This evening it's raining. It has rained for so long there is nothing
      to do.
Maryellen knocks on my door and says, Hia do you want to walk
      outside?
But I only listen to the rain and hope for something better to do
(why this selfish feeling, I can't say, a kind of stiffness as in late
      fall).
It keeps raining and gets dark.
Everyone returns to the dorm. It is dark and also it is Sunday, the
      worst possible mix
like the time in childhood before sleep, no lights on anywhere
      except beyond the blinds.
And on Sunday, even books appear dull when I cross the long and
      slow gap from one word to the next.
Even our mascot Brandy is bored, his snout buried under a paw.
Then I had had enough.
I find Maryellen needlepointing a cloth, and she asks if I still want to
      go, even in the dark.
Yes I say, let's go.
She is more generous than I and puts her sewing down.
So we wear slickers and boots and walk arm in arm into the rain,
past the brick halls, past the white Gymnasium and the oblong
      dome,
right off campus, it isn't allowed but we go,
right down the dark shiny street into town.
With no plan for the night we walk on past the traffic lights,
and we say something about walking till Monday when the dorm
monitors change,
because we want to avoid the strict rules of conduct, the council's
      admonishment.
The sound of rain rises like brown drums, and water slips from our
      yellow coats, and a thin yellow light surrounds us: --
we are very bright, like two bulbs of light seeing the city from a
      dark roof!

                                          after Vicente Aleixandre

DAYS IN PUNJAB, 1960-67

The sanseviera plants were vicious and hardy along the bricks in
      front.
And when relatives visited, my mother-in-law's tongue was quick to
      the point.

In the dining room, lotus floated in a bowl; and when they wilted,
       we took our time removing them.
Every day I contended with the constant dust on the window and
       over six yards of my sari's hem.

And of the banyan tree, I'd think abundant tree: the peepul and
       palmyra grew wild beyond our garden.
Pantry left unlocked, the servants stole food I'd later need; though I
       took it and even them for granted.

Mali watered the lawn morning and night and reported on the rose
       bushes: blooming memsahib.
For shopping, Faye and I travelled by train to Delhi until the curfew,
       keeping us in Punjab.

We threw kitchen scraps and old flowers to the eager goats at the
      back door.
At three, we waited for the postman's cycle bell and had tea a few
      times before the war.

Always green, the patch of mint never failed me. I'd shred some in
      jugs of water.
My son dug a ditch between raids and lined the gap with cloth
      should any cat need shelter.

We grew fruit trees, never short of guavas in season; looking back,
      they were lovely.
And those evenings we often debated how we might have changed
       the country in some way.

mail (Hindi) -- gardener

TWO CITIES

That 4 a.m. I lay
back on the living room
couch, seeing as it was
still night. At 5 a.m.
Elle's light in Unit B
upstairs came on, and she
sailed down the wooden steps
and drove off to bake bread
until two. Then I thought
of you doing to me
those things you described on
the phone. I in utter
surprise kept asking, Would
you really? Yes, you would.
But you had not phoned me
this morning, though it flew
anyway: I heard you
patiently interrogate.
At first I didn't know
what to do.

      Six years later
this was better for all
the time taken out, gone
were the unimportant
miles between our cities,
even better than on
the phone or in person,
though it was without doubt
only you in your absence.
Then the sun rose, wiping
away this entanglement,
as I shake creases out
of the sheets and fold them
like a note I will send
to tell you how things are
going, pretty much the
same and good on this end.

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Poetry, Part I

Poetry, Part III