Roof With A View

During the sultry afternoon heat, I retire to the roof,
ostensibly to read but, in reality, to drift into reverie.

Armed with a book, today’s “Hindu” newspaper and my laptop computer, I relax.

My morning may have been busy supervising the staff, taking the ferry across to the mainland for a shopping excursion, or visiting one of the many local art galleries.
But come noon, I aspire to avoid the foibles of the Englishman abroad.

Shielded by a colonnaded terracotta roof and bamboo blinds,

Sitting beneath the roof fans, I am protected from the fierce Indian heat,

And the eyes of neighbours.

It is quiet

And shaded

The silence disturbed only by an occasional sea breeze.

But dusk arrives early in the tropics.
By six o’clock it is too dark to read and time for the day staff to go home.

I rise from my planter’s chair as the sun begins to set over the Arabian Sea.

Twilight fades on another day.