Waiting in Mussoorie for the birdfeed to 

drop to the bottom of the cage was 

wishing for the cold to pass, for the 

  

mountains to rumble again and move as 

large waves of land flooding the valleys- 

 always disappointing. 

  

Your shoes left in their place an emptiness. 

 

I heard 

    

  

the         train at night 

         as a ship rolling, 

violent  in the   ocean 

of maize,         cutting 

through        crests of 

waves      violet in the 

moonlight,    with my 

head   pressed to the 

          complimentary 

pillow,   watching my 

eyes  drift like moons 

  

across the    window. 

A mountain range of

bodies   outlined the

sleeper car,         and 

one could nestle in a 

valley of    anonymity 

when the  prickly rail 

way blankets blanket 

the    details of one’s 

skin and how           it 

shines in the night so 

  

a       wandering man 

won’t uncover me to 

find a girl who found 

herself  stillborn and 

left home  five nights 

   after her discovery 

losing sensation, 

so a woman waking 

in the night   to visit 

the bathroom won’t 

touch a life      taken 

  

  

away too late 

losing sensation as 

I travelled up north.   

  

  

  

I want to tell you about the rain. 

The rain falls here as a rebirth of snow. Rainfall here is 

a baptism and it pinkens the cheeks of children playing 

in the fields and slickens the tiled roofs to a glistening 

orange, like they’re holy. It makes my desperate footfalls 

running through the thicket a rhythm for the raindrops to 

swing to; they dance into the night and 

  

forget me, forget 

  

the mountains are too clean for me. 

  

  

  

Forget me, forget 

  

me dancing like I have feet, smiling and not feeling 

how my skin stretches over my teeth, touching and 

feeling how the feeling came so easily.  

  

Row me down the stream 

like I’m a baby you want to leave 

to the mountains, on my knees. 

  

I want to be left 

to the mountains, on my knees.