International Women’s day, four poems

This morning she brought green “methi”
in the market, choosing the freshest bunch;
picked up a white radish,
imagined the crunch it would make
between the teeth, the sweet sharp taste,
then put it aside, thinking it
an extravagance; counted her coins
out carefully, tied them, a small bundle
into her sari at the waist;
come home, faced her mother-in-law’s
dark looks, took
the leaves and chopped them ,
her hands stained yellow from the juice;
The usual words came and beat
their wings against her: the money spent, curses heaped upon her parents,
who had sent her out
to darken the people’s doors.
She crouched, as usual, on the floor
beside the stove,
When the man came home
she did not look into his face
nor raise her hand; but bent
her back a little more.
Nothing gave her the right
to speak.
She watched the flame hiss up
and beat against the cheap old pot,
a wing of brightness
against its blackened cheek.
This was the house she had been sent to,
the man she had been bound to,
the future she had been born into.
So when the kerosene was thrown
(just a moment of surprise,
a brilliant spark)
it was the only choice
that she had ever known.
Another torch, blazing in the dark.
Another Women.
We shield our faces from the heat.

Unfamiliar with the blue of the sky,
Unfamiliar with the shining green
of the earth,
Unfamiliar with the history
of man’s covering his body,
I am standing
Inside a circle of ice,
Surrounded by sorrow and anxiety;
And naked, ancient and alone,
I carry on my shoulders
the thousand-year-old burden
of shame,
of coveredness,
of modesty.
O mothers of sleep
Whose bones
Are the ancient hiding place
of the dead instincts,
Look how my bare, ancient roots,
Slowly but with resolution,
Penetrate the ice.

I can no longer pretend the flowers are enough,
flowers in ink, flowers on plates, flowers in my shoe
laces, candied flowers, 1-800 FLOWERS, balloon,
birthday, funeral flowers, marshmallow flowers staining
the milk pink. Flowers in my mother’s hijab frame the smile
lines grown deeper; the long term health effects of appearing
gentle in a hostile setting. Have you read the instructions on tigers?
They may attack the unfamiliar. Remain calm, move slowly,
adapt as the tremor of leaves. To survive is to convince
the predator you are not really there.
I can no longer pretend slowly alive, kneeling in the soil
is enough. A nation of neon plastic straws, machines
on the surface of Mars, reminds its citizens to be patient.
Slowly, when the bill passes, slowly through diversity
training, slowly through handshake and t-shirt and apology
and apology and apology and apology and apology. I take a knife
to the dam, bathing in the leaks. There are teeth
in my laughter. Imagine a life of tectonic distortion: gaping, wet,
magma, colliding with, really there.
I scream my name in the pool, it is almost enough to hear the terror
I can be. Remember when discovering fire,
the heat of progress pairs a leather palm with new
ways to eat and be eaten.

these are my people & I find
them on the street & shadow
through any wild all wild
my people my people
a dance of strangers in my blood
the old woman’s sari dissolving to wind
bindi a new moon on her forehead
I claim her my kin & sew
the star of her to my breast
the toddler dangling from stroller
hair a fountain of dandelion seed
at the bakery I claim them too
the sikh uncle at the airport
who apologizes for the pat
down the muslim man who abandons
his car at the traffic light drops
to his knees at the call of the azan
& the muslim man who sips
good whiskey at the start of maghrib
the lone khala at the park
pairing her kurta with crocs
my people my people I can’t be lost
when I see you my compass
is brown & gold & blood
my compass a muslim teenager
snapback & high-tops gracing
the subway platform
mashallah I claim them all
my country is made
in my people’s image
if they come for you they
come for me too in the dead
of winter a flock of
aunties step out on the sand
their dupattas turn to ocean
a colony of uncles grind their palms
& a thousand jasmines bell the air
my people I follow you like constellations
we hear the glass smashing the street
& the nights opening their dark
our names this country’s wood
for the fire my people my people
the long years we’ve survived the long
years yet to come I see you map
my sky the light your lantern long
ahead & I follow I follow