the day of consecration in Ayodhya
1
Today is the day of consecration in Ayodhya

that potent symbol of a new Indian warrior

nationalism that divides crowds into roaring

Rams and weeping Sufis bedraggled in rags
Some months earlier: everyday at work, I’d take

to reading Indian news, which began obscure

in a shroud of Delhi smog, but slowly the noise

subsided; in a dilapidated courtyard, we calmly
learnt about Dalits, Muslims, eunuchs. A pitter

patter of violence in my newsfeed, even after

the telecom bill. I visited in dry season, still

it was raining and we waited in the cool bar.
The rain cleared. A local offered me the back

of his motorbike. We went to the next town,

the next, each with multiple glaring Modis

and at the train station, Modi selfie stations.
On life went, I think – the walls of Delhi had been

torn down and reconstructed many times over.

Everyone from traders to invaders had become

Indian at last. Christ was Krishna, Persia Parsi
ghantas rung with echoing adhans, all burning

the same incense, all tying rakhis from a single

spool. Men gathered in the night to sing ghazal,

each taking their turn: Hindi songs, Urdu songs,
women in modesty wear clapping along, hands

twirling from front to back, keeping the time.

Eventually, even us foreigners were called up

to sing whatever song we might remember…
In a yellow room thick with beards and sweet

smoke, I was told the lesser known history of

how the fabric of Calicut was cut, a time before

the Europeans. Land was parcelled out between
every trader who came by monsoon. Yemeni

mosques, Assyrian Orthodox churches, Chinese

and every other spice, dye, grain, root rested

on the heads of Big Bazaar road. Ornate trucks
in the blistering speed of a palm-tree shoreline,

a Dutch house was converted by an offshore

project member of Google Street View, to serve

all black specialty coffee grown in the hills. 
Here I finished reading Attar’s Tales of the Saints:

a Sufi despairs when he tumbles down stairs

if only there’d been a few more steps, for every

injury was a kiss pressed upon him by God. 
I closed the old world in a book as I grew high on

caffeine, sneaking cigarettes in the dark passage

beside the cafe. There was no public smoking

in Kerala, just staring uncles and abrupt judgement. 
2
I see you come in, sunny scarf, chequered blue and

orange button-up searching the cafe’s bookshelves,

flipping through Márquez and Rumi. I’m saying to you

ohhh, so you’re into mystical poetry, magical realism
You’re saying to me, ohhh, so you’re spiritual. We sit

on the floor together. You tell me how Shiva contorted

the holy crowd’s judgement by transcending his form

uniting with Parvati, becoming half man, half woman
It’s twenty minutes – not even half an hour – before

you must leave. We just have to get coffee. Leaving me

with your contacts, I am shocked. I immediately write

a poem about you. Your first message is love hearts
Our first date the next day there are butterflies

in the garden by the museum, couples on swings.

We start holding hands while trying to cross the road,

linking pinkies and then, maybe, something more
Walking through Pazhassiraja, cannonballs get bigger

as the years pass by. The tombs become more elaborate.

I notice you like to take photos of me, amongst the old

pieces of ceramic vessels. Then, you take me out to dinner
at the newly opened floor of Paragon. I’m not so graceful

eating biryani and fried fish with my hands, but I guess

you find it endearing. I watch with delight at how precise

your fingers press raita, papad and rice. Beside each other
we wash our hands. You teach me to wash my mouth

after meals. We drink tap water back home I say

and you’re grossed out. I tell you so many little things,

you tell me you want to hear it all. You tell me about how
you never wanted to travel overseas, really. Everyone else

wants to leave to Canada or Dubai, but you’re more of

an Indian sanskari girl. Despite this, you tell me you’d like

to see where I live, just because I come from there,
because it’s a part of me. You post a photo of me

with the words, my soul met yours today telling me,

I think… we are soul mates. I think so too. It is crazy

I am in India smoking Indie Mints (you smoke them)
on my balcony thinking of you. Another midnight here,

I saw a large unidentified rodent in the foyer while

I was covered in ants. Now I am in love. You gifted

to me a trishula pendant, that symbol of the Destroyer
I bought a chain for it to hang on my neck. Rubbing

the trident when I miss you, I call my mother

to check if I have lost my mind. I have not. I want

to turn my world upside down for you. As the sun sets
again and again over Calicut beach, we eat local food

you’ve never tried before: pazhampuri and beef.

I walk you down laneways you haven’t seen.

We are both the tourist, we are both the guide,
we are equals. We are both stared at by the uncles

as we try to find somewhere to smoke in peace, walking

through a group of children looking for privacy, then

we are chased by angry dogs for stepping on
their territory. Young boys start heckling me for

500 rupees. Something is being said in Malayalam

that you don’t know how to translate, making you feel

distressed. We hide at the back of the cafe holding 
hands, a stumbling conversation giggling at language

breaking down. You are worried how others will see us,

how they judge me as a tourist and will tell your family

about our love. We decide on the code word language,
which you say when you need me to pretend, to live

in this empire of secrets. We link pinkie fingers, barely

connected, and yet… Oh, and yet! We make so many

promises together! We are two mad women in love!
Today is the day of consecration in Ayodhya. On Instagram,

a coworker of mine posts a video shouting Jai Sree Ram!

while another posts a celestial graphic of Ram captioned

If you’ve never had your country taken away from you

you wouldn’t understand this day. Both are vegetarians

living outside India, insisting that I am wrong to share a post

on how the nation is celebrating the destruction of a mosque.

We meet up and are both a little tense, upset that I am leaving

so we sit on the hotel rooftop, smoking again, a little joint
with some Indian reggae. The adhan calls, a Tricolour flag

bigger than our bodies pressed together waves in the sunset.

You whisper My India is something else… the moon sinks

into the sky, an adrift parasol, a cut kite, Shiva’s toenail…