Ras Al Khor
Ras Al Khor is salty and green, just where eye meets
light at the edge of the road where lives speed
on hope and promise of safe returns.
Ras Al Khor begins where flamingo legs
bloom pink roses over silver water, henna green
mangroves whisper and glitter like young girls
forever young.
And the land we stay on smokes black breath
on our faces, loops upward as metal stalagmites
brushing sky’s hard bones, snakes into coils of steel
bridges ready to be crossed. Winter fog
rests a while then rolls aside and we leave too
gathering our shoes, setting course for highway
tolls, flyover labyrinths. Ras Al Khor remains.
To My Sadness
I speak to you as a friend.
Make you warm milk on damp nights, wrap you
in silk when you visit. Place you on soft cushions.
You must be my friend too.
We must turn our terrible faces to each other
through this radiant darkness. When memory
falls like broken roof tiles over our heads.
We will walk the long road together, hide at dawn
from hungry birds, snipers on rooftops who mistake us
for joy and grief.
You are the only faithful one. The word
that never leaves.
Tonight
Tonight. 12 am. Thick blanket thrown over
winter’s last shivering fog. Dark trees sigh and whisper
as if in love. It is beautiful, this night.
A bomb has crashed into another country, another home,
another mother’s cramped kitchen.
It is raining somewhere. A man pretends to be
a ghost, carries a sleeping child
through a narrow lane somewhere. An owl
glides past the half moon. Paddy fields burn in freeze frame.
There is peace, somewhere.
Morning
Rummage for dry rusk, peel an overripe banana.
Recollect a song someone once hummed
through cloudy window glass.
This foreign woman, her body, her mind
is all yours this morning. Sing a song
if you remember. Stir a teaspoon of sugar into tea
for sweetness to reach bones, veins, where dark
remains pooled. Admire how the road shines
lightly dusted with footprints.
Silken
What is it about the death of a woman that makes her silken and cherished?
In dying, why does she turn
adorable, desirable?
All these beautiful dead women with Nefertiti’s nose, Kamala’s darkling eyes, Amrita’s searing
gaze. Even the nameless one found in a river.
Young forever, melancholy, poised like a painted
finger, sleeping bird. Pressed flowers inside radiant glass boxes.
Sand in the silver bell jar.
We buy them with a sigh, take them to bed, weep despair on their shoulders, get drunk beside
their rotting cold bodies, set them to slow music.
Imagine us as them.
Women, not warriors, tired, killing ourselves
for no reason.
(Anuradha Vijayakrishnan is an Indian writer who lives in the UAE.)
