What Have I Left Behind?

This is a poem:
that I wrote in the Philippines,
to reflect on India.
Remembering moments, situations,
pictures that remain on my mind...







what have I left behind?
dust
rocks in the road
the people whose smiles capture your heart
whose hands are stained with henna
and lean up against crumbling
moist
cement walls.

I have left behind
billowing fabric doors
and one room houses

chubby babies
and thin mothers

and smoke that is so potent with spice
that it makes a burn in
your eyes
your throat
and you cough.

I have left behind smooth
frictionless stairs
and
musty cobbled
ancient backways

that open up to a lively street
of sorting rice
wandering dogs
the whir of sewing machines
and the swing of incandescent bulbs.

Turn the corner and
the goats on the rubble
of the garbage mountain
stop their scurry for a moment
as we take swift steps
down a fork in the winding road.


I have left behind
a place
where rings on your hands
mean nothing
and rings on your toes
mean everything

a place where ears and noses
are adorned with a gold
that shines
bright against skin tones of olive and caramel

a place where
babies look better with eyebrows and
men look better in moustaches

a place that conceals the collar bone
but reveals the ribs

where
children with kohl-smudged eyes
sleep soundly on dark marble floors
of a goverment hospital

nurses scuttle in starched whites
gaggles of Muslim women
huddle in gowns of black
and a young girl faints in her chair
from her first miscarriage

this place
of joy mixed with sorrow
oppression and progression
hard labours and hot climates
silver shackles and pocket combs

in the midst
of it all--

yet
no necklace is too sparkly
no pattern is too outrageous
no crowd is too large
no smell is too strong
no braid is too long


and
there is
always
a reason
to smell of fresh
jasmine flowers.