The clothes were laid neatly
On the rim of the dustbin
Adorning its inner walls to seamlessly merge
With the garbage and resident cat inside.
A new sight in the hostel corridor, shocked
By the deliberate aesthetic of its fetid corner.
She immediately recognized the clothes
as hers.
Then she checked herself.
She had given them away only yesterday.
They were not hers anymore.
She felt the distinct loss of ownership
She was leaving the hostel for good
There was lots she had to leave behind
So she had asked
Jibi Didi who was cleaning the bathrooms
Would she take them?
Did she know someone who would wear them?
The second query followed the first,
The demand to productively reuse precious clothes
Masquerading as a normative ‘would’.
After all, Jibi was still wearing the Power chappals
She had given her six months ago, to gain
Patronizing satisfaction from a discarded lovers’ footwear.
But now her clothes were decorating the dustbin
Material she had so lovingly collected
In combinations only she enjoyed.
Retextured with new layers
Of yellow dal and blood from sanitary pads
A cadaverous ode to her dissident fashion.
Her roommate noticed the dustbin’s new gilding
With contained yet unquestionably legitimate indignation.
‘What was Jibi trying to prove?’
The corridor’s other fashionistas also chimed in
‘If she didn’t want the clothes she could have just said no.’
Her cultured outrage for ruined belongings was validated.
Then she bumped into Jibi on the stairs
looking at her
With what her champagne-socialist conscience
Could only fathom as dignified disappointment.
She couldn’t show Jibi her anger, she didn’t have any of
The power she thought she would have in that moment.
She reminded herself that the clothes were not hers anymore
Instead
She was an example
Of all she theorized against and made a living of.
How could her theories stand?
If her outrage only extended to Dustbin décor?
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