Very briefly then,
I am mid­dle class
and very Madras.

Born and raised in
West Mambalam-
the oth­er side of the rail­way tracks
where fabled mos­qui­toes turn peo­ple into
elephants.

Went to col­lege in
Khush­boo sarees stripped
right off the absurd­ly volup­tuous man­nequins at
Sar­a­vana stores T.Nagar Chen­nai 17.

To wed­dings I wore,
in def­er­ence to my mother,
silk kan­jee­varams with tem­ple borders.
Every oth­er girl
was a design­er-sequined shimmer.

I thought noth­ing of
throw­ing away
my dream­ing hours on
MTC’s 47 A,
sit­ting beside women who ruined my
view,
           
lean­ing casu­al­ly across to
spit or
chuck
through the grime of  windows
spinach stems they didn’t fancy
in their evening Kuzam­bu,
hurl­ing  moth­er­ly advice at
young men who dared death by
swinging,
two-fingered,
from oth­er women’s windows.

My idea of a holiday
was rolling down the hillsides
of Ooty,
dressed in white
like Sridevi.

Objects of love-hate:
the auto annas.

And of course it is cof­fee that defines
the lim­its of my imagination.
I nev­er could think of it as
cap­puc­ci­no or mocha or
any­thing oth­er than
decoc­tion coffee,
deep brown like my own Dra­vid­i­an skin.
                                                                                             
Lunch:
10.30 sharp: samb­har rasam curry

Tif­fin:
5 sharp: idli dosa vada

My idea of arc­tic winter:
twen­ty six degree centigrade.

And so on and so forth
as they don’t say in Tamil.

Nev­er mind this new upstart Chennai.
Madras, my dear, here I come!
About me, rest assured,
there is
no Bom­bay, no Del­hi, no London
and cer­tain­ly no New York.
I am all yours,
Madras, my dear,
wrap and filling!

 

Fea­tured in Poet­ry Inter­na­tion­al Web, Novem­ber 2, 2011
 

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