I don’t have a mobile phone, I feel cut off, I feel alienated. It happened thus, I guess it had to. I was boarding a bus at Andheri East. There was a crowd at the entrance, an unyielding mass of people, not budging an inch (which is usual for people as me who commute to make a living). I tried to make my way inside, and was hanging by one hand, almost out of the bus, quite precariously. I decided that I would have to get down and not carry on this way. So I got down.
Then I felt my pockets to see if my wallet, credit cards, ATM cards (all desiderata of modern life) are safe. But no, my mobile case was empty. I couldn’t believe it! They had stolen my mobile phone. The realization was shattering, mind-numbing! I had all my contacts’ telephone number and hadn’t bothered to keep what is called a “hard copy,” i.e., a written copy.
I felt like sitting down there and crying! Oh, God, no, not to me, not to me. I had heard of other people losing their mobile phones. Not my Nokia color mobile phone with internet surfing features, games, FM radio, the gizmo had everything. And the last installment wasn’t even paid up. In short, I was inconsolable, my rage and disappointment was, needless to say, immense.
But then thinking about it a bit more, a poem occurred to me. I wrote my mobile phone a poem, a sonnet.
Sonnet for Stolen Mobile Phone
You were small, curvy, and cute,
Full of lively chatter and, sometimes mute,
For hours I would wait for your ring,
That set my pulse racing.
You spoke to me in several lingos,
Mallu, Hindi, English, Bambaiya patois,
A ventricle and aorta full of feelings,
Elations, greetings, glad tidings.
Then one evening, I know not,
Who stole you from me, my Camelot,
Are your rings dead, are you still alive?
Has he de-SIM-ed you, would you survive?
Please come back to me, I miss you,
Without you, I am not me, without me, you won’t be you!