POETRY KITe ANTHOLOGY

LETTER FROM PUSHKAR


Wish you could see me now at Pushkar Fair –
like a bug in the straw in the midst of a crowd –
Can you imagine the smell? Hot spices,
sweat, wet cattle dung ...Have you stood close
to a camel? They’re massive with gentle, soft
eyes. Last night I sat on the shores of the lake

where people were bathing in ritual dips. This lake
is well known – as famous itself as the Pushkar Fair –
for its sunsets of saffron and red. Reflections are soft
in the lake. I was glad to escape from the crowds,
those tourists, shoving to get themselves close
to the stalls with their trinkets and spices

like scarlet-bright chillies – the fiercest of spices –
and baskets of fresh coriander green as the lake.
It is sacred, that lake, sacred to Brahma, close
to a sense of creation away from the fair
with its picturesque beggars and crowds
with their greedy, small eyes. Voices are soft

by these waters, there’s a harmony here, soft
as a sitar, although like harsh spices
that clash on the palate, other gods crowding
in with their force may save or destroy a green lake.
One may give battle for all that is fair
while another brings worlds to a close.

Do I sound like an expert on India now, close
to its wisdom – a tourist become a soft
guru who chants Now open your eyes to the fair
and the good ...? Truth is more varied than spices
in Pushkar, that beautiful, sanctified lake
is degraded, poisoned by crowds

and by centuries of garbage – I don’t mean that crowds
throw their rubbish bits in – those who are close
to the spirit of Brahma cherish the ethos, the lake
and its temples, but we are too careless, it’s us who are soft.
Enough. I am here on a tour, to barter for spices,
take photos of camels, experience Pushkar Fair.

Here are snapshots of our crowd, blurred and soft
at close of day, spices packed away in boxes,
Shiva’s moon upon the lake, upon the dwindling fair.


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