Nostalgia : My home

I left my native home and village in 1963. I was 17.

It was my parents’ home. 

A middle-class-farmer’s house, in  Southern Kerala.

Never again I stayed there for more than a month at a stretch.

Yet the image of this home 

with leaky tile roof, wooden creaky attic,  

a cattle shed and hay stacks,

remained as that of my home.

The place that I grew up and had siblings,

grandparents and parents 

and

played with early friends around the yards,

With all the uncomfortably hot and dark interiors,

rice and grains in all nooks, the dust, high ceilings, 

the cattle ‘moos’ and goaty 'bahs'

the sweaty nights of summer,

the grandma-instilled fear 
to open windows at night 

and love of darkness.

All etched a foggy fond memory to call it  my home

until the last of my parents , my father, died in 2008.

Until then I used to return to my home regularly;

I do go there often now, but I do not ‘return’ home.

The image of my home.     It evaporated slowly.

..............................................................

My children grew up in the residence I built,

Where I stay now, in Mysore

They come once a while for a few days; new nomads.

Yet I know,  this is their home.  

And me, am I homeless?