Wednesday, August 29, 2007

Visiting Grandma

I went to my grandmother's grave on my way to the gym today, braving the torrential evening downpour and after-work traffic. It's been quite some time since anyone had visited,judging from the weeds and tiny shrubs that have carpeted grandma's grave. Visiting grandma has always been on my list of things to do, but I guess sometimes we allow ourselves to get caught up with work and issues in life that something as simple as paying someone dear to us a visit is put off until we are consumed by guilt and start to scramble to our knees to get the job done for a clear conscience. The reason I went to grandma's grave had little to do with getting my conscience clear but I was also in search of solitude and solace which, in my books, are synonymous with cemeteries (Whoever said I am normal?!). Plus, grandma was a great listener. I reckon she still is..Besides, I didn't want to let myself repeat the same mistake as I did when she was still alive by not visiting her often enough.
It's also been quite some time that I'd written or blogged. I've not lost my penchant for writing, it's just that I think I wasn't in touch much with my emotions and thoughts in between work, minding after people (by people I really mean my students, friends, family, acquaintances, colleagues, gym friends, etcetera), getting back on my feet (I live for my gym now! **Note to self: blog about how choosing to go to the gym has been the best decision I've made in my whole life!), getting in and out of relationships and the hospital and so on and so forth that blogging or writing just had to take a backseat, much to my chagrin though. Well, at least I have a real life to live, not just writing out how I'd love to live my life or merely writing about mundane things that don't even count as a so-called life. Blogging or writing is no fun when you make it into a routine or when you make it into a spectacle to garner awe and admiration from people.
Garbed in my normal office wear of pants and conservative looking top plus a scarf to boot with an additional accessory of my green umbrella, I must have looked very out of place (yet with an air of mystery if I may add), considering I was at a Muslim cemetery where I should have been more 'decently' dressed or more 'covered-up'. At least I had the decency to have a scarf on out of respect with it being touted as a sacred place of eternal rest.
Walking down the pathway between graves, I greeted the 'dwellers' of the cemetery with a quiet yet resounding 'assalamualaikum' ('peace be upon you' in Arabic). Upon entering, I was instantly reminded of Usman Awang's 'Ke Makam Bonda', a poem which I have always been drawn to, for some inexplicable reason since I was first made to read it way back in the third grade in primary school. I remember seeing my then close friend, Sonja tearing up quietly while the poem was being recited. Her mother had passed away the year before and I guess she was reminded of the painful loss. I felt for her and I still do, it still being in my memory and all. Usman Awang had a knack for evoking or shall I say bring out the imageries through his thought-provoking and at times melancholic pieces of poetry.
I stood there in the silence of the cemetery except for the sound of raindrops pelting on my umbrella and the occasional falling of a leaf or flower from the frangipani trees. Bending down, I started to pluck away at the weeds that obstructed the sight of my grandmother's grave. Having done that, I rested on a line of arranged bricks and recited the Yassin and Al-Fatihah. Suddenly I felt so much better and the tonne of bricks I was carrying with me on my back had been lifted away and dissipated into thin air. As the poem 'Ke Makam Bonda' reverberated in my head, I felt tears trickling down my cheeks as images of grandma and me playing seven stones and spending lazy afternoons together in the living room of our old kampong house, me with my legs out-stretched and grandma with a cigarette held steadily in one hand and the remote control on the other, flashed by before me in black and white, just like in the movies. I really miss you, grandma! I was a kid back then when you expressed all your worries and fears and I'd brush them off by saying how trivial they were and that they'd go away soon. I didn't understand then. I really do understand now that I've 'grown up' and gotten a taste of what the real world is all about. I wish you were here to tell me "I told you so!". I wish...
Come this September 3, it will be exactly three years since my beloved grandma had left us, just three days short of her sixty-fourth birthday. How I wish I were only a kid when she passed away. It's not as if I'd miss her any less but I guess if I were a kid then, I wouldn't have been able to articulate my emotions and even if I could, they wouldn't have been so complex.I wouldn't have to deal with so much then. I guess as adults and the fact that we are capable of more complex emotions and thoughts makes it more difficult for us to be positive about things in life. I wish I could be a kid and tell myself when I go through rough patches in life that everything will be okay again tomorrow when I wake up from sleep. I wish I could drive my grandma in my car to get her fix of Black Forest Mocha...



Ke Makam Bonda ~ Usman Awang

Kami mengunjungi pusara bonda
Sunyi pagi disinari suria
Wangi berseri puspa kemboja
Menyambut kami mewakili bonda

Tegak kami di makam sepi
Lalang-lalang tinggi berdiri
Dua nisan terkapar mati
Hanya papan dimakan bumi

Dalam kenangan kami melihat
Mesra kasih bonda menatap
Sedang lena dalam rahap
Dua tangan kaku berdakap

Bibir bonda bersih lesu
Pernah dulu mengucupi dahiku
Kini kurasakan kasihnya lagi
Meski jauh dibatasi bumi

Nisan batu kami tegakkan
Tiada lagi lalang memanjang
Ada doa kami pohonkan
Air mawar kami siramkan

Senyum kemboja mengantar kami
Meninggalkan makam sepi sendiri
Damailah bonda dalam pengabadian
Insan kerdil mengadap Tuhan

Begitu bakti kami berikan
Tiada sama bonda melahirkan
Kasih bonda tiada sempadan
Kemuncak murni kemuliaan insan

~Usman Awang