obscured by clouds- meghalaya part 1

from calcutta we find our way to guwahati,
Guwahati is paan-chewing men
with red mouths
that lick their lips when a woman walks by
Escape from this city. this weary-washed-out wasting city.this broken jaw of our kingdom.
To a greener place, a softer world.
Everything is green.
Greener than apple.
Greener than sea.
Greener than envy, than eden. than sky.
The hills start to appear and I'm tongue tied and twisted.
Its starts to get colder. My toes are cold again. I've missed this feeling.
The air is sweet. I buy strawberries, a mango, 4 bananas and litchies for lunch.
Four hours later we're in shillong. Shillong itself is over-rated. Like Shimla or ooty main towns.The next morning we shake dreams from our hair and explore shillong a little. walk around whatever part of the city is walkable and then go to a butterfly museum. This made me happy but we wanted more from the north east.
Let down and hanging around.
Ten minutes later our bags are packed and we're in a taxi to Cherrapunji where we'll stay with the taxi drivers aunt who has an extra room she'll rent out.
So we leave this city with its blue windows and small eyes.

The Ride to Cherrapunji is surreal. Like Sigur Ros or dali painted these landscapes with their soundwaves or a brush and ink.There are clouds here that try to swallow me. Swallow this little village that has never been mapped out. This topographic tale that was never written down. This hill that was ignored when the kings or fools came down from their thrones to own the land. It rains. and then it stops. It rains again. and ceases. again. There are trees. She is sleeping next to me and we are still driving to our destination but I tell them to stop and go for a walk in this forest.tall trees with their branches sticking out in right angles like arms and I look up. The sky is an unbelievable blue, like the requisite technicolor surreal dance number in some musical.
It starts to rain. Big blue drops of water this time. And each drop licking the leaves before falling on my head. I sat down and wrote sentences down with a purple ink pen and liked how my carefully thought out words dissolved as drops of rain fell on the page.
Drenched to the soul/bone. The trees shuddered. I shiver. And find my way through the trees back to the car parked by the side of the road
We start moving again through the rain, through the clouds and I fall asleep.
In my dreams I'm in a forest surrounded by trees. I can see some words etched into a tree..i see a light. the light illuminates the words from the back. The light reflects off whisps of brown straw, green blades and gray reed. Like a negative on a light table. The color is intense. It's twilight.The ground is dull, but the words glow. I wake up before I can read what it says.
There is land. Stretched out everywhere like sky.There are clouds. and more clouds. We drive through them carefully afraid that somewhere in that mist is a truck waiting to crash into us.
There are graves. Crosses sticking out of the hills like hands and fingers thrust up from the earth. Reaching out to the sky. There are little temples with pink dried up flowers at the entrance. And there is cold.
There is always cold.