The Woman with a Baby
Sukrita Kumar
Lilacs and tulips sprouting
From the slants of her eyes
Her yellow face
shimmering in white sunlight
Her body, a luminescent garden
Life within life dancing on
Feather feet
The rising belly, a tight sponge
Puffed into lightness
Her hands going in circles
Caressing the baby inside,
On the cozy pathway
Whispering history in Portuguese,
Lingering pasts
In the ruins of the fortress
at Macau,
Pasts hanging with roots
from old branches
of Banyan trees;
Whiffs of future blowing
from the citadel of the present,
Singing the song of her body
The woman walked
Through smoke and dust
Our eyes met,
Chinese with Indian,
Entwined in maternity
Not mediated by English;
Tiny movements rising
in our bellies,
fish churning in the ocean,
birds flapping wings through the skies
and eyelids, drooping and batting heavy,
to enter
or exit the bliss of sleep.