You Shiva and My Mum
Shall I tell how she went to India
At the age of eighty
For a week in the monsoon

Because her last unmarried son
Was getting married to a girl
With a mask of yellow turmeric on her face

At the shrine of Maa Markoma
In the forest where Orissa’s last
Recorded human sacrifice took place?

How this mother of mine rode a motorbike,
Pillion, up a leopard-and-leeches path
Through jungle at full moon,

Getting off to shove away
The sleeping buffalo,
Puddled shaves of sacred calf?

How she who hates all frills
Watched her feet painted scarlet henna,
Flip-flop pattern between the toes
And backward swastikas at heel, without a murmur?
How she climbed barefoot to Shiva
Up a rock-slide – where God sat

Cross-legged, navy blue,
On a boulder above his cave,
One hand forbidding anyone impure,

Or wearing leather, to come in?
How she forded Cobra River
In a hundred degrees at noon

To reach the God’s familiar – his little bull of stone,
A pinky blaze of ribbons, bells, hibiscus –
And, lifelong sceptic that she is,

The eyes of all the valley on her – Tribal, Hindu,
Atheist and Christian – bowed? Shall I tell how you
Laughed and fondly at me for my pride

In her? How I wait on the miracle
Of your breath in my ear? Shall I tell
Them? Yes. Tell that.