Afshan D’Souza Lodhi: Turn my tongue

“Most of my poetry explored desire: to love, be loved and belong. The pieces are mainly told from a female perspective, and question the gender given to particular acts, objects and idea. Burning dupaattas and white weddings, white funerals play around with the idea of a female killer. What would drive a woman to kill. In the same way that Valerie Solanas’s SCUM talks of cutting up men, the protagonists in these poems do just that”.

“In black marigolds, a piece with multiple characters and perspectives, the gender neutral-ness of their names and the way in which hindi names double as verbs and nouns, pushes the boundaries of what gender and sexuality actually is. My choice to not have capital letters for the names, here is a decision to not give names importance, but to also understand that names can be aptonyms, i.e. they are synonymous with the identity of the person. Her name is a piece that looks at grotesque women that are ‘unnatural’ and ruin things as they walk. The piece is in direct opposition to ‘beautiful princesses’ in fairy tales. Kanta is as much part of nature as any other woman, but her own relationship with it is being challenged”.

“Anonymous was a woman plays with the idea of women’s voices, especially those that have been silenced in the past. It asks to what extent are women allowed to have a voice, is it only if they are anonymous? The piece plays with the Arabic word awrah which is a form of nakedness ascribed to a woman’s voice. The word, only every associated with a woman’s voice also gives birth to the word aurat which means woman. Women should be silent, for if they are not, then they are naked. This is as much a resistance poem as it is a poem about the idea of nakedness in its many forms”.

burning dupattas

he said he liked it 
             rough 
 so the next day you 
 bought handcuffs. 
 she did the same but 
 lost them before she could 
 use them 
 she’d been taught 
 pigs are haraam 
 it doesn’t stop her from 
 sleeping with them 
 or is that dogs 
 she asked him to show her 
 how to use dupattas 
 instead of cuffs, cuffs 
 cut into his skin, dupattas 
 cut into her honour 
 she lied her way 
 through his pants on 
 his shirt – but kept his 
 shoes on 
 he wasn’t dead from 
 the waist down nor neck 
 up so took pictures of her 
 in empty bathtubs fully clothed 
 naked minds, long exposure 
 stopped her from 
 being able to reveal her 
 skin to him 
 you left the ashen remains 
 of the dupatta clinging 
 to his hands when you left

white weddings, white funerals

when Deepika walked in 
 she intended to do nothing more 
 than tell her this was over. loving 
 married people was something 
 her mother had warned her 
             against doing 
 and somehow she still managed to 
             do it anyway. 
 she was ready to wash 
 the henna from her hands. 
 standing over the sink 
             washing and washing, 
 certain this wasn’t going 
 to be a replica of a Shakespeare. 
 she used a pen, only 
 because it was the closest thing. maybe 
 it was a nod to the one-too-many times 
 she’d heard that pen and sword quote. 
 She, was bored now. 
 weddings are: 
 long, blood-covered winding sheets, 
             relatives whose names you can’t remember, 
 funerals. 
 white to mark 
 innocence and white to 
 mark death. whiteness forced 
 into and onto brown faces. 
 then crying as the body is taken 
                                                 away. 
 she had married him 
             first, pretending. 

black marigolds

– chaandani 
           chaandani 
 – did it rain? 
 – stay. 
 – the rain took your shape. 
 – it didn't rain. 
            stay. please. 
 she told him maybe, 
 to herself counted 8 reasons 
                                               not to. 
 and then his ada strolled in. 
 8 reasons not to 
 turned to one reason to stay. 
 ada was classy –  
 but even the moon has craters. 
 the type who probably had 
 a möbius strip between her legs 
            dated the brazilian instead. 
 she was 
            a worldly woman knowing about 
 dawn and dusk and 
 everything that came between. 
 though ada had a preference for moonlight, 
 she ignored chaandani, went straight to 
 give kiran a line. 
 – light doesn't bend, and you, kiran, are extremely kinky 
 she walked round to chaandani 
 looked her up and down 
 assessing 
 then playfully slapped her with 
 a lady's glove.  
 – what about you, chanda, are you bent? 
 she elongated the name and 
 let it roll around her mouth. 
 chandaani returned the gaze 
 – I reflect off what's given to me. 
 lights now turned on 
 chandaani played with his ada. 
 stood gracefully. 
 – your ada is really something, isn't she, kiran? 
 shame she's always looking for a new dawn. 
 kiran was pissed 
 exited left, followed by her, 
 bare. 
 – Is that true, ada? are you? 
 – I guess. 
 kiran left. 
 leaving them staring up 
 into the sky looking 
 for dead birds. 

