Skip to main content

Kiara

Jan J Manithottam


 The loss of a pet can be a lingering pain. Jan J Manithottam, a grade 12 student of mine, wrote this moving poem on the death of her beloved cat, Kiara.

 

Our baby, my first child,

I don’t know where she came from,

But I know where she has gone.

On a Saturday night, when it was raining,

This little creature started crying in our garden.

Soon she walked into our hearts.

 

She became our baby, my first child.

She grew not in our home but in our hearts.

We loved to watch her changes with curiosity.

She cried, played, laughed, loved and lived with us.

 

Our baby, my first child.

We called her Kiara.

I used to talk to her, feed her, cuddle her,

Care for and love her.

The sparkle in her eyes

When I took her in my arms,

The purrs she made

When I cuddled her,

The joy she expressed

When she saw me,

The jumps she made

When I sat next,

The vibe she changed

When I was moody,

The heartbeat I felt

When we were close,

All this runs to my mind

When your memory strikes.

 

Our baby, my first child.

She grew up into adulthood

Even before we expected.

Who can act against the laws of nature?

She became a mum

Of two little kittens.

Alas! The happiness didn’t last.

 

Our baby, my first child,

Got ill all of a sudden.

All our efforts didn’t save her.

Who can act against the will of God?

She went, leaving me, leaving her babies,

Leaving our hearts broken.

Kiara, my love,

Though you are not in our home anymore

You’ll always be there in our hearts.

Your shining eyes, your cute ears,

Your small nose, your soft skin,

Your little cries, your special tail,

Will linger never fading.

On a Christmas night you came,

The next Christmas you went.

 

Our baby, my first child.

Every night I look up to the sky

To find you shining there for us.

I know my love that you’re there somewhere

Watching us, especially your babies.

Don’t worry, Kiara, they’re safe with us.

Let peace be your eternal companion.

Photo by Jan


 

Comments

  1. Hari Om
    so heartfelt... Once you let an animal into the heart, nothing can dislodge it! YAM xx

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. So true and I've experienced it too. The tenderness in Jan's lines shows that too.

      Delete
  2. Reading this sweet writeup is the ultimate joy in the morning! Thanks for sharing
    Facebook Business Suite Vs Business Manager

    ReplyDelete
  3. No wonder pet is a term that is used endearingly.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Adventures of Toto as a comic strip

  'The Adventures of Toto' is an amusing story by Ruskin Bond. It is prescribed as a lesson in CBSE's English course for class 9. Maggie asked her students to do a project on some of the lessons and Femi George's work is what I would like to present here. Femi converted the story into a beautiful comic strip. Her work will speak for itself and let me present it below.  Femi George Student of Carmel Public School, Vazhakulam, Kerala Similar post: The Little Girl

The Little Girl

The Little Girl is a short story by Katherine Mansfield given in the class 9 English course of NCERT. Maggie gave an assignment to her students based on the story and one of her students, Athena Baby Sabu, presented a brilliant job. She converted the story into a delightful comic strip. Mansfield tells the story of Kezia who is the eponymous little girl. Kezia is scared of her father who wields a lot of control on the entire family. She is punished severely for an unwitting mistake which makes her even more scared of her father. Her grandmother is fond of her and is her emotional succour. The grandmother is away from home one day with Kezia's mother who is hospitalised. Kezia gets her usual nightmare and is terrified. There is no one at home to console her except her father from whom she does not expect any consolation. But the father rises to the occasion and lets the little girl sleep beside him that night. She rests her head on her father's chest and can feel his heart...

Joys of Onam and a reflection

Suppose that the whole universe were to be saved and made perfect and happy forever on just one condition: one single soul must suffer, alone, eternally. Would this be acceptable? Philosopher William James asked that in his 1891 book, The Moral Philosopher and the Moral Life . Please think about it once again and answer the question for yourself. You, as well as others, are going to live a life without a tinge of sorrow. Joyful existence. Life in Paradise. The only condition is that one person will take up all the sorrows of the universe on him-/herself and suffer – alone, eternally. What do you say? James’s answer is a firm no . “Not even a god would be justified in setting up such a scheme,” James asserted, knowing too well how the Bible justified a positive answer to his question. “It is expedient that one man should die for the people, so that the nation can be saved” [John 11:50]. Jesus was that one man in the Biblical vision of redemption. I was reading a Malayalam period...

Are You Sane?

Illustration by Gemini AI A few months back, a clinical psychiatrist asked me whether anyone in my family ever suffered from insanity. “All of us are insane to some degree,” I wanted to tell her. But I didn’t because there was another family member with me. We had taken a youngster of the family for counselling. I had forgotten the above episode until something happened the other day which led me to write last post . The incident that prompted me to write that post brought down an elder of my family from the pedestal on which I had placed him simply because he is a very devout religious person who prays a lot and moves about in the society like the gentlest soul that ever lived in these not-so-gentle terrains. I also think that the severe flu which descended on me that night was partly a product of my disillusionment. The realisation that one’s religion and devotion that guided one for seven decades hadn’t touched one’s heart even a little bit was a rude shock to me. What does re...

Loving God and Hating People

Illustration by Gemini AI There are too many people, including in my extended family. who love God so much that other people have no place in their hearts. God fills their hearts. They go to church or other similar places every day and meet their God. I guess they do. But they return home from the place of worship only to pour out the venom in their hearts on those around them. When I’m vexed by such ‘religious’ people I consult Dostoevsky’s novel The Brothers Karamazov in which there are some characters who are acutely vexed by spiritual questions. Let me leave Ivan Karamazov to himself, as he has been discussed too much already. In Book II, Chapter 4 [ A lady of Little Faith ], a troubled woman comes to Father Zosima, the wise monk, and confesses her spiritual struggle. “I long to love God,” she says. She knows that she cannot love God without loving her fellow human beings, or at least doing some service to them. The truth is, she says, “I cannot bear people. The closer they ...