", keeping a stiff eye on the proceedings and a daughter-in-law, now husband less in shocked and wordless fear. Beautiful memory jewels safely locked in her mind, she walks to her mental destruction in a dark room, where a shiny heartless razor turns into nothing the only thing she once called her own, her jet black braided and piled up hair, a she gets wrapped in a red lifeless saree, and proceeds, to cover her head frightened to bits, the beginnings of a dark life. The tall Coconut Palm clutches together safely the bunch of green coconuts hanging on, and says , "Not for you the shendis, the eyes, and a death in life. Yours is to simply spread your nectar amidst small kids who come to the beach ....."