Birthplace with Buried Stones: Poems

Water Crossing

77 Water Crossing I I was born into a house where music didn’t matter, But now I know it is the one thing that counted— an earthly music scraped from root and rock. Stones stirred when no one was looking, The house with its courtyard started to float. limestone quickened into fists and thighbones, Handprints flowered on bedroom walls Thumbs cut off, ancient marks of mutilation, Wrists the color of glaciers before they split and water poured into the open fields. Then came the scents of wild lavender Flung from the other side of the globe, Thickets of it, sprung here and there making a rare sound—a single note torn open and lengthened, as far as it would go— a violet sound no one could have missed, even at sunset as far west as we were going Up the red Sea with its blunt sandstone cliffs. 78 II When I turned five, high wind and water Swallowed what I could remember: a mango grove where beetles danced, Symmetries of silk, saris of mild cotton Grandmother’s blackened pearls and so much more. amma was with me but I was all alone, We had each other but our life was lost. Salt water curved its sonorous being To what the eye could bear in weight of loneliness. Was this what it was to live in the world? Time turned transparent. Pentimento of pastoral— I had to teach myself much later and with inordinate effort. We set foot on sand, I held tight to her hand. amma and I saw dry trees heave, Guns on the cliffs started to stutter. It was a tongue we had not heard before. Waves clustered, rose into a fountain. But what can music do against the weapons of soldiers? ...