Poetry | 'What My Neighbour Left Behind' By Aditya Tiwari And 'The Kettle' By Pallavi Singh

Aditya Tiwari wonders what the absence of someone you know feels like while Pallavi Singh finds her subject within her kitchen.

Of death and loss | Image for represntation *Getty*

Latest Issue

Last Page
The Story Of Sanjay Sahni: Migrant Worker-turned Independent Candidate

Contesting from Muzaffarpur in Bihar, sanjay Sahni is determined to make MNREGA work for his people.

Sanjay Sahni
Arts/Theatre
All In Asylum: Denzil Smith And Neil Bhoopalam Steal The Show

The Mumbai-based production of Tom Stoppard’s 'Every Good Boy Deserves Favour' is a winner

Alpana Chowdhury
Photo Essay
Pain In Grey: Reminders From The Pandemic

In a world where attention spans are short and news cycles are relentless, here are snapshots from India’s migrant crisis from 2020 that we must never forget

Neeraj Priyadarshi
Interview
Anubhav Sinha's 'Bheed' Is A Much-needed Reminder

In an interview to Outlook, filmmaker Anubhav Sinha talks about what pushed him to make the movie starring Rajkumar Rao

Haima Deshpande
Migrants in Kashmir
A Tale Of Resilience

In the recent past, the flow of migrant workers to Kashmir has taken a hit due to several factors, but it has not stopped them from coming to the Valley in search of work

Naseer Ganai

Aditya Tiwari

More from Aditya Tiwari

View All

Updated: 24 Oct 2021 4:41 pm

In this deeply thoughtful poem, Aditya Tiwari wonders what the absence of someone you know feels like. Sometimes it could feel like a song in the rain. At other times each memory they leave behind, could be squeezed, into nothing, is nothing, but dust.

What My Neighbour Left BehindÂ Â

The Day That She DiedÂ Â Â

The day that she died she left behindÂ Â

Four dead flowers in a vase, two fresh newspapers,Â Â

An old television, a refrigerator,Â Â

Pearl necklaces, a box of gold bangles,Â Â

Perfume bottles, a pack of Virginia slims,Â Â

Yesterdayâ€™s shadow, her smile,Â Â

The absence, like a song in the rain.Â Â

What she left behind was only enoughÂ Â

to fill - the empty rooms in herÂ Â

abandoned house.Â Â

If we were to go backÂ Â

to the way we used to beÂ Â

If everything weâ€™ve lostÂ Â

all our lives were to returnÂ Â

Our faces would be bright-litÂ Â

across a long river.Â Â

Each day, squeezedÂ Â

into a grain, a petal.Â Â

Each memory, into nothing,Â Â

is nothing, but dust.Â Â

But remember, that the mouthÂ Â

of the open river withoutÂ Â

the rain - is a blue prayer,Â Â

Breathless, on a strangerâ€™s face.Â Â

While many poets travel around the world to find the right words, to find their inspiration, Pallavi Singh finds her subject within her kitchen. She sees the world within her kettle â€˜where ambition and hunger mix/ like coffee beans in waterâ€™.Â Â

The KettleÂ

In my homeÂ

kitchen is a neglected spaceÂ

there are toasters and ovens and kettleÂ

microwave and steamer and the barbequeÂ

the slow cooker, the chopping board, the knivesÂ

but itâ€™s the kettle I use every day.Â

Fierce, contained,Â

primed to a boiling pointÂ

a scalding cauldron where ambition and hunger mixÂ

like coffee beans in water.Â

It makes my coffee the easy way,Â

not the way my mother taught meÂ

because that takes minutes whenÂ

my patience allows seconds.Â

For every drop I drink,Â

my impatience defines the course â€”Â

strong for the one who gifted me the kettleÂ

black for those who wanted me pureÂ

bitter for those who said I must know cooking.Â

A million coffees brewed every morningÂ

in angry, un-abiding, storming kettlesÂ

when the world rushes out to work,Â

and I return to the boiler within me.Â

(Aditya Tiwari is a poet and gay rights activist. His first book of poems April is Lush (2019) received international acclaim. Learn more about him on Instagram and Twitter at @aprilislush.)

(Pallavi Singh is a bilingual writer, journalist and poet based in the UK, and has been awarded a grant from the Irish Arts Council for her writing. She is currently training as a business historian at a UK university and is part of the core leadership of an ecommerce startup based in London. She tweets @econhistorienne.)Â