Imtiaz Dharker

In the Year of My Death

    When I was twenty-five
        the Shadow Reader said
            I would live to a ripe old age.

                    He licked his finger, flicked a page
                        and told me the year of my death.
                            That year has arrived.


*

                        Shadow Reader

                Midday, and we are climbing the stairs
            from Perfect Electronix and Electric Dreamz
        to the second floor in one of those buildings
    that had a life before it was painted pistachio
green, blistered by time and salt off the sea.

                Bunches of wires swagger up the stairwell,
            wagging a finger, ready to coil and drag
        me up if I falter. I don’t want to know
    my future. All I want is to turn around
and walk away down Chowpatty beach,

                along the shore where the coconut sellers
            and paper windmills are, but these are early days.
        when I still give in to other people’s whims,
    so here I am standing at a spidered door,
waiting to meet the Shadow Reader.


*

Where you belong

You can squat in this room if you don’t say a word,
you can stay in this town if you pay for a room,
you can go on this train if it’s off-peak,
you can speak your mind if you change your look,
you can have your chance if you don’t expect luck,
you can be in the group if you get enough likes,
you can live with family if you toe the line,
you can keep your children if we countersign,
you can enter this church if you quote the book,
you can open the book if you close your mind,
you can save our time if you follow the rules,
you can play a role if you buy the mask,
you can take on the task if no one else wants it,
you can ask the question if you never offend,
you can belong but only if you don’t stay too long,
you can end it now or start over again,
you can follow the signs but never turn back,
you can see you have run out of time and years,
you can leave in tears or go with a laugh,
you can take your clothes but leave your shoes and
your attitude behind, it does you no favours, and
you can do us a favour, don’t change your mind.


*

Back

When the person holding your passport says,
You’ll have to go back where you came from,
you are four again, crossing the bridge at Jamaica
Street, the River Clyde rolling under your feet
away to the sea where ships set sail;

and when the woman in the queue mutters
This is not where you belong, you think of
the way light plays hide-and-seek
over the hills on the Sunday morning ride
up the Campsie Fells;

and when the man outside the pub looks you up
and down and says, Go back to your country,
you know you could squash the stoater,
if you could be bothered, with Go back
to yer cave and bile yer heid, ye dolly walloper!

and even if you’re wired to the moon,
that’s when your heart goes home and you
coorie doon, all of Glasgow shining in your window,
because this is where you came from,
the place that will always have you back.


*

For the girl whose hair escaped

The things that can happen
in the back of the van.
The culprit can be just sitting there
and out of nowhere the jaw
comes apart and the teeth
are lying on the floor.
Amazing, if you think
about it. Next thing you know
she is lying against the door
with cracked ribs, the air
squeezed out of her lungs.
It’s a wonder, the way
she picks up her body, all
the broken bones, climbs
to the top of the precinct roof
and throws herself off.
You wouldn’t believe it
but here it is in the Report,
in black and white

white as white
as the light she escapes to,
black as black
as her rampant hair.
 

    11     In the Year of My Death
    13     Out of the rose garden
    14     Story
    15     (But the roses are savages)
    17     The map of this country is made of scars
    19     Face to face
    21     Witness
    23     The Show
    24     They brought glass beads
    26     Boy with a Turban
    27     Letters home
    29     Did anyone say what happened to the girl?
    31     Loom
    33     The weaver makes a pitch
    35     (This is not a prayer mat)
    36     Shadow Reader
    37     The weaver tells the spell
    41     Demons Rule
    43     What goes of your father?
    44     Fly
    47     I am Not Alone
    49     The Shadow Reader Is Measuring
    50     Saying No
    51     Pink
    52     Chori
    54     Where you belong
    55     What it grows into
    56     Back
    57     Redeem
    59     (When you hear the wind)
    60     The welcome
    62     The key
    63     Reader
    64     The piece
    66     For the Minicab Driver Who Looked as if He Needed Feeding
    67     For the Woman Who Will Bring Biryani Next Time
    68     For the Girl on the Elizabeth Line
    69     For the Woman Who Changed Back to a Snake
    70     Cross
    71     So How Does This Work? I ask
    73     (A door full of light)
    74     Swiping Left on Larkin
    76     Let’s Meet in the Place Called Jazz
    77     In Which I Am Ghosted by William Blake
    79     I Find Faiz Blowing on His Saucer of Tea
    81     Away
    83     There are no words
    84     Next
    85     For the girl whose hair escaped
    87     What it is like
    88     What you can buy with a bangle
    89     Naa Ja
    90     However
    93     It was the fault of the clothes
    94     (Only you can tell)
    95     They arrive
    96     Fold
    98     They leave
    99     As they go
    100     (Take one step forward)
    103     They are walking
    105     Night Walk with Ghosts, Smithfield
    106     Night Walk with Dancing Bones
    107     Night Walk by the Canal
    108     Night Walk with Lit Windows
    110     Night Walk with Fox
    111     Night Walk with Blackbird
    113     Night Walk with Voices
    115     Cranes lean in
    116     Seen from a drone, Delhi
    118     Seen from a drone, Mumbai
    120     Seen from a drone
    121     On mute
    122     One says this, another says that
    123     X
    124     (Life chases your feet)
    125     Sweeping
    127     Writing the Will
    129     She Is Trying On the Pre-loved Shoes
    130     What Bunny-Auntie Says to Bobby-Uncle
    131     She Has an Off-day
    132     Bobby Saves Nature to the Cloud
    133     Auntie Death Says She Slays
    134     Bubbles Experiences a Moment of Dread
    135     She Contemplates Her Death
    136     Donor
    137     Night Visitors
    138     The Host
    141     The Guest
    143     With empty hands
    144     You write a window
    145     Go to the child
    147     (This is the embrace)
    148     You are
    150     We are holding
    151     But the radiance
    153     (We turn our faces up)
    154     Your Session Has Been Terminated
    155     Everywhere the angels
    156     I Walk in the Shadow
       
    158     Acknowledgements