A Fistful Of Stars: The Tamarind Tree
...The tangy fruits were all for me
I did not care for the rest
I ran back home with pride and glee...
Hariharan Balakrishnan expresses the immense joy of being young and adventuresome.
I wandered in the wilderness
Far away from humble home
I trudged along the paddy fields
Deep and far, away from town
I was a boy of hardly ten
And ventured not beyond my street
Till that Indian summer noon
I had not ventured out at all
I walked and ran, I walked the fields
To cawing crows and singing birds
Till I met a tamarind tree
Calling me with its heavy fruit
I climbed above - and way beyond
To the farthest branch with joy
The red ants bit, I did not care
It's the tamarind tree and me
Pockets filled with tamarind fruit
But body swelled with blisters
The tangy fruits were all for me
I did not care for the rest
I ran back home with pride and glee
Blisters bled, but pockets full
I let out a yell and shared with kin
My conquest of the tamarind tree
