The Titiya Bird Poem by Jagannath rao Adukuri

When we were wee-boys, in knickers,
We threw pebbles at the mango tree for fruits
Later, demons came into our lives
In the morning, when the white birds in the sky
Whizzed past the tall palm trees behind our house
We called them out shaking our fingers at them
Thinking that little pieces of their milk-whiteness
Will somehow enter our pink fingernails
We tried catching the water snake by its tail
It swished the tail and mock-bit you
Making you think that you would soon be dead
The tamarind tree hosted hundreds of suicide-ghosts
At night little flickering flames floated in the air
From out of the phosphorous bones of the dead
Then a little bird flew over us, in our own sky,
With its mournful cry which said titiya
Our dear cousin looked up, lying sprawled
On the bamboo stretcher, with eyeballs screwed up
The whites of his eyes were inexplicably opaque
Nobody told us why he could not come with us
To hurl flat-stones on still water surfaces
To make them frog-jump three times over.