Death of a friend

1.
When my friend died suddenly,
struck by the ill-judged turn of a roaring truck,
he left behind,
a chirpy little daughter-
her head full of wistful memories,
a some what distracted wife
and a smiling face with a vermillion mark-
scanned, enlarged and framed in black,
ringed with flowers and the light from an oil lamp.

He was not even religious!

2.
"The family elders were not around.
It was an intercaste marriage you see,
so nobody knew what to do.
To be safe, he was given a Brahmin's last rites",
said a mourner after the event.