Gadaparai

As I heft the gadaparai
Onto my shoulder
With a spring in my step
To move a jackfruit sapling
I realise that the springiness
Is not because I have grown
Taller and stronger:
Rather, the gadaparai
Has lost a couple of inches
And become lighter
Over its twenty years of use

Where should we plant
The sapling
So that, full-grown
It doesn’t darken the house?

Twenty years ago
We kept planting
And said
We’ll tackle that problem
When we come to it

Today, we need to ensure
That the next-in-line
Do not inherit
A problem of our making

The sapling is planted:
The problems of the last twenty years
Have been surmounted, somehow
Those of the next twenty
Are in the future
Today, now
It is time for
A cup of coffee