her name

when you drop sticks into a pond  
 the frogs swim away from their spawn 
 faster than the trees fall 
 from allowing 
 that last bird to 
 call its lover 
 Kanta came from a place near a pond, 
 was using sticks to prod the other children 
 when the falling branch of cypress 
 narrowly missed her head. 
 she was alive, 
 no less alive than she had been 
 when she left home that morning; 
 alive nonetheless. 
 but no. 
 Kanta would never 
 disturb the countryside again. 
 that is, until she was older. 
 she stood underneath 
 the cousin of the tree 
 that once tried to kill her 
 as she coyly called her lover. 
 he wouldn't come. 
 and in a fit of rage 
 more trees fell. 
 not of their own accord or 
 because of birds and their lovers. 
 but because her own lover 
 left her unsatisfied. 
 the trees soon learnt 
 that Kanta was trouble. 
 when she walked through 
 the woods 
 they cowered in her footsteps. 
 frogs found other ponds and 
 the fields, 
 they became bare. 
 all that was left 
 was a single rose 
 growing so close to a wall 
 one would think it was trying to prove something. 
 Kanta tried to pick 
 the white rose 
 but in doing so 
 pricked her finger. 
 and so 
 kanta was given her name.

anonymous was a woman

anonymous was a woman who 
 wrote romance only in stories 
 because living them and watching 
 love die was too hard. 
 she never knew what it was like to 
 turn heads, to be the object of 
 someone's desires and that’s why 
 she wrote love stories on her body. 
 hoping that lovers would fall in 
 love with them and in turn her. 
 she doubted herself, but her 
 stories, her words that spoke of 
 true love, she trusted them 
 more than she trusted 
 her own skin. 
 no one wants to be walking 
 propaganda for censorship 
 maybe that’s why she did it.   
 anonymous, a woman, she 
 kept it that way. waiting 
 for the ink to dry, she 
 shed her clothing. 
 the words on her skin, a 
 sign of survival marred with 
 possibilities and excitement, 
 Mashallah, they speak 
                          volumes. 
 her father had told her 
 that the female voice is awrah. 
 but even anonymous words 
 can change the world.

Mother Tongue

my mothers mother tongue is Konkani 
  but she uses my fathers language at home. 
  we have to 
  because having multilingual arguments in the house 
  would confuse M I five and 
  well, we’re just too kind for that. 
  so instead we speak Urdu: 
   a language of love   the language of poets 
  but all my mother ever hears are 
  the butchered slang words 
  young boys sling at each other 
  on the bus.  
  my mother's mother tongue is Konkani but  outside 
  the house she use english 
 good forbid anyone thinks she's a freshie. 
 she's learnt to not roll 
 her rrs and use only, 
 only sparingly but still 
 she gets asked: 
 where is your accent from? 
 hears cheap imitations of a voice 
 she's tried so hard to shake on 
 tv and film 
 and it reminds her of what she sounds like 
                             to the rest of them.  
 my mothers mother tongue is Konkani 
 but sometimes she speaks Hindi 
 like when we're out shopping  
 talking about the guy who just queue jumped in front of us. 
 She smiles when she speaks it. 
                   head up. proud. 
 brings her closer to home.  
 but then, she has to revert back 
 to the language of the colonisers 
 to finish the sale and 
                             suddenly her head lowers.  
 my mother's mother tongue is Konkani 
 but the only time she ever speaks it 
 is over the phone to 
 her mother on 
                   Sunday mornings. 
 I watch her struggle sometimes 
 as she tries to remember the word for 
 fruit but instead 
 replaces it with english or Urdu. She blames it 
 on her growing age.  
    I know she's forgotten. 
 mujhe mai che bas Konkani  
                    so should mine be.  
 I dread the day my grandmother passes for 
 I'm afraid my mother will lose her tongue. 
 she won't speak with proudness or 
 chat back with slickness. 
 and my mothers tongue, 
 will feel foreign in her mouth.

