In Bangalore
Carmine Dandrea
Margaret Reid Poetry Contest for Traditional Verse 2010 (view all the winners)
Most Highly Commended
In Bangalore
the warm rain falls;
the calls of crows
are stilled;
the ceiling fan had chilled
the room like a glacier.
The native bearer comes,
a sure devil,
handsome and dark
in his Dravidian skin,
wringing his impeccable smile,
bringing in his fertile hands
the inevitable coffee,
the ripe green oranges,
and cook's last sweet
in the later afternoon.
Your letter lies opened,
old and unhappy,
white and creased
as your body must be,
smudged in sleep
on the rumpled sheets.
My answer is folded—
thin and decisive namaste,
as such letters should be;
the ink anaemic;
the handwriting faint
as lines of smoke.
You are asleep, no doubt,
in our country
where morning shadows
shudder like peacocks
spoiled in rain;
where time is the sun rising
and the birds singing
and the stems of flowers
slashed by light.
Here, the centuries contend
with the hours;
the moments oppress me,
weighing like stones
on my eyes;
here, time is a Hindu adjusting,
and the rain, too, is time,
and the crows and the fan.
I cannot span
the dimensions of space,
the degrees of love
lying between us.
My decisions were made in the light,
but madness pervades me
as lizards lying out on the rocks
are compounded of sun.
This letter will journey no death;
it is only love that will suffer.
Yes, in Bangalore
the warm rain falls;
the calls of crows are stilled;
the ceiling fan has chilled
the room like a glacier.
