Description
The Visitor
I.
A row of crosses watch over this cemetery.
They are blue giants, their arms outstretched
and lined with blossoms –
the soul’s fingerprints. The lavender sun sinks
gradually. These crosses approach
a cluster of graves
packed with a quiché lullaby,
covered in everyday doors of every color
except white. And some have knockers,
brass and lovely. And some are cracked and splintered,
ordinary and worn. We keep them company,
uncover each grave. We bring something good.
The pulp of fruit or honey bread,
a calabash, and our words
like the rain our dead drink.
II.
I do not imagine myself below
waiting for a visitor, a friend
in the shape of a sister, or listening
to the rain and remembering
that metallic sound it made
against the tin roof of the house I’ve left
in the backyards of my childhood.
But hope that when I pass, and you remove
the blue door from off of me
that your words are moist like rain. Will they make me
shudder the way a woman once did
in Chichicastenango, singing softly
ever so softly while braiding her daughter’s hair?
© Seshu Badrinath 
