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Amma
Tabish Khair
About Tabish Khair
Tabish Khair (born 1966) is a poet, novelist and essayist. His significant poetry collections include Where Parallel Limes Meet (2000) and Man of Glass (2010). Born and educated in the state of Bihar, he worked in Gaya and New Delhi as a reporter with The Times of India, and later moved to Copenhagen where he did his PhD. He lives in Aarhus, Denmark.
Down the stairs of this house where plaster flakes and falls,
Through the intimate emptiness of its rooms and hall,
I hear your slow footsteps, grandmother, echo or pause.
As they used to through long summer afternoons spent within
The waterd-down four walls of khus and fragile drinks
Of ice, mango or known, the circle of water-melon crescents,
Slowly you shuffle examining each new tear in the curtains
Which will have to be mended when the first monsoon rain
Provides a respite from sun, curtails the need for shade.
Slowly on arthritic joints you move from room to room
Marking the damage of the years, evaluating how soon
The past will collapse or how long the present last.
You never need glasses to mark the contours of your house
Though you can't see grandsons at a distance, once wore a blouse
Inside out. Nothing has changed, grandmother, no, not yet.
Though your collected steps never turn the corner into you
In a starched and white sari, the fragrance of soap around you.
And all the curtains have long been taken down.
Available Answers
- 1.
After reading stanzas 1 and 2, do you think the poet is talking about the present, past or future? Give reasons for your answer.
- 2.
Explain these lines:
"As they used to through long summer afternoons spent within
The waterd-down four walls of khus and fragile drinks
Of ice, mango or lemon, the circle of water-melon crescents." - 3.
Whose condition is the poet talking about in the fourth stanza: the condition of the house, or amma, or both? Give reasons for your answer.
- 4.
After reading the last two stanzas, do you feel that Amma is still alive? Why? Why not? Quote the words or lines from the oem that point to your answer.
- 5.
What kind of mood is projected through this poem. What does it say about the probable state of mind the poet was in when he wrote 'Amma'?
- 6.
"You never need glasses to mark the contours of your house
Though you can't see grandsons at a distance, once wore a blouse
Inside out. Nothing has changed, grandmother, no, not yet."- Earlier in the poem, what tells us that the poet is taking in time and recreating a scene?
- Describe the scene immediately after this extract.
- Why does the poet say that the curtains have long been taken down? Yet he says that her perfume from the soap she uses lingers on? Is this a contradiction? Elaborate.
5 more answer(s) available.