Imtiaz Dharker Poems

When I can't comprehend
why they're burning books
or slashing paintings,
when they can't bear to look
at god's own nakedness,
when they ban the film
and gut the seats to stop the play
and I ask why
they just smile and say,
‘She must be
from another country.'

When I speak on the phone
and the vowel sounds are off
when the consonants are hard
and they should be soft,
they'll catch on at once
they'll pin it down
they'll explain it right away
to their own satisfaction,
they'll cluck their tongues
and say,
‘She must be
from another country.'

When my mouth goes up
instead of down,
when I wear a tablecloth
to go to town,
when they suspect I'm black
or hear I'm gay
they won't be surprised,
they'll purse their lips
and say,
‘She must be
from another country.'

When I eat up the olives
and spit out the pits
when I yawn at the opera
in the tragic bits
when I pee in the vineyard
as if it were Bombay,
flaunting my bare ass
covering my face
laughing through my hands
they'll turn away,
shake their heads quite sadly,
‘She doesn't know any better,'
they'll say,
‘She must be
from another country.'

Maybe there is a country
where all of us live,
all of us freaks
who aren't able to give
our loyalty to fat old fools,
the crooks and thugs
who wear the uniform
that gives them the right
to wave a flag,
puff out their chests,
put their feet on our necks,
and break their own rules.

But from where we are
it doesn't look like a country,
it's more like the cracks
that grow between borders
behind their backs.
That's where I live.
And I'll be happy to say,
‘I never learned your customs.
I don't remember your language
or know your ways.
I must be
from another country.'
...

There are just not enough
straight lines. That
is the problem.
Nothing is flat
or parallel. Beams
balance crookedly on supports
thrust off the vertical.
Nails clutch at open seams.
The whole structure leans dangerously
towards the miraculous.

Into this rough frame,
someone has squeezed
a living space

and even dared to place
these eggs in a wire basket,
fragile curves of white
hung out over the dark edge
of a slanted universe,
gathering the light
into themselves,
as if they were
the bright, thin walls of faith.
...

It's a great day, Sunday,
when we pile into the car
and set off with a purpose -
a pilgrimage across the city,
to Wembley, the Lahore Karhai.
Lunch service has begun -
'No beer, we're Muslim' -
but the morning sun
squeezed into juice,
and 'Yaad na jaye'
on the two-in-one.
On the Grand Trunk Road
thundering across Punjab to Amritsar,
this would be a dhaba
where the truck-drivers pull in,
swearing and sweating,
full of lust for real food,
just like home.
Hauling our overloaded lives
the extra mile,
we're truckers of another kind,
looking hopefully (years away
from Sialkot and Chandigarh)
for the taste of our mothers'
hand in the cooking.
So we've arrived at this table:
the Lahore runaway;
the Sindhi refugee
with his beautiful wife
who prays each day to Krishna,
keeper of her kitchen and her life;
the Englishman too young
to be flavoured by the Raj;
the girls with silky hair,
wearing the confident air
of Bombay.
This winter we have learnt
to wear our past
like summer clothes.
Yes, a great day.
A feast! We swoop
on a whole family of dishes.
The tarka dal is Auntie Hameeda
the karhai ghosht is Khala Ameena
the gajjar halva is Appa Rasheeda.
The warm naan is you.
My hand stops half-way to my mouth.
The Sunday light has locked
on all of us:
the owner's smiling son,
the cook at the hot kebabs,
Kartar, Rohini, Robert,
Ayesha, Sangam, I,
bound together by the bread we break,
sharing out our continent.
These
are ways of remembering.
Other days, we may prefer
Chinese.
...

Every step we take
could have been a step
in another direction.
This time we choose
to go to the canal.
By the time we reach it
the day decides to stop
following us around.
While we are picking
our way down, watching our feet,
the park packs up, the city
moves a few miles away.
Children's voices are balloons
released to open sky.
Behind us footsteps fade,
streets turn into water.
Leaf by leaf, the day
grows smaller. Whoever we are now,
this has been bequeathed to us.
Every other claimant has stepped aside.
Our steps the only steps.
The last finger of light points out
landmarks we do not recognise.
Still, between the cobbled banks,
cradled by bare branches.
we know we will be safe.
Now, even the unknown path
will tow us home.
...

All the people are wearing black.
Coming out of stations, scrambling
on buses, crossing the street, stacked
on escalators
they look like letters running away
from words I am struggling to understand.
There is no way to fix them
blurred as they are by movement,
mirrors and cracked glass.
I am trying to write you down
on this white space
in longhand, calm
you, still you,
put my arms around you,
touch your face, trace
the cheekbone,
hold you long enough
for you to read
the words we have been assembling
...

Outside the door,
lurking in the shadows,
is a terrorist.
Is that the wrong description?
Outside that door,
taking shelter in the shadows,
is a freedom fighter.
I haven't got this right .
Outside, waiting in the shadows,
is a hostile militant.
Are words no more
than waving, wavering flags?
Outside your door,
watchful in the shadows,
is a guerrilla warrior.
God help me.
Outside, defying every shadow,
stands a martyr.
I saw his face.
No words can help me now.
Just outside the door,
lost in shadows,
is a child who looks like mine.
One word for you.
Outside my door,
his hand too steady,
his eyes too hard
is a boy who looks like your son, too.
I open the door.
Come in, I say.
Come in and eat with us.
The child steps in
and carefully, at my door,
takes off his shoes.
...

One day they said
she was old enough to learn some shame.
She found it came quite naturally.
...

Did you expect dignity?

All you see is bodies
crumpled carelessly, and thrown
away.
...

Yes, I do feel like a visitor,
a tourist in this world
that I once made.
I rarely talk,
...

The best way to put
things in order is
to make a list.
...