How to fold grief so it looks like duty

The dal burned

i started this yesterday. or the day before.

does it matter. i don't like the smell of masala clinging to my sleep.

i meant to write about

something.

Something about anger—

The kind that rises

when the land is ploughed and my house falls apart again.

sorry i have to

soak the rice

i had to check on the fever.

I had to wipe the counter, then the floor, then my own mouth.

10:42 a.m.

Father doesn’t believe in help.

He’ll break his back before asking for it.

today he is angry

because the tomatoes went bad and I forgot the second sabzi and that i am not a doctor

and

Ma needs paracetamol.

1:17 p.m.

i think I was saying—

I am tired.

not the kind of tired sleep can fix

i dream of recipes or the timeline of english literature

i cannot find my slippers i think i didnt keep them properly father must be angry. how tightly to shut the fridge door,

how to fold grief so it looks like duty.

I read somewhere that care is political.

i must cook lunch before facebook shows another cousin

with a government job

a wedding date

5:08 p.m.

I was staring at the rain-filled pond.

The land’s been sold. battered land, half-sold and half-waiting, has become a pond. I click photos like I’m proof that something beautiful still exists

marriage

grades career

the fever hit last night.

I slept all day. i want someone to touch my forehead

I made tea for everyone.

morning

she's sick now.

I do the kitchen. She doesnt like being told what to do.

I cried while chopping garlic.

i cleaned the spew

day

I want to have an opinion

I want to talk politics outside

the kitchen

find my name in a bibliography read a novel or two

or maybe just write something whole

a full sentence a full

thought

Inheritance

I crush mangoes the way I have always seen it done—

by hand.

Skin against fruit,

pulp thick between fingers,

a kind of mess that leaves its mark

even after the water runs cold.

You didn't ask to be taught.

You watch—

the quiet choreography of women in the kitchen,

pressing sweetness from bruised flesh.

Love is the little things.

A bowl resting on cool tile.

Sunlight pooling on a wrist.

A thumb sinking into golden meat.

You learn to care by doing,

again,

And again—

You carry forward

what no one said aloud.

And maybe that’s the inheritance:

the Motion.

There’s something sacred

in making something with your hands.

Even when they’re tired.

Even when they are no longer yours

alone.

Nails of Haldi and Atta

You begin to carry the house

without noticing—

until your body folds into its corners,

so much so that you start to smell of lineage.

Sometimes, I look at my hands

and wonder if they were meant

to be softer, gentler—

like a woman’s hands are supposed to be.

But what women are we speaking of?

The ones I’ve known

grip both pens and spatulas with the same urgency,

palms etched with burn marks,

ink trails,

flour tucked into nail beds—

Still, there are nights I want to return glowing,

still full from laughter,

not peeling leftovers from the sink

under flickering kitchen lights.

Nights I want to look down

and not see the day

etched into the curve of my cuticles.

Nights when sleep would come easy,

not weighted by the memory

of folding shirts with care

and still not knowing how to keep a man.

---

About the Poet:

Anamika Tamuli is a writer from Jorhat, Assam, with a postgraduate degree in English literature from Tezpur University. She has previously worked as a Prompt Engineer at NVIDIA, exploring the intersections of language and AI. Her recent photo story was published in The Chakkar, where she continues to explore themes of memory, domesticity, and emotional inheritance.