Karma (3 page)

What?

Jiva.

No, Amar! It's a boy's name.

It's a name for girls as well.

I will not name my daughter after your father!

We'll talk about it later, Leela.

When you're back to normal.

We'll talk about it now!

The child should have a beautiful name.

It is beautiful!

It is a Sikh name.

It will offend my goddess.

Leela, there is only one God
!

With the utterance of these words a second time,

my parents' world tilts on its axis. The horizon

moves. Somewhere a river floods over a field.

Islands are forming, drifting.

Maya. I will call her Maya,
my mother whispers.

It is her destiny.

My father goes out the back door. His black eyes red with anger.
Maya,
he spits.
Goddess of Illusion.
Not reality.

He remembers what his father said:

The world is a dream,

Any moment it may pass away;

Thou has built a house of sand,

How can it endure?

All this is Maya.

I should have listened and insisted you become Sikh, Leela, or never married you! That was your destiny!

Name

My birth certificate reads
Jiva
.

It means
“soul”
in Sanskrit.

But my mother privately called me Maya.

“
Illusion.” “Change.”
From Sanskrit too.

The truth of it— what my two names really mean— is that I was born into a division that began long before me.

Munsa Devi

This is where we pray, Maya.

In Hindi. Not Punjabi.

(In the red barn behind our house.)

This is our goddess
.

Of desire.

And fertility.

(But I'm afraid of her. And that snake in her hand.)

This is our altar.

And these are our gifts to her.

Water.

Fruit.

Incense.

Blue vermilion.

Golden turmeric.

Mata, is Munsa Devi married to the man in Bapu's picture?

You mean Guru Nanak?

Yes. He is Sikh. She is Hindu.

Like you and Bapu.

Maya, never let your father hear you ask that question.

Now on your knees.

Three times.

Every day.

Maya means “dream”

This is what my mother tells me when I'm five.

So dream away
,
Maya.

Her name is Jiva
, Bapu says, rolling a piece of

chapati
in his hand.

Why not Maya, Bapu? Why can't my name be Maya?

He sighs and leans close to my face.

Look at me, Jiva. What do you see?

Your beard?

What else?

My Bapu!

Yes, your Bapu. But one day when you are older, you will see that I was just a dream. And your mother too. This life isn't real, Jiva. It's a veil that prevents us
from seeing the truth. The truth that is God's life. This life is nothing but an illusion.

He turns back to his food.

Amar!
my mother shouts.
You're scaring the child.

(Actually, I'm just confused.)

She needs to know the truth, Leela.

She's five!

Maya
means
“Delusion,”
Leela. Maya is what a Sikh tries to escape from during his life on earth.
He pushes away from the table.

But why do you want to escape from me?

(Now I am crying.)

Not you, Maya. I mean not you, Jiva. The point is one can only attain spiritual enlightenment by escaping the trance of Maya.

Mata picks