Park Street

 

I don’t try to go to Park Street these days.

 

Like an old lover,

She reminds of golden days

From many years back:

Oxford and Family Book House,

Music World, Hobby House, Mocambo

Kati roles, Asiatic Society –

Big names aside, the series of vendors

Selling old coins, glossy magazines, pirated books;

Oh! What a delight it was

To walk on the boulevard of bounty

Without a rupee in the pocket

 

Strangely, today I can afford

That thick Coffee table book on Darjeeling,

Or that Chelo Kebab at Peter Cat,

But it feels like a ray of winter’s sun

 

Sometimes, I wonder

If that childhood dream is fulfilled

What happens to the dream?

Have I grown too big for my city?

Or has my mahanagar failed to keep in step?

 

The metro stops at Park Street,

The mosaic at the station stares back at me

And I wonder:

What if I couldn’t grow my dreams?

What if my city has been waiting

For that wisdom and autumn’s age

To let me see what the child couldn’t?

When did the way ever stop

It’s the traveller who gets wearied,

Sometimes, he rests under the shade of a gulmohur tree

On the Maidan

And stares at the Monument, and ahead

A shiny dazzling oasis of a street.

 

The train doors are about to close

I know an old lover still waits for me…

30th May, 2026