A Floral Emblem

1

Flowers in hand, he comes calling when night descends. I see that he's smiling. So I too smile back. Asks how I'm doing. And when I ask him his name he replies 'Foolish'. Later I come to know that he loves flowers, that his name derives not from the English 'fool', but from the Bangla 'phul ' (flower). He's come to carry out some duty, enquires how many times I've done it, and when I reply 'not once', suddenly turns grave and orders me, 'Go on, get in! At once!' And the moment I enter the toilet he starts playing a flute.

2

A middle-aged gentleman shows up with flowers.
'What gives?' I say. 'Why the flowers?'
'I like you very much,' he replies. 'Please don't refuse them.'
I take the flowers.
'Don't you have a wife and children?' I ask.
'Wife, yes; children, no. These are from my own garden.'
'So I take it you love flowers?'
'Well, not exactly. I brought them because I like you so much.'
'Where do you live?'
'Round the corner. My wife's twenty-six.'
'Why twenty-six?'
'Don't know.'
'All right, then, do bring her over.' He waves his hand as he leaves.
The next day he appears with his wife. Now she has flowers in her hand.
'You see, I love flowers', she informs me.
'Right! Well! And you are...?'
'I am Zuleikha.'
She pronounces her name as if an entire 'y' and a 'sh' had encroached into the initial 'z'.
'Zshyleikha,' I exclaim, 'the sultan's daughter.'
She heaves her bosom and laughs ('haha'), a rippling undulation that causes her sari end to fall off her breasts onto her lap.
'How long have you two been married?'
She stops laughing. 'Six years.'
'No issue?'
'He's got problems.' She looks away from me, and then down fiercely into the flowers in her hand.
'I thought that wasn't a problem anymore these days.'
Her husband smiles sweetly at me. 'The very reason we came to you', he says.

Predictably enough, the lights go out. A power failure! I light a candle and ask her, 'Your measurements?' I look deep into her eyes.

She starts to unwrap her sari.
'Could you please hold her down?' I ask the husband. 'I can't function normally anymore.'
He obeys. She spits out "Son of a bitch!'
At whom, I can't tell.

3

I sow jute seedlings in the fields; why I do so, I don't know. There never was any need to know such things. My father, his father, his father before him, all of them trudged on similarly, daily, uncomprehendingly.

So when the jute pushes upwards, I do not know why plants grow tall. And when I dip them in the waters of the canal nearby and my mind turns over in sorrow, I do not know the reason and think it is the Chaitra breeze.

Later, I separate jute fibers and lay them out in the sun to dry. Then I go looking for Lailee to help me weave ropes. I find her fishing by the canal.

'Lailee, so much jute all around us, and all you can do is fish?'
'Sounds like you're in a romantic mood today, Mama.'
'These jute plants growing tall, can you tell why?'

She says she does, then leans to whisper words into my ears that would have turned my forefather's brains, let alone mine, to mush.

"Let's go now, Lailee, you help me weave some ropes.'
We enter a jute field.
'So, Mama,' Lailee says, 'you plan on inserting some sex in this story too?'
'No, this is something quite different.'

And Lailee, what she does is fling off her clothes and emerge cleanly from them. Then we go home.

Oh Mama, I think, you've robbed of everything, robbed me clean of words. I'll just get some ropes from the storeroom and hang them like drying jute fibers from the trees, really, that's what I do...

The Advent of the Writer

Afterwards what I do is I hand a couple of flowers not in the story over to the girl. The girl, Lailee, who is sharp, says, 'This trick you keep on playing!'

'So what are you going to do now?'
'What do you mean? You think I am a dumb ass? Come here, have a look.'
...with that she, Lailee, bares her lonely belly--with the American family planning poster on it--and we kiss.

4

Khosru bhai introduces her to me, saying, 'Do you know her, Raisu? A well-known 'feline-ist' writer.'

I join my palms before her and plead ignorance, 'You have to excuse me, but no. I live on the wrong side of the tracks. Though it seems like I have seen you somewhere.' Which, the last line, is just pure crap. Never seen her before.

'Might I ask your name?'

'C. Konka.'

'I see. Great name. I've heard of it.' I place a stick of tuberose in her hands. She folds it seven-eight times and slides it into her pocket.

'Flowers won't get you any anywhere, mister', she says. 'Humans can't eat them.''True. Plus it's unhygienic to eat flowers.'

I will meet her again three years later. On a ferry launch. She'll be headed for Barisal.

'Barisal's a very beautiful place,' she will remark.
I will say yes.
She will laugh. 'I want to talk to you about your stories.'
'Go ahead.'
'Well, they are lifeless. Bone-dry stories. Perhaps it's better not to write at all.'
'I can't believe you're saying this.'
'Well, think. A story's one thing, a con job quite another. You've got to get close to life, close to the human reality.'
'But I am! I love all mankind, especially womankind.'
'That's the problem with you male writers. "Womankind" indeed! Is that how you view women, as commodities?'
'Yes, I do. Though as very precious commodities.'

She will fly into a rage then. Mane erect, stamping her feet against the floorboards, she will throw her head back and roar.

Which (I don't know) may be the reason why our launch will sink in the end.

Bratya Raisu is a poet and short story writer.