Sarajevo and 2 other poems

Six feet stuck out
from the maroon quilt
as Abba woke early,
queued for rations.
Amma polished our shoes
combed our hair,
readied us for our miles-long
walk to and from our school.
Six feet was the length
of my room shared with three
as we juggled classes, cooking,
learnt English, and cleaned
dishes, scraping leftovers for later.
Six feet was the driveway that I cleaned every day
unable to believe that I have
my own house, and enough
money to travel home.
Six feet was the distance
from which my wife watched
as my passport and the right accent,
the right clothes, the right papers, even the right “card” got checked.
Six feet is the span of the cell
where I was detained
where I hear the cries of others
who like me wait to belong.
Six feet in the ground
will be mine in the end.

His legs jerking like a lizard’s tail
while the cops tried to force-feed him,
knew that the dam had been sanctioned,
the officials bribed,
the river banks concretised,
the villages flooded,
the villagers maggoted into cities.

      Yet, he still fought for the river, warning
      that this river will rage again, if dammed, yet again
      just like this river had once flowed from the heavens with such force
      that all the sages and gods had prayed to Shiva,
      to save the earth from being swept away

      To him this river was his mother.
      Just like the trees were family
      to the women from the villages up the river,
      who chained themselves to the trees,
      blocked the loggers, and sang:
      “Kill us if you want to cut the trees.
      We are one and the same”
      until the loggers had to leave.

            A tree is not a forest.
            But even trees know
            that to survive
            they have to offer food through their roots
            and not cross into the canopy of each other.

for Jasminko Halilovic
“I have seen the face of sorrow.
It is the face of
the Sarajevo wind leafing through newspapers
glued to the street by a puddle of blood …”— Goran Simic
      A blue compass
      the letters to the high-school crush
      the candy-striped-clad Barbie
      the plastic lemony apple with teeth marks
      the teddy bears
      the friends who are suddenly ‘on the other side’
      the collection of food cans testifying to the charity of others
      the colouring books
      seeds from the horse chestnut trees that propped mock
battles
football matches
interrupted by lightning moves from shelter to shelter
an assembly of memories instead of children