About a Fisherman from Cuddalore (2005)
I’ve been sad lately as there hasn’t been a way to get all my old writing back. Last night, I just woke up in the middle of the night, with the idea to search my gmail inbox. Low and behold. I am happy, really happy again. I will work on putting together a chapbook. Here is one piece I wrote when I got news of the Tsunami that ravaged South and Southeast Asia back in 2004.
ABOUT A FISHERMAN FROM CUDDALORE (2005)
for Mani Natrajan who lost his family on December 25, 2004
I.
The tag #196
is tied to a foot of a listless body
veiled by white cloth
Mani kisses this foot
Belonging to his wife, Muniamma
Convulsing in dry heaves
his body goes into aftershocks
like rusty fingernails
excavating his muscles
II.
Mani and Muniamma
learned of each other at the market
as Muniamma picked pungent sardines
from his weathered hands
Not only can she make a sensation out of scraps
she has a hearty laugh for her frame
thick with life
Holding her tiny face
gentle like a wilted rose
they exchange confessions
in whistling rain
keep themselves a secret
shared only with the ocean
Thatch shelter with promises
whispered in sleep to keep heat
she consumes him like survival
Why he swallows hard
Watching her sleep
chest emerge, ebb
wishing to kiss her like
every time is their first
and last
III.
2004
the 11th year marking the 10, 8 and
6-year-old birthdays of their children,
Sukaniya, Vanaya, Surender respectively
Mani and Muniamma have bought them
a pale blue kite
mad swirls against the fog
like an S.O.S.
They fly it in the bare brown field
a sprint away
from their mother
washing their shirts
on the wood
planked staircase to their home
…
Muniamma thought it odd one afternoon
that as her three firecracker children
ran towards her for an early lunch
they were mute
Turning her head towards the ocean
for the first time
she saw the sky disappear
In an unwanted staring contest
she didn’t blink
when the wave poured through
like bleach
IV.
Mani outran the wind
burning the skin off the underside of his feet
Upon arrival
his home didn’t even look like a sketch
of the life he once had
Just crumbs
and the scent of phantoms
V.
December 26, 2004 –
“Among the hundreds of thousands of Sri Lankans, Indians, Indonesians, Thai dead and missing, 7 Americans may have died or suffered injury.”
VI.
Wailing gravediggers couldn’t afford to spare a second for sentiment
running out of tears
as the shoveled earth bevels Muniamma
faster than the sea could swallow her
VII.
It won’t matter if this time, he is safe on a mountain
Mani will build a small house elsewhere
tuck himself away
VIII.
Every time he sleeps
Mani dreams Muniamma, Sukaniya, Vanaya, Surender,
crackling with laughter, sly squids in their grip
secede slow into a huge hole in the Earth
He coats the hole with a viscous scream
sapping him to collapse
as an avalanche devours him
breaking his rib cage open
drowning his heart in salt
