Evenings

Streetlamps glower on at the darting birds. I always skip the time they are turned on. They droopily watch the turn of events, gazing at their feet lost in whizzing traffic. Evenings slowly dim around them like a deep inky sigh.

Green

Syrupy eucalyptus oil. It sat sulking in a tiny glass bottle marked by a label with Mandarin script. It had traveled all the way from China to the wooden table in the old house, thronged by other ointments, phone books and Quality Street tins with sewing tools. It was a stark green. Like the mouth-watering thought of raw mangoes.The potion found it's release every night when it was rubbed onto grandmother's aching knees. After she dozes off, it would drift out and wander around brutishly. So pungently stubborn, as if to say that this is how green smells like.
She had forgotten to cork it once. The gluey oil had silently left till it was nothing but a thin green scented line. The scent was now tainted with other things that had drifted in and taken refuge. There were choking fumes of the mosquito coil, the smell of the sweetmeats she stealthily ate, the odour of the musty wooden beams, the scent of voices which reached late and the thoughts which were shooed away among many others. When I found it and sniffed what remained, it stung and watered my eyes.

Catnap

You sleep, unfettered by the frail evening shadows that slowly settle on you. The shapes of leaves, the indecisive light of passing clouds. Lazily moving along with the rise and fall of your breath. Be still. Sleep calm. Lest they wake up and scamper away when you stir.