Zabaan

Some things I can only express In a language I have forgotten.

Half my mind slips from the hand, Like a fleeting fistful of sand.

South of Fort St. George by the sea, Adyar erodes absentee memory.

A linguistic legacy of Macaulay's colony, Still, English halts Hindu/Hindi hegemony.

How, then, did I forget Tamil, or Telugu, Or, mainly, meri pehli zabaan, Urdu?

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