Parvathi watched the grapes in her hand fall to the ground. She mistakenly imagined them flutter around from too much freedom, like the bloated purple cockroaches bursting out of furniture sunning in the courtyard on a hot day. Instead, they lay there, oozing dispiritedly on the warm stone wishing they could just die. One intrepid grape had flown into the flowers that grew in the solitary quadrilateral of earth where someone had contrived to remove a concrete tile. She wondered if the bombardment had forever changed the life of a small ant population or if it had assailed the spot where she had laid a bee to rest or if the noble flight was resolved in some dog kakka.
The cow behind the red gate looked at her, its liquid brown eyes asking her what it was doing there on a sunday afternoon. Only plastic bags filled with old upma and dead rats blossomed out of the yellow dirt there. She wondered idly what she might accomplish if she lobbed a grape or two at it. Then she wondered where the path outside that gate crawled to. “What is behind the jackfruit tree, cow?” she asked. The cow stared back at her, unmoved. Perhaps it didn’t speak English. Perhaps it was offended that she hadn’t addressed it in proper Kannada. It walked away, presenting its behind, tail swinging at flies dancing around the caked dung.
The cow behind the red gate looked at her, its liquid brown eyes asking her what it was doing there on a sunday afternoon. Only plastic bags filled with old upma and dead rats blossomed out of the yellow dirt there. She wondered idly what she might accomplish if she lobbed a grape or two at it. Then she wondered where the path outside that gate crawled to. “What is behind the jackfruit tree, cow?” she asked. The cow stared back at her, unmoved. Perhaps it didn’t speak English. Perhaps it was offended that she hadn’t addressed it in proper Kannada. It walked away, presenting its behind, tail swinging at flies dancing around the caked dung.
