A Lump In Her Lungs Poem by Ismim Putera

A Lump in Her Lungs
—for my grandmother

Grandmother's tea
is always sweet and warm
in the wooden kitchen
the rainwater from
the coconut leaf rooftop is drained
into her rusted tangki
and boiled and burnt
using fire woods
then she sprinkled
the sacred tea dust
and casted some sugar crystals
to calm the hot water
down.

She liked it—
when the tea dust
enchanting the water with
its reddish hue
like rolling thunderclouds
roaring into our tropical air and
storming down from above
into the trench at the base of her
favourite teapot.

We knew, that she had a
lump in her lungs, a ball of white
cotton in the X-ray film
the doctor told us her heart was enlarged too,
from fluid overload—

"cover your feet with the blanket,
its cold outside, " she reminded us,
with wheezy words, many times.
"it's going to flood soon."

We took a sip from the tea
that warmed our hearts that night
the lump in her lungs, is a manifestation of love

Grandmother stirred the tea slowly
under the blurry kerosene lamp
I saw small creatures
paddling to reach the cup rim
leaving its sparkling wings rippling
behind.