I remember mornings when my father sat

under the tamarind tree trimming

feathers, as he whistled 
Sunday tunes coming from inside.

On those mornings I would look

through frosted louvre panes 
as he nursed those fowls

in ways only a doting parent

could. And I would think
my mother right.

That man love those animals

more than his own children.
I remember him feeding them

things I’d never seen and examining

every inch of their reddening bodies
making marks and bruises go away

with iodine and a gentle rub,

which he never did for us.
But for all the time he spent

with them and not with us,

for all the care he showed them,
I never blamed him.

I learnt somewhere

that each man had his love.
He loved those animals.

I loved books, and him.