Mahtab
Mahtab was a virtual
orphan my mother
took in. She put warm,
clove scented oil
on the welts, purple
and blue bruises.
She became Mahtab's
intermediary, sent
her home unwillingly.
One evening, the girl lost
a spatula: fine copper
with silver polish.
It was
late November.
Knee deep in water,
the girl
with a dark face
could not find
a spatula.
It was night already
and Mahtab lunged
after silvery fish.
They slipped from her
hands, the spatula must
have hidden behind
a heavy, moss covered
stone, sickly green.
How could Mahtab go home?
"Bhatanya Dedi," she said
to my mother, "they will
kill me."
Mahtab's tears were warm,
her hands cold like ice;
her hair took many full
buckets to get clean.
She became beautiful.
Fifteen years later,
my mother went back
to Mahtab's town
and wanted to see her.
The girl had died
in childbirth; there was
no grave, they said.
If there was one,
no one could find it.
"Bhatani! why
do you care so much?"
they said.
My mother is not
an ideologue.
In her dreams
Kashmir is Mahtab
whose grave
she cannot find.
[© Lalita Pandit, May 18, 1998].
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