Salt

 

Gasping for breath, I stopped my trek

I had come to the bugyal’s end.

Emptiness, except for the mountain winds.

Sometimes, this kind of silence is a godsend

 

‘Babu, are you headed to the village below?’

Silence interrupted, I found a boy

Draped in yak’s wool and antiquity

There he stood, hesitant, coy

 

I nodded, ‘What do you want?’

‘Can you deliver my salt to Ramji’s store?

The only grocer in the village below,

For I cannot linger here, not any more’

 

He sensed my doubt, the lack of trust

Visible in all us citymen’s face,

‘It has begun to snow, the Pass will be blocked

I must return before winter’s days.’

 

‘And my yak is hurt,’ he sadly spoke

‘I don’t think he can make this journey back,’

I felt his sorrow in melancholy grey

Trapped in our worlds of white and black

 

‘Where is your salt? Have you been paid?’

I asked as descended, a shower of ice

‘Seven gunny bags in the hills above,

I came this far for a bag of rice.’

 

He told me further of his home beyond,

In the village of Shalang I had never heard,

A journey he made every year

Salt for rice, sometimes butter and curd

 

‘But I don’t have your rice, do you take cash?’

He shook his head, knowing not what to do,

I searched my rucksack – at the end of a trek

I had those long packets of Maggi few

 

He had never seen noodles, the village lad

I had to tell him they were edible, boiled to eat

Doing a salesman’s job – soupy, filling

The noodles were healthy and made of wheat

 

Were they worth more than a bag of rice?

But he saw the packets in yellow and red,

And told himself it was a better deal

He would take them all for the rice instead

 

The seven bags - he pointed again to the hill above,

Kept in a Shiva temple in an emerald glade,

Would Ramji come? Would I collect my money?

I asked him to worry not of my part of the trade

 

I was already pitying deep within

The travails this lad had to make each year,

All for a bag of rice, he walked

From God knows where, with his salt and fear

Ahead of my trek, and at its end,

My guides with mules would soon be here,

I would ask them, well, for a side trip up,

For salt, Shiva and little prayer

 

The boy disappeared in the folds of the hills

Did he swindle me, I thought for a while,

But I was tired of noodles, and my trek would end

Today, after just a few more miles

 

Prason, my guide, came not very late

As I told him of the bags to pick,

But he stared at me, as I told my tale –

Was I deceived? Was it all a trick?

 

‘Ramji died decades ago,’ Prason replied

‘He died when I was very young!’

I decided I had to trek to the hill above

I couldn’t leave this song unsung

 

At the top of the hill, no temple was found

But Prason pointed to ruins not far

Bricks and mortar, and a trident red

Reaching to the skies, the sun and the stars

 

A part of the roof had not yet caved,

A few more objects were scattered inside,

Wait, what were those? Tattered gunny bags scattered all

Could it be true, that the boy hadn’t lied?

 

‘Babu,’ Prason pointed to nearby rocks

Strewn around what could be a cairn,

Yak bones,a skull, and a rock that was carved,

For the best of friends that could come to men

 

And wait, something more beneath the rock,

Rose up from this burial of the past?

A discoloured packet in yellow and red,

A tribute of noodles in 2 minutes fast….

________________________

6^th April, 2025