Kumu: Meye bela

The house in Bogura did not shout its presence. It stood quietly, as more than shelter, more than walls and roof. With some walls made of clay, the house was warm and porous, absorbing many things and remembering every monsoon. Others were tin–thin and loud–echoing every footstep, every childhood rush towards something or away from it. The walls also held stories, chatter, and smells. The memory of lullabies sung not only at night but in broad daylight; when the sun slid in through unopened windows and played kutkut on the floor. The hiss of oil lamps lit when the day gave up too soon. Arguments too soft to be called fights, too familiar to be remembered. Words that fluttered and died before they could bruise.

The cement floors stayed cool even on the hottest days, and the verandahs wrapped around the house. The thatched roof was patched just often enough to show care, sagging just enough to show comfort. They did not measure wealth in a well-kept thatched roof or freshly plastered walls, but in new books stacked carefully at the bedside and in small blackboards dusted white with sums and spelling. Wealth was a report card inked with numbers above ninety. Wealth was a glass of hot milk pressed into drowsy hands at sunrise or a spoonful of ghee dissolved into steamed rice–for brain food.

And above all, wealth was children, boys and girls alike, and their widening gaze beyond the courtyard, beyond the mulberry rows and the low clay walls, imagining a world that did not end where the village path did. Wealth was the understanding and the steady support to send them outward–to rise, to learn, to unfold into their own becoming. Because space on this earth is never simply granted. It must be claimed, with ink on fingers, with books held close to the chest, with the stubborn insistence on becoming.

So, if the house looked modest, it was only because its true architecture stood elsewhere, rising quietly in classrooms and libraries, in sharpened pencils and open books, in the invisible scaffolding of becoming that no visitor could see but that held everything up.

From its front verandah, the world spilled open into a sea of green, miles upon miles of mulberry trees stretching toward the horizon like a quiet promise. In winter, they stood stripped and skeletal, their branches brittle, their silence deep. But by spring, they softened. The same mulberries unfurled, their leaves tender as breath, trembling in the hush before dawn. These were not trees for shade or show. They were the living spine of the household’s survival, leaf by leaf feeding the silkworms that spun gold in silence.

Nani and Nana shared the central room of the house, just off the long, shaded verandah. It always smelled faintly of betel leaf and mustard oil–sharp, familiar, lingering in the air like memory. At the far end of the front verandah, in a small, dim room, Nani’s mother lay bedridden, quietly counting her days. She had once followed a man across rivers and then along rail tracks. When he died, she unpacked her sadness and came to her younger daughter, my nani, to stay. Not quite a guest. Not quite the mistress of the house. Just there, loved but always forgotten. That room held the scent of talcum powder and silence. Her eyes, even when closed, seemed to see everything.

There were three rooms at the back of the house, stitched together by a long, quiet verandah where shadows lingered and time staggered, especially in the late afternoon. The breeze came through the smell of guava skins, kamini blossoms, and mulberry dust, slipping between the slats. The largest of the rooms held the tender democracy of five small lives. There were rules, but broken as needed, and also rhythms–sometimes soft, sometimes wild.Kumu, at 10, already carried the seriousness of someone older, her hair parted with precision, her manner quietly exacting. Tultul, eight, was a tempest in a frock, her voice sharp as shattered glass, beautiful, reckless, and impossible to ignore. Bacchu, six, slept with fists tight and secrets tighter, always plotting the next bit of mischief he’d deny with a grin. And Faruk, four and a half if asked, five if not, wore his bewilderment like a second skin. He cried in installments, pausing mid-sob to follow the trail of an ant or wonder aloud why spoons shine. A spoon’s curve with sugar could derail his misery. A beetle’s shimmer restored his peace.

“Kumu” is a living memoir of Selina Hossain’s early life, unfolding through carefully chosen themes and reimagined by her daughter, Lazeena Muna. This is an excerpt; read the full piece on The Daily Star and Star Books and Literature’s websites.

Lazeena Muna writes occasionally, weaving together gender and politics, often exploring memory, movement, and meaning across personal and public landscapes.