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A Lost Memory of Delhi I am not born it is 1948 and the bus turns onto a road without name There on his bicycle my father He is younger than I At Okhla where I get off I pass my parents strolling by the Jamuna River My mother is a recent bride her sari a blaze of brocade Silverdust parts her hair She doesn't see me The bells of her anklets are distant like the sound of china from teashops being lit up with lanterns and the stars are coming out ringing with tongues of glass They go into the house always faded in photographs in the family album but lit up now with the oil lamp I saw broken in the attic 5 I want to tell them I am their son older much older than they are I knock keep knocking but for them the night is quiet this the night of my being They don't they won't hear me they won't hear my knocking drowning out the tongues of stars 6 ...

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