Train to Agra

On the Edge of Delhi

 On the Edge of Delhi I am the one who is afraid of the dark, afraid of the cornfields on the edge of my aunt’s farm, the ones that whisper at night long after the last train whistle shakes the house and after my uncle falls asleep from too much whiskey and not enough meat.Your voice is thick with iambs, husks opened to the night, mouths hiding rows of hard, beaded secrets.You tell me about Krishna and the cows, about Pravathi carving her son from mud. Every night it is a different story: Ganesh running through the jungle, Sita swallowed by the ground. It always comes back to the one who rides the tiger, the one who is unafraid of fire. You speak in a language that seems to love the tongue.You would do anything to keep me from thinking I am in exile, to keep me from the shadows that bend and curve, that make the night seem closer than it is. ...