In the name of my mother, the most kind, sometimes  merciful but almost always gracious

our mothers taught us to love / taught us to love unconditionally / when a man / breaks glass tables / while showing you his nostrils / you pick up the glass / cover your hands in bandages later / make sure you don’t shake  when you bring him tea. 
 We are the girls who lived.  daughters who live past their first day are wrapped in izzat and shame and still they wonder why 
 the girls grow up wearing guilt and marrying men who 
 break glass tables          not glass ceilings] . 
 they make her wear red on her wedding day 
 so that when she bleeds it doesn’t show. 
 gold adorns her wrists so that when she cooks 
 she’s reminded of the         burning. 
 But the red dress protects her lack of         virginity 
 and the gold, she counts that and keeps it close to her heart an escape route.

1.5 generation

1.1 last night I cried / my dad came home / and told me an uncle had shouted at him for letting his daughter wear dresses / I cried / not because of the inherent sexism / the male  gaze that will never let up in our community / but because when I imagined having a conversation / with this uncle, in Urdu / I couldn’t / I got half way through telling him / what respect really meant / when I forgot the word for gaze / I couldn’t come up with the equivalent / in Hindi or Urdu / and my mother tongue bit itself / I am able to engage and interrogate certain ideas / in English but basic words / and emotions are still stuck / in my mother tongue / I cried because / even in my fantasies / I couldn’t win / an argument against my / sexist uncles

1.2 it has been too long since / I stood side by side with my mother / in the kitchen to cook / writing down / recipes to dishes / to remember them / for when I’m older / she switches them up when she tells them to me / adds extra tomatoes and yoghurt and / halves the spices / she knows something I don’t / the more / years I spend / apart from her / the less spice my tongue will be able to hold / as desi words / no longer fill my mouth / so will desi tastes vanish / from my palate / I plate my food now with extra spices / an attempt to try and get used to the / feeling of mirch and pain / on my tongue / a feeling that will grow / to become more familiar as I move closer and closer to –

1.3 my body is one with the beats / of the tabla / but my ears / can no longer / take the high-pitched tones / of the singers / the sur stops / at me. / sa / re ga ma / pa / dha ne sa / came before / do re me / but I only know the raags that feature / in the top 10. I’ve listened to remixes of remixes / until all I can I hear / are the dj / dj / dj / dj/ dj wale babu mera gana chala do / but still rejoice when Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan’s jaaniaaa / sends shivers down my spine / I start the song again / my lips opening as if Nusrat’s voice is my own / but still / even with his voice / guiding mine / I miss / the beat and start / the next line too early / my body / moves a half beat off the tabla / I pretend I’m listening in / double time / double time

1.4 women do not fit into saris / saris are made for whole women / one-point-zero women / for those of us that are 1.4 women / the yards don’t stretch enough / to make the right amount of pleats / to fall and grace curves / when we walk / the gap between our blouses and our skirts / is bigger than the space between the ground and our falls / but not greater / than the rift between our histories and us. / 1.4 of us won’t remember / to pin the pallu / before we count the pleats / we will fold the threaded sari in on itself / and buy sari-inspired jackets / with labels that cost us more than a flight ticket back / 'home' / I buy bangles from Amazon / because I’m too ashamed / to walk into a high street shop and ask the uncle for chudiyan / and pronounce it wrong / my wrists may have been made / for the constant clanging of glass / against glass / but smashing the patriarchy / makes me bleed / I bleed vermilion: sindoor / recognise it not from my relatives / but from daily dramas on Zee TV and Sony / as the pseudo-shock from the cliffhanger ending / of that last episode / hits / my sari threatens to undo itself / expose my pale skin.

1.5 generation immigrant / I am not wholly / 2nd generation / assimilated / somewhat accepted into a / community / I am / ‘too young when you came here to be 1st gen,’ / but / ‘still foreign enough to have a “home” you should go back to,’ / I’m not enough / point 5 of me is in another country / – constantly / point 5 of me is struggling to / turn my tongue in ways I used to / point 5 of me cries / at the thought of my children / not being able to hold private / conversations in public / point 5 of me orders lemon and herb instead of extra hot / point 5 of me cannot hold a duppatta straight / point 5 of me forgets if this song was an original or a remix /  point 5 of me will never remember what channel kyunki saas bhi kabhi bahu thi came on / point 5 of me / point 5 of me / point 5 of me / point 5 of me / turns to the whole of me and questions her identity / 1.5 of me sits on the borders and laughs back / one foot in each country / weight distributed so not to weigh anyone down / I take your spices / and mother tongue / and sequins and / raags and raise you as a / proud immigrant.