Vidya Hariharan
Monsoon
The pyramid of tomatoes on the vendor’s cart fascinates me inordinately. The tomatoes are arranged with such precision, and also shade coordinated. The lighter colours form the bottom layer, and the ripe crimson ones form the top one-fourth of the pyramidal structure. The iron weighing scale is placed front centre on the wooden cart, akin to a sacrificial altar. I watch in a mild panic as a customer comes up and picks a few red ones from the very top and continues to choose at random. The top of the pyramid now lies in an uneven strata. The buyer moves on, and I heave a sigh of almost audible relief as the vendor swoops down and replaces the missing tomatoes with fresh ones from a basket at his feet.
grey clouds amass
the mango seller hurries
towards the banyan tree
About the Author
Vidya Hariharan is an avid reader and traveller. In her spare time, she wrestles with crossword puzzles. Some of her poems, narratives, haibun and haiku can be found online in Glomag, Under the Basho, and Muse India’s Your Space, where her poems “Beauty” and “Open Heart Surgery” were selected as Editor’s Picks for July 2024 and September 2024, respectively.