The Man Who Never Missed a Funeral | A Ponmanipudi Story About Grief, Compassion and a Promise

The Man Who Never Missed a Funeral

I first noticed Subanna at Shwetamma's funeral....medium built man with a face which exuded calm and peace.

Everybody else noticed Shwetamma. I noticed Subanna.

The old house overflowed with people.

Women cried softly, children stood confused in corners wondering why everybody was so tense.

There was a strong smell of incense and jasmine mixed with freshly brewed filter coffee.

Outside, slippers lay scattered like a stampede had just happened.

Subanna moved quietly through the crowd....never hurried, never important....calm...just simply present.

He handed water to an old man. Pulled a chair for an elderly woman....

Lifted sacks of firewood without being asked.

Then sat beside Shwetamma's husband.

Neither spoke for a long time....

Finally the old man whispered,

"What will I do now?"

Subanna placed his weathered hand gently over the trembling fingers.

"You don't have to know today."

Silence.....

"Tomorrow?"

"We'll think about tomorrow... tomorrow."

The old man nodded gratefully.

Not because he believed it. But because somebody had stayed with him in his grief.

As we walked back, I asked Appuswamy,

"Relative?"

"No."

"Neighbour?"

"No."

"Friend?"

Appuswamy smiled.

"Subanna belongs to everybody."

That puzzled me.

Over the years I began noticing Subanna everywhere in funerals....

At the funeral of a newborn child. At the funeral of Basavarajappa's mother....

At the funeral of the old postman. At the funeral of a migrant worker nobody knew...

At every funeral, rich, poor, young, old, known or unknown.....Subanna never missed one.

Ponmanipudi noticed too.

One afternoon, while drinking tea, Murugan finally asked him.

"Subanna..."

"Hmm?"

"Why do you attend every funeral?"

Subanna smiled.

"They serve good coffee."

The tea stall erupted.

Murugan refused to laugh.

"I'm serious."

"So am I."

Subanna sipped his tea.

The conversation ended.

Years passed....the question remained....why?

One monsoon evening, I found Subanna sitting alone beneath the banyan tree.

Rain fell gently on the leaves above us.

"Can I ask you something?"

"You already are, Doctor."

I smiled.

"Why every funeral?"

For the first time...Subanna didn't answer immediately.

Instead he looked toward the cemetery beyond the fields.

"When my wife died..."

His voice became very quiet, too quiet as if he was there....

"...I thought the whole village would come."

The rain suddenly grew heavier.

"They didn't."

I said nothing.

"We had moved here only six months earlier."

"They didn't know us."

"There were four people."

"The priest."

"My neighbour."

"My little daughter."

"And me."

Subanna's eyes never left the rain.

"I carried her myself."

The words hung between us.

"I remember looking behind me..."

"...thinking maybe someone else would come."

"They didn't."

A long silence followed.

Then Subanna smiled, wistfully...

No bitterness. Just sad...

"I promised my small daughter something that day."

"What?"

"That nobody in this village would ever walk behind a coffin feeling alone again."

The rain continued.

Neither of us spoke....there was nothing to speak...

Years later, Subanna died peacefully in his sleep.

The news spread before sunrise.

By eight o'clock...people began arriving....

Farmers left their fields. Teachers closed classrooms early. Shopkeepers pulled down shutters.. Bus drivers changed shifts....

Children came holding flowers picked from roadside bushes....

By noon...there wasn't enough space in the courtyard....

People stood on walls. Even under trees. Along the road too...

Appuswamy wiped his eyes.

Murugan looked around in disbelief.

"I've never seen so many people."

I looked toward the simple wooden coffin.

Then quietly replied,

"He came to all of ours."

Nobody counted that day. But somebody later said... ....it was the largest funeral Ponmanipudi had ever seen.

As the procession slowly moved through the village...I noticed something.

Not one person walked behind the coffin alone..🌿

Welcome to Ponmanipudi...where nothing is as it seems.