Yesha Shah

Incantation

A peepal tree.
In the courtyard of the ancestral mansion of her father, where his mother died giving birth to him.
A peepal tree.
At the crossroad where her brother’s bike collided with a speeding lorry.
A peepal tree.
In the temple where she married the lover she had eloped with. To be divorced three months later.
A peepal tree.
By the window of their dingy chawl-home where her mother lost the battle to cancer.
A peepal tree.
By an unmarked grave, which was razed to construct her plush apartment.

Peepal: the root cause, also the solution, says the exorcist as he pours ladlefuls of ghee into the sacrificial fire and fastens a knotted red thread to her wrist.

en route to mammography hunter’s moon