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Leela Soma: ‘Vermillion’ a poem for Autumn

‘Autumn’ in the broadest sense. It is how Indian widows had to undergo a ritual  in olden days to give up all their ornaments, even the red dot on their forehead wear only white. Life stopped if their husbands passed away.

Vermillion

Leaves fall down, blown away in the autumnal blitz

Gold strewn paths crunch and crackle underfoot

A single vermillion leaf like a tear drop stands proud

Defiant, blood red, life courses through its veins.

The widow looks askance; the blood red leaf sends a shiver

The memory of her wedding day, a bride adorned with jewels

The red sindoor in the parting of her hair, beginning a new life

Of wedded love, happiness, babies, the start of a journey.

The sudden death of her spouse, the ritual of her widowhood

An awakening of the day as the sindoor on her forehead is wiped away

The bindi, the dot, the point at which creation begins, negated forever

The jangle of broken glass as bangles are crushed and ornaments discarded.

The white sari envelopes her shroud-like, a colourless palette

A life of the walking dead bereft of feelings, love or emotion.

Vermillion turned to ash, grey, unassuming as the leaden skies.

The blood red leaf is trodden under the walker’s brisk steps.

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