Maa

Dipa Chetry

 Salutation to the scuffles, sacrifices and serenity
 You behold my marvelous Maa
 Seven decades, seven autumns gone by
 The hardships turning the willpower a rocky mountain.
 The moments of despair, poverty and pangs of hunger
 I ponder now my magical mother, 
 How and where from you endure the perseverance?
 Cardinal requisites are a far cry
 A valiant women with four children to nourish by.
 Farming quitoles of vegetables to earn and live by
 A teacher yet a hundred roles to play.
 Those handstitched frock and skirts with father’s knee torn pants
 You crafted dream and destiny for us.
 A mudhouse of two rooms, a frog hole and kerosene lamps 
 Where Maa, your days were least of meals 
  Substantial chunk of all fish, egg, meat was only for child
 The empty stomach after daylong blood and sweat at field.
 Great economist, agriculturalist, teacher, artisan, home maker
 Designer, environmentalist, dietician, doctor, and what not Maa.
 As you invariably say “poverty is the root cause of discovery”
 You unearthed ways to survive, thrive and surrender to God.
 A legacy, a reality for what life meant to be,
 Juggling amid far by cycling, with saree and sweat
 In debt, in asking how agonizing it may be.
 Poised, liberated, empathetic, optimistic, noble life
 Faced every forsaken demurrer with humility and fidelity.
 
 
 It’s a journey of decennium of “work is religion”
 Seeking purpose with indomitable spirit.
 The silent tears, heartaches and emptiness
 Felt what it meant to be with a hundred rupees to manage life.
 My Maa, a hope for what we are created by sovereign.
 Somehow, somewhere each moment you tried to raise us
 With no due penny, attire, shelter needed by.
 Walked hundreds of miles across to school, for meetings 
 Yet never tired, the mother's role in infinity.
 Grown delicious fruits at firm, all seasonal 
 Tiny land but hand of divine, 
 You bestow us those divine nectar.
  Unostentatious life with butterflies, birds, rain, ponds, grass and trees
 You weave mystery of what a tiny soul can do.
  Kissed our wounds, calmed frights, gave vigour and vitality 
 laughed with us, dried each tear ignoring own weeping soul.
 
 (Dedicated to my devine mother, Mrs. Hari Maya Devi, Beselimari, Nagaon, Assam)