Elephant in the room – Ardra Manasi

For his fifty-fifth birthday,
I sent my father a postcard —
a Japanese painting of
an elephant
painted in grey and gold.
Brooding and still,
amidst a room full of monks,
in their saffron silences.
I left a note:
‘For the elephant in our room.’
Miles away, my father wondered:
who is the elephant —
him, me, or the years
of silence between us.

Ardra Manasi

Born in Kerala, India, Ardra Manasi is a writer based in New York City. She has served as a policy consultant with the United Nations (UN). Her poetry and prose have appeared in the Reading Hour, Sahitya Akademi’s Indian Literature [forthcoming], The News Minute, Huffington Post, Madras Courier and elsewhere.