What does a city taste like after a sudden retreat? Where does it go, disappearing unexpectedly?

They say its sounds will come back chirping at your windows in mornings when you lie idle in bed. On evening walks in the terrace, listening to Roshe, it comes out as tears, longing to hold you close. In dusty books and clothes, that have turned a year without you knowing, it hides carefully.

And then when you finally embrace it, the city behaves like an elusive young woman, longing to be with you, yet playfully putting its desire away. In small gallis and bylanes, in the pigeons that huddle together on traffic islands, in the butter chai that waziruddin ji serves in his small corner and the imam who lives in a cozy little archway in the old masjid without the roof, the city waits for you, yet does not show it.

How do you behave to a city that isn't yours yet is yours? Everytime you walk away , you feel like leaving a home that you are bound to come back to. A home thats always yours no matter wherever you go. But how do you bid goodbye to a city with the uncertainty of knowing that you may forever take leave?

Suruma Writes On...