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A PORTRAIT



The Sun had just set out from behind its hilly curtains on its journey to the other end of the sky, as I walked in through the gates of the station. The lone station official in sight looked a bit surprised as he saw me. Yeah, I would definitely have been something  out of the ordinary. A railway station that seemed like time had forgotten, and just one train scheduled to stop daily, would be a place where you rarely see passengers and a lone woman at that must be an even rarer sight. He looked at me a bit quizzically unsure of if I was a real person or just a figment conjured up by him in his endless wait day in and day out. I just nodded and walked towards the platform. Satisfied he went back to mindlessly staring at the ceiling.


Boarding the 7 AM train here, the only one that made a stop, wasn’t really something that I had planned for. A delayed decision in booking tickets had done it for me. And as I stood waiting, my only company was a sweeper busy cleaning up the dust the previous night had brought in. Dust unperturbed by human presence. Was he surprised to see me too in this place which you might miss if you blinked while sitting in a train speeding by? Even if he was he didn’t show.


I still had some time to kill, and as my sight scanned the surroundings, taking in the trees that had grown unchecked making it feel like I was in the middle of a forest, the birds chirping away merrily looking on at the day ahead, it came to rest on the portrait of a woman hung on one of the walls and its unexpected presence got my attention. A random thing of artistic beauty that somehow popped up in this neglected place left behind in time. Who was the painter, when was it painted? I had no ideas. I walked in for a closer look to see if I can spot a signature or some proof of identity. Well there was one scribbled in the right hand bottom, whose it was I didn’t know.


I took another look at that face. The blemish free smooth face and wondered if she was real. Did she sit there patiently as the painter did her portrait? I wondered what was going through her mind as the painting was being done. I tried looking into her eyes, if I could find some answers there. They seemed distant, lost in some deep thoughts even as that face seemed to peer at me, as if she could walk out of that painting anytime soon.


What could she have been thinking about? Her lips seemed to have gently curled up into a smile. The kind where on a casual first glimpse you might miss it, giving her face a look of serene contentment. Did the painter add it, thinking it would make for a more appealing portrait or was this a true representation of her face. Did the hint of contentment really come from within her, or was she playing  a part for the painter’s world? Did she know the painter? Was it just a paid gig, was it a lover or was it just someone she knew? I knew there was no way that I could get to a definitive, but that didn’t stop me from going off mentally providing character and personality to the face.  I conjured up someone successful, happy in her own life, content with what she has achieved just lazing as the painter worked the magic, sketching her, preserving her likeness for people who will never actually know her.


I took a visual step back, taking in all of her at once. The brush strokes that defined her hair, one side of which disappeared behind her shoulders and the other in front, continuing on beyond the limits of what the painting captured, melding with the hint of her polka dot dress slightly visible in the frame. A dash of dark that added some shadow to the edges of the face creating the faint hint of a shadow providing the illusion of depth. The background that looked blurred. A surrealist mix of colours, some light, some heavy coming together to create a single hazy backdrop from where the face seemed to be emerging. All this coming together forming the face you will never know in reality.


And as I looked at this vision envisioned by the painter, I thought of how much of it was her really and how much of it was the painter’s projection. And her image formed in my mind’s eye was it free from my personal biases. Would another woman who was not me, and walked into this station under these exact set of circumstances look at this painting in the same way? I looked at the sweeper who having done his work was now packing up and wondered how many times would he have come across this portrait. Did he ever pause to take a glimpse at it? Or was it now so ingrained into his daily schedule that for him it would have now just become yet another thing he has been hired to keep clean.


The noise from the incoming train broke me out of my reverie. There were none who got down. My compartment was relatively empty and the few who were there were getting prepped for the day ahead. The person in front of me was still asleep though , covered head to toe in a blanket, just a hand had causally slipped out. As the wheels started to turn, I looked at the portrait one last time through the window. I wondered if she too was staring at me. And if she was, what type of a woman would she be observing. I thought of all the people who had looked at the portrait. Will there be someone whose inference would match with mine? An exact copy of my ideas on it.


How much of what I saw was really there, and how much of it instead was just who I was?



ASHWINI UDGATA

17 January, 2022


1 commentaire


Dr. A .KUMAR
Dr. A .KUMAR
03 nov.

Brilliant word selection with continuing immersive style of narration and thought provoking uncommon substantial topics of prose is excellent creativity, congratulations, keep it on

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