My Mother at 66- Kamala Das

The Poem

Kamala Das

Driving from my parent's
home to Cochin last Friday
morning, I saw my mother,
beside me,
doze, open mouthed, her face
ashen like that
of a corpse and realised with
pain
that she thought away, and
looked but soon
put that thought away, and
looked out at young
trees sprinting, the merry children spilling
out of their homes, but after the airport's
security check, standing a few yards
away, I looked again at her, wan,
pale
as a late winter's moon and felt that
old familiar ache, my childhood's fear,
but all I said was, see you soon,
Amma,
all I did was smile and smile and
smile.

Summary-

"My Mother at 66" is an ironical expression of the inevitability of Death. Kamla Das very skillfully portrays this theme of ageing, death and isolation through a narration involving her mother. The poem is an intricate mixture of the two very fundamental human tendencies-- Love and the Fear of isolation-- which puts the poet on the highest pedestal of reflective poetry. These two emotions are inseparable, intertwined with one-another for eternity; the feeling of Love gives rise to the fear of isolation and loss, and the fear of isolation itself nourishes the Love as it buds in the human heart. 

As the poet is driving from her parent’s home to Cochin Airport on a ripe Friday morning, she notices her mother beside her, lying still, “open mouthed”, in a sleep that seemed to stretch till Eternity. Her face, pale like a corpse, almost ashen, and the pain visible on her face makes the poet realise the thoughts lingering far away in her mother’s mind. This realisation erupts in her the fear of isolation from her mother. It is a childhood fear of every kid that he might be isolated from her mother; an emotion that grows even more intense with Age because as a child the fear is of mere isolation but as Age starts catching up, this fear turns into the fear of losing one’s mother forever. Thus, the poet very skilfully describes the helplessness that human nature feels upon the inevitability of Death. 

In order to distract her mind, the poet tries to divert her mind by looking out of the window, only to be clasped by the memories of her childhood which get refreshed when she witnesses “young trees sprinting” and “the merry children spilling out of their homes”. These remind her probably of her own youth and life, her own younger days and her mother when she was young. Kamla realises that to the children, she is now a mother’s age. But to Kamla, her mother is still her mother, and when she looks at her, she feels like a child again.  This is an ironical expression of the fact that as animals, we grow old and die, but the relationship that we share with people never changes with time. We are always kids for our elders and we feel the same when we are around them. We have an identity as animals, this is subject to time. But our identity as persons seems timeless. 

After the airport’s security check, “standing a few yards away”, she catches the glimpse of her mother again—pale, exhausted, and as motionless as “a late winter’s moon”-- and seeing her like this, losing the battle with Death, the old childhood fear within her of losing her mother surfaces again. But suppressing this ominous feeling with all her might, she bids her mother goodbye and hopes to see her soon, again an irony to the thoughts that are going through her mind and just smiles as her mother fades out of view.

The poem instates Kamla Das as skilful portrayer of human emotions which she very innocently describes through the fear of isolation and loss and the very powerful emotion of Love, both as integral to nature as the inevitability of Death.