CREATIVE NONFICTION
Amazing Grace
In response to Dancing Elephants prompt 33 of 52
When we were young, our parents used to take my sibling and me, to visit temples in out-of-the-way places in Kerala. They were usually far from the place we were living in, and we stayed the night in a lodge.
Lodges, back then, were rooms let out for the night, to families, or people travelling on their own. The rooms were basic, and so were the amenities. All of them had simple fare served at meal times, to travellers who were neither fussy nor finicky.
The temples were shrines, not the magnificent, rich establishments of today. The first pooja began at 5 am, and the last ended at 6 pm. There was one three-layered stone lamp, blackened with age and sesame-seed oil, in front of the small enclosure of the main deity.
The worshippers, apart from the odd traveller, were usually villagers who began and ended their days, all days, every day, with prayer. The outer structure of the temple was made entirely of stone and was centuries old.
Hoary old trees stood around the temple, whispering secrets to each other, in soft sussuration. Sleepy cockerels crowed in the morning, and dew hung heavy on the grass.
I used to creep out of the room early in the morning, long before sunrise, and peep out at the beginning of dawn, on the horizon. The earth was waking up and there were strange little mounds in the earth, soil that the earthworms had dug up. Rich loamy soil smells fragrant and there is a kind of steam that rises from it that caused my brain to reel, and my senses to surrender. I was seven, I think.
Do you know that one can taste mud, without actually tasting it, just like one can taste blood, or iron, when one eats beetroot, bitter gourd, or red amaranth?
To this day, those days return to me in a series of sharp, intense, concentrated images, sights, sounds, tastes, textures and colours. I don’t remember which God I prayed to, but I know I was blessed in a way, with a richness that informs my life, and infuses my days with unadulterated joy.
I was happy.
ⓒ 2023 Suma Narayan. All Rights Reserved.
Shoutout to the sharp, evocative images in this beautiful poem by Jenine "Jeni" Baines:
Raindrops in Puddles
Stowed in our souls — memories that no longer hurt but solely instruct
medium.com
Shoutout, too, to pockett dessert, a writer I admire for her ability to evoke emotions with no more than one, solitary word:
Shoutout to Christine Morris Ph.D., for this entrancingly honest story:
