"In search of memory this Memorial Day."

In search of memory this Memorial Day

Is a line I heard on NPR

While I struggle to experiment with appam batter

-- A culinary art I never had a chance to learn

Nor miss

While still a child at home,
Co-existing with the Lost Generation.

This Memorial Day
I don't need to search my memory
To remember my grandmother
Who neither fought in a man's war
Nor has passed away,
But merely, enormously
Hovers
Between life and blessed death.

But this battle

For breath,

Neither old nor new for her,

Is a struggle she'd consider

Much less tortuous

And more welcome

Than the fight for dignity

That she has been losing

For more than half of her life.

Malathi, 5/30/2016

The identity of a 11-year old

I am.

I am the wind

I have the power of one thousand

butterflies.

I am like a fire

Wild and untamed.

I am like air

Significant like everyone else.

I am a volcano,

Tall and mysterious.

I am like an eagle,

I soar to great heights.

I am like water

Calm and easy to see through.

I am lightening

I have the speed of a cheetah.

I am like a tiny cube of sugar

Sweet and pleasant.

I am a dog,

I will never let you down.

I am Divya Durai.

Salt those wounds until well done

Salted wounds,
Pickle,
Fester well
When carefully nurtured
With
Cupfuls of neglect
Spoonfuls of arrogance
Fistfuls of cluelessness
About the responsibility of
Walking in another's shoes
However old and worn out.

Yet when the job is well done
The stench of sadness
Maybe yours to own
But it becomes mine to keep.


(C)

Condemned

The night is dark...
                             dank...
                                      silent and cold...
The plantation crops stand still;
the crickets whirr
                            and for miles around
Everything else lies still.

But hark!
In one of the tiny sheds...
In the dark and the cold
                           amidst swaddling rags,
Witness
the birth of a helpless soul.

A kerosene lamp greets the babe...
                            into an otherwise uncaring world.

No doctors, no nurses...
Just an old neighbour with a blade.
No hospital, no ward...
Just a mat for a bed.

No blankets nor warm clothes...
Just rags and the cold.
No high-pitched wail...
Just a tiny whimper,
a resignation to the fates.

For the tired mother, there's no joy
                         her first born's female...
The tiny rivulet of joy
                                   is lost...
                                               dries...
                                                          shrivels...

In its place
                  a sea of helpless anger
and frustration grows.
The mother sees her daughter's fate
                  no better than her own,
nor any of her kind.

For she is of upcountry stock
                  and being Tamil is her fate.
And unto her daughter
                  she could bequeath nothing...but
a life of suffering...
                             violence...
                                             hunger...
                                                            sorrow...
And finally death.
Blissful, welcomed death.

How to break out...
                  is the anguished mother's cry
To end this awful fate of
                                       poverty...
                                                      malnutrition...
                                                                             slow death.
A monstrous fate hanging o'er them
The future of the plantation child.

The future of her new-born child
                    a daughter of the plantations...
Condemned to a stateless being
                    and rearing yet more stateless.
A fate so cruel -- it has turned
                    a free land into prison.

To break this fate is her mission
                    but tears, prayers and submission
Are all in vain
                    They are of no avail.  

Copyright Malathi Raghavan 1985-86

FOR SALE

For sale the farmer advertised

the best bred of his stock.

And so he spread the news around.

The news travelled fast.

From far and near the buyers came

to see his red roan cow.

"Her pedigree's unimpeachable", he said.

"There's no doubting that

in the prime of life

giving gallons of milk,

many calves too she will bear.

Yet when she's old

She'll have so much beef

An army she may feed.

Her skin is of the softest roan

no factory can refuse…"

And so the farmer prattled on

the quality of his stock.

My son's of age the farmer thought

the eldest of his brood.

And so he spread the word around.

The news travelled fast.

From far and near the brokers came

of brides-to-be to speak.

"She's a homely type", one broker said.

"I assure you that

of flawless skin, the divine shape,

a house too she can keep.

A pleasure to behold

Yet ever so strong,

many robust sons she'll bear

of talented mein, with house worth lakhs,

jewels and farmland too she'll bring;

no thinking man'll resist…"

And so the broker prattled on

the quality of his stock.

"Why is this so" a daughter asks,

"that we be bought and sold?"

And soon she passed the message around.

The news traveled fast.

From far and near the women came

to see what could be done.

"We'll meet with hostility first," said one.

"We should recognize that

With bricks and bats and this and that

 they'll try to keep us down.

 We're human beings with brains and mind

and not just household slaves.

No more for us as dressed up dolls

and beings to bear more heirs.

We're through with being just mindless beings

whom man cannot resist…"

And so the women vowed to rise:

No more would they be stock.

By Malathi Raghavan 1984-85

Early Birds Sing Me A Tune

Feb 10, 2014.  6:00 A.M.

Just when I wanted to pick a fight
With a God that collects its paycheck
Without ever showing up for work.

"How can you stand by
And watch
A daughter long exiled
A sister permitted to discard emotional ties
A father typically wooden,
But now bending and swaying,
Willing to be plied;
Eager to be used
By a mother conniving,
Spiraling out of control
With truths hidden
And secrets untold?"

-15 degrees C outside,
Over 10 ft of snow on the ground.
And yet the most beautiful bird calls
Exchange
Between a talkative pair
Gracing my front yard.
On and on they go
As if to take turns
To sing
To comfort
To stay near me.
Only me.

Is it true?
Can it be?
That for once
God strives to
Break down my walls,
Penetrate my indifference,
Establish Her presence,
And feel the need
To prove Her existence?

For a minute, I am awed,
I welcome the image,
I ready myself to cautiously open
The floodgates to my heart
One teeny bit.

Until,
Until
Google searches
Set straight my perspectives.
"Winter birds all.
It's still winter,
but the light,
The changing light,
Has a hormonal trigger
That starts the birdsongs",
reminds John Hanson Mitchell.

I remember
To put my faith
In established facts
That rarely let you down.
To put my faith
In the rythmn
Of light and day,
Night and dark,
Spring and seasons all.
 
I smile.
I laugh.
I shake my head.
And go about my day.

But 'tis the morn
Of the day next in line.
6:00 A.M.
Silence.
6:15 A.M.
Only the muffled sounds
Of traffic in the early hours.
6:30 A.M.
The waking smell of coffee
From our kitchen.
Yet no sight nor sound
Of my avian angels.
Where are you, my feathered friends?
Are you out playing God
In another's front yard?


(C) Copyright Malathi Raghavan

My mother's extension

My mother and I,
We grew up together;
We wish to conquer the world together;
We learn to live for one another,
So as to fill the gaps in each other's lives,
Such that the whole of our universe has fewer holes.

My mother is mostly left behind by the swiftly changing outside world,
And so I choose to be the colorful rainbow above her unpaved road.
While she has lived in one city all her life,
I've flown across countries and moved from one city to another.
Since she cautiously diversifies her mainly homemaker life
I recklessly concoct unusual career paths and hope that she too can enjoy the view.

She was relegated to being under-educated,
I make up for it by striving to be over-educated.
For every year of education that she didn't have,
Her value in the marriage market soared.
For every year of education that I do add,
My value in the marriage market drops.
The age at which she wanted to add a missing career slot to her family life,
Is now the same age that I want to add a missing family slot to my career life.

With her effortless air of charming sociability she attracts helping hands to her side;
With my contrived air of proud self-sufficiency I drive away annoyingly poking noses.
But sometimes she confides in me that she could do without some meddling folks;
At those times I confide in her that I could do with some more caring souls.
There are days when I watch, wait, and get exasperated at how crowded her life is;
In turn, somedays she watches, waits, and gets her heart broken at how lonely my life is.
And then we cry.
Together we cleanse our knotted souls;
And through the tears, we smile.
Then we remind each other
To be strong,
To be confident,
To believe in our own lives,
To trust in our own fates,
To practice patience while we wait for what's missing in our own different ways.
But alone and separate, we are not;
We each are assured by one another.
The cord, it seems, was never ripped.

As in a circle, we know not
Who begins, who ends;
Who asks, who receives;
Who sows, who reaps.
We merely strive to keep that circle unbroken.
Her dreams, I live;
My dreams, she lives.
We live both our truths and our lies.
Both half-happy, half-sad.

If two happy-halves make one happy,
Where do the two sad halves go?
"Modern math and logic are beyond my comprehension," is all she can offer.
Then I get angry in that special way reserved only for a daughter.
I complain that once again I am left alone with the puzzles and the fears.
Without moving in space, I manage to trample the maternal heart.

Did I say we grew up together?
That we learnt lessons in the presence of one other?
But yes, I meant the lessons of life.
Unlike those that are taught to me inside four walls,
Unlike those that are printed in books,
Unlike those that are strictly formulaic,
The lessons of life, those we are allowed to learn without being separated.
So together, she and I, we are still searching for the answer
That we are sure is still out there, somewhere.

In the meanwhile, there is Mother's Day
To remind me of her selflessness and sacrifice;
To remind me that my mother sustained my life at a time when I most needed her.
At a time when without her there couldn't have been a me,
She did not wake me; she did not leave me alone; she did not send me on my own.
And so I sigh, a dark, heavy, guilty sigh.
Because when I look deep inside me, I know that even now she has not sent me off alone.
She has, in fact, bundled in me all of our ancestors' hopes.
And these as my badge of honor, I am blessed to wear.
Within my heart I am gifted with all their dreams
In loneliness, I gently unwrap them to soar high and fly.
In me she has collected the reservoir of all their tears
That I may, when I thirst, have a fountain to drink from.
In every vein of my body flows their blood;
So, when I hunger I am assured of my nourishment.
And from every pore of my body oozes their sweat.
It is in this way that I wrap myself with their fragrance.

So my mother, in her own wisdom, and love, chose me as her extension.
To carry with me to these far-off lands a part of our ancient self.
Do I spread my wings homeward or plant my roots downward? -- this I know not yet.
But today, I am content to merely think of my mother, who is far away,
And of all her own mothers.

(C) Copyright: Malathi Raghavan 2000

Indulging in Writers’ Woes, One & Two

"Be my cohort in verses," invites a poetic friend
While another reminds "You know, gentle vet stories are in trend."
Both unaware of the extent of my tumultuous soul
That makes me, in my luscious donutty life, see only the gaping hole
Left behind by the unexplainable itches & urges to write
For breakfast, lunch, and at night
When normal folk want to make love
But me, I am agonized by writer's blues, can't explain how.
Morning, evening, every waking, and every sleeping hour
Memories sprout, ideas bloom, like wild, spring flowers
Alas, no paid writer am I
Just a lowly perpetual student, sigh!
The irony:
If I spend half the time I dream and think about writing on my writing
And the other half on my Ph.D. citing
I would be more accomplished
And quite published
But alas, time management I have never grasped
Although its importance, many harped.
But I am digressing,
I intended to mention, to all friends of mine, without much buttressing
That er, um, hrrm, hum, if I may, have one, er, story out!
There I said it come what may
Leaving modesty, humility, all at bay
First-time writer's pride I cannot hide
'Twas the apple that I eyed
And therein lies writers’ woe two.
It comes after you steal time and write, phew!
Of course, it is the big question:
How does a writer share her arted, crafted fiction
With the seemingly busy, uncaring outside world
Without being thought of as shamelessly, self-absorbedly bold?
(But then, Reading as Power, never fails
So therein my altruistic part, I thee hail
To set me free with a sort of bail
From this other of novice writers’ ails.)
Lucky popular writers have their publishing houses
Do their dirty work for them without any grouses.
But no-name ones like me,
We learn to come right out, you see
And blurt out loud,
As above,
“I have a story out! Would you like to read?”
And gentlefolk, God bless their souls, always, even when taken aback, say oh, so graciously, “Of course! Your story, we’d love to read.”
And in those gentle, tender words, this restless writing soul of mine knows
Its moment of peace is in sight.


© Malathi Raghavan, 2000

July 11th

It's that fateful day again.
I am lost, simply spent.
Drenched in despair,
Soaked in sadness,
My womb, literally,
Bleeds and bleeds
Its inside out.
To hell with
"No right
To mourn your fourth (that never quite was)
In a crowded world."
My world is half-empty
Even though
Only one corner
Of a tantalizing hexad
Was snatched.

A new koan for our facebook age

Our new universe
The facebook universe
Requires
Brand new koans.
Here are a few
To ask our friends
At our next
(Facebooked) dinner party.

Does our fried calamari
Not exist
If picture not flashed?
Have we really, truly eaten
If we dine, in full obscurity,
At Olive Garden?

If we shop at
Schaumburg Mall
After announcing the fact,
Do we have
To pay the store?
Should not we be paid
For advertising?

If we believe
That we are
The Perfect Family
It wouldn't mean anything, would it,
Without
The endorsement
Of our dear facebook friends?

If our happiness
Multiplies
With each 'Like' received,
Are we reduced to
'Zero' happy state
Without a respectable
Status update?

And what about the corollary?
Does our sadness
Not take a shape or form
If we give it
No facebook life?
Can this be true?
Can this be the promise
Of a new Zen way?

Two sides of a coin, yes?

Those who don't believe in divorces
Are forced to get one.
Yet those who yearn to be free
Of a mistake
Are likely to stay imprisoned.

That's not strange enough, you say?
OK, how about this?

Family, friends, social support,
All prerequisites for a good marriage. 
So how come
Family, friends, social support
Also propel one to step into a good divorce?

If undisputed truths of the world were told, tell me:
What chances does an orphan have
For anything? 

Hidden Universes

A universe
Explodes inside me
(Not unlike the real Big Bang)
Each time I stumble
Onto music
From my teens.
How is it
That neither my Zambian-assembled husband
Nor my "half-Indian" kids
(the other half is "Canadian" or "American" as the case may be;
so says a 6-year old)
Nor even my sis-from-another-gen
Notice this world,
This oh-so-real-that-it-is-painful world
Hidden well
Inside me?
And so I come to ask
My peers
Does your universe
Explode too
Into millions of unexpressed moments
Occupying spaces that you didn't know existed
With every song, tune, beat
From our past?
Do you stop and wonder
'Who am I? What am I doing here?
Where is the world
That once used to be mine?'

Kodai kaala kaatre
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B4T0fjYELw8