Calcutta / Instagram

A few photos which I took in Calcutta / Kolkata in October:

The Taj Bengal hotel

breakfast (the most attractive part, at least)

dawn, over Calcutta's big sky

a morning walk behind the hotel (red rooftop in the distance), crossing a bridge over Tolley's Nullah

Bhowanipore War Cemetery

perhaps this does not mark a warrior's grave, but it touched me

A side street in Bhowanipore

a lively morning market in the narrow streets across from the War Cemetery. A butcher.

 a temporary vegetable market

freshwater fish

 a water tower, I suppose. what colours and shapes!

 Durga puja. The demon victim and the lion vehicle are looking equally apprehensively at the goddess, who is not overly concerned about where her spear-point is going.

 puja implements in a small pandal, waiting for the priest

The City of Contradictions

Going through old things I'd written, getting ready for a visit to Kolkata, I found this forgotten scrap:

The City of Contradictions

The girl walks on her knees.
Her feet end at the ankles:
she was caught in a contradiction.

People live inside the window
which is inches from your window.

From the corner of your eye
a wedding band
  marching
    away
      from
         you

The rickshaw-puller clangs his
dull bell, waiting to drag you
to the innermost chamber.

Jasmine at the burning ghat.
Friend, whose ashes are these? 

Instagram

Some instagram photos, taken in the last couple of months:

frangipani

 a water lorry's hubcap

 the door of a small, portable shrine

 a rice flour kolam pattern

 dinner at On the Rocks

 the swimming pool at Radisson Temple Bay

wild mushrooms grow among tree roots after the rain

High Dive

I took a high dive from a pair of grass-green platform shoes once in Boston Garden, in the Spring. The weather was wonderful, sunny and warm. I wore a long dress in a floral print, which I had sewn myself. I felt as stylish and beaufitul as I ever could, which seemed like a LOT. An old man passed me and said, "You look like the spirit of Spring." And I did!

Just-like-that I toppled from my pedestals, thunderstruck, onto my knees on the pathway. A man approached with a look of sympathy and said, "Need any help?"

I smiled a gallant smile, gathered myself, and walked home barefooted, swinging my green shoes from one hand.

100 Portraits / 4: Maharaj

Maharaj Kathak. Stencil and collage.

Three Men With Four Legs