as I dug further into my thoughts and revisited
writing
on writing technologies

I made yet another journey down to the basement
visually remembering what I needed

in the book I dug – it was from another time – another writing journey
another janma

I found a letter written in my mother tongue
by my mother – dated from more nearly a decade and a half ago

she wrote in poetic prose admiring a poem I had written about her
and which my father had read to her
[for of course I wrote in a language which she only spoke in "pidgin"]

in it she wondered where my skill in writing had come from
and wondered at what I re-membered

and as I re-read it I wondered how I could not have seen that
it was from her that I have the ability to write

in the interstices and margins
as was his habit in published books

was his writing

scrawled in a squiggle revealing the pain of rheumatoid arthritis

wishing me the best of luck for my comprehensive exams