Turtle

the turtle writes a story of longing for the lotuses.

once upon a time there was a tired dreamer who was named for a turtle. Indeed he had balded before his time, he had tried to retire, but he had to see his son through college, so he carried on work in a private factory now. His face was like a bird, his eyes behind those glasses, good pen work, his body folded over its centre in fatigue, from a barsaati in a large city far away, he had briefly seen a garden of fragrant nasturtiums. When he met her, when she softened in her tone, so his eyes could come out of their customary nervousnesses, he briefly thought he saw the garden of fragrant nasturtiums, that he had seen as a paying guest in the bungalow of well off people in an unknown city far away. His mother had fallen sick and he had had to come back.