Himansu S Mohapatra

He who was close to us From far off seemed to have come To our uncanny homeland, Only a searching for traces With a divining rod of words That quivered in his hand. Across…

If only he had read the signs, if only he had made that telephone call that night, things might have turned out differently. But he had failed to read the signs. He little suspected,…

Half Circle Full Circle Half Circle A Half Circle Full Circle Right-angle A He had first heard the magic formula for the magical drink in the home of his Asansol-based uncle several…

The other day at school their fifth class English Sir was giving a lesson on anger. He recited a verse before writing it down on the blackboard. Anger is an evil thing that spoils the…

Ever since the two baddies walked into our after-school hours-life a year or so ago, each humdrum school day was transformed. Late afternoons in the school playground were splashed with…

The commotion on the main arterial road that cuts the town of Baripada in two made us boys suspend our game in the empty patch of grassy field below. An extraordinary scene was unfolding…

Master Shakespeare said one was liable for one’s actions, not thoughts. What about intents, you might ask? For don’t they resemble actions in being fixated on a target? But the Master…

On a pleasant October morning in 1996 Subrat alighted from a bus on to the famous cobblestones of Oxford’s Gloucester Green bus station.  He had come for a three-month stint as a Visiting…

The news felt unreal as long as it came in an aerogramme. During the 15 to 20 days an aerogramme took to reach Norwich the news from home would go stale. It would of course be lapped up by…

Do(e) Re Me Fa(r) So La Ti.... Every time Subrat thought about the cult song from The Sound of Music, he stopped short at ‘So’. “How does ‘a needle pulling thread’ explain the musical…