Wrapping up my nostalgic memory ride this month with a haiku to celebrate the BHEL Zoo. It really wasn’t a zoo. A few pigeons, deer and a porcupine. It was closed down sometime during my college years. A park with a train replaced the animals. A bakery found its way there. I have no clue what exists there today.

But the zoo was a childhood evening staple. I remember the smell of the zoo, the pigeons, the porcupine and the search for fresh leaves to feed the deer.

Zoo? Entertainment?

A patch to stretch my legs, run

Evenings I spent there

 

Watch cooing pigeons

White ones were a favourite

Stinky pigeons

 

Fresh green leaves I feed

Deer with spots and antlers tall

Watching  flicking tongues

 

Beady eye, bristly back

Lone porcupine in confinement

Patient, old, asleep

 

Drifting bird feathers

White tips of porcupine quill

The bare branched antlers

 

Tiny me against fence

Ashoka Trees, gigantic

Caged birds flutter, flap