muscle/memory

In this salt wind city

we take grief in both hands

dress her in poster paint blue

and lay her in damp earth.

When the flowers are dead

she packs her things

rises up past remembrance

into the permanence of stone.

In this city

we grow up

and not out.

After the fire

when grief is swept up

we travel to where rivers meet

and somebody important

a long time ago

did something we do not remember

but worship still.

Of what is left

with salt on our tongues

we plant lemon trees

in old homes.

They will grow to gentle scent

both up and out.

And when grief is a stranger

too large for both hands

we seek no damp earth

or certain stone.

We ache in absences

our muscles remember

salt is heavy on our breath

the sea is not far.

irani

between the flower tree lane

and our very first home

to mark the bravery of doctor’s visits

we go to see the ponies

the sky is late afternoon bright

we tread gently over the gulmohars

Degas

By a bridge I cannot name

we stop to buy posters

bring home papercuts and strange words

Frame them in pastels

and put them up

On a wooden square

in a yellow room

a girl in wax

frames her body beyond five

Looks away with a face

that I forget to leave

In the quiet moments

I draw dancers

Limbs awkward

eyes solemn

They are beginning to look like me.

buoy

From where I am lying
ear-deep in the water
I can see the kind of  sky
that you would not stop to photograph.

Overhead, a very small bat
is zig zagging wildly through the air.

Far below it
a lone feather
floats gently downward.

From where I am lying
they are the same size.

If I crane my neck backwards
I can see one half of the moon
and one half
of the shadow rabbit
that lives inside it.

From where it is crouching
the shadow rabbit
cannot see the nondescript sky.

It cannot see
the very small bat
or the lone feather

or me.

churchgate fast

On the very edge

of platform number two

at goregaon station

on the western line

is a wooden bench that seats five.

There are four women on this bench

and a puddle

in place of the fifth.

Right now is not a good time for benches

or cats

or you

if you do not like mud.

They have managed to place a crack

just so

(in what passes as a roof)

So that you are trapped

quite neatly

between a downpour

and a very damp place.

If it is a slow train you are waiting for

you can join the huddle

that stands in for a line

and be whisked away

in the most sluggish of whisks

and hope 
that when you arrive

It will be dry.

But if you wish to get there quickly

You must stay put

on the bench that seats five.

while the rain claims the fourth occupant

and then the third

and then the second

until it is just you.

mail

The bottom of my mattress

is lined with pale green envelopes.

It used to be wrapping paper

But our outsides change with the years.

Of contents I am less sure

things have a way of fading.

But the pale green envelopes

I keep. 

for zoy, wherever she may be

If we were to measure in birthdays

this love we have built

Would it look small?

or impossibly large?

Because there are so many moments

I have missed

but not a single day

I have spent away from you. 

of things we raised

In the sunny echoes of our childhood

we raised, you and I,

A dozen squat caterpillars

that lifted  their heads

from the thick green ooze of bhindi

in annoyance at our loving intervention

(to little avail).

With the mangoes came Fudge

and her mangy brood

an ugliness that nestled smugly

in the sun kissed perfection

of sweet smelling hay

and the sun burnt perfection

of little hands.

A small shoal of new born fish

held us in stunned wonderment

and mild horror

for the brief seconds

of their rather eventful lives

before they were eaten by their somewhat grumpy mother.

(With children, this is the way to go

mine maintains).

In the sunny echoes of our childhood

We raised, you and I,

A cat called rabbit

A dog with an ancestral name

A family of love

And somewhere along the way, each other. 

Weather report

The sky here has an undecided clearness.

The careful migration of my woolen flock

now a slow meander through the shifting seasons.

It is difficult to tell

what it is like where you are.

You seem at peace with the atmosphere.

But then

you always were a friend of the winter.

I haven taken to photographing trees

I do not show my pictures to anybody.

Other people take your picture now.

I do not know their names

and I do not think to ask.

The sky has an undecided clearness

you smile at distant strangers

and in my hidden gallery

a secret forest silently grows.

transit

When falling asleep on the metro

always make sure

to get a seat at the corner.

(nobody likes a shoulder leaner on-er)

If you can

ensure that your metro

is lit in yellow.

White light never reminds you of your bedroom

and in dreams, at least,

you should get to go home.

Forearms make for handy pillows.

But even the most patient

and gentle and kindly of forearms

will eventually leave you, for sleep

as you have left it, for sleep

And waking up sans vital limb

is never too much fun.

When falling asleep on the metro

do not worry about missing your station.

Your body is a friendly co passenger

it will tap you on the shoulder

at just the right moment.

It knows when it is time to go. 

C - 52

My grandfather crushes

a lemon leaf

between the thumb and forefinger

of the nicest hands in the entire world

and extends them towards me

in his familiar little version

of botany lessons.

Can you smell it?

he asks.

We are standing on the tiny square garden

he has lovingly tended

for as long as I can remember.

Above, they are stringing up Diwali lights

the same ones we have had for years.

In the evening, we will use

our unskilled hands

to draw dreams in coloured chalk

that the whole family

will come out to admire.

My mother will teach me

how to make tiny feet

with just some paint

and the side of your palm

so that the goddess will know where to come

and we will stay blessed for another year.

We will put on our bright, itchy clothes

and smile

for picture after picture

that will hang on fridge doors

around the world.

And when the children’s games are over

the cards will come out

and we will jest and quarrel and laugh

late into a perfect night

in the only home we have ever known.

But for now,

My grandfather crushes

a lemon leaf

between the thumb and forefinger

of the nicest hands in the entire world

and extends them towards me.

Can you smell it?

he asks

And I tell him I can. 

Tarapore

I found the longest earthworm

In the history of the universe

And yelled for you to come see.

You stepped on it

With your black plastic school shoes

And said

now there are three.

She has decided to work.

She will miss the little things, they say.

But when everyone is asleep

She brings out her inks

and we paint.

They are the most beautiful colours I have ever seen.

The three of us wait by the street

It is an exciting time

We have never had a car before.

I lie in the back

If I look up, I can see the whole sky.

My mother holds three slender pods in her palm

If you spit on them, they will pop

She says.

I look, disbelieving, at the spit that pools

In the hollow of her broad smooth palms

They will pop

If you spit on them

She says.

And they do. 

Atlanta

I have not written to you

In all the time

since we left the ocean.

Yet I am certain

that I write to you constantly.

Every thought a postcard

in my mother’s writing

Addressed as much to you

as it is to myself

and to our ocean.

I think I would like it

if I could measure our closeness

In things that I can hold

In paper cuts and paper boats

In your intermittently dotted I s.

But I have not written to you

and I do not think I will.

Perhaps you could do it for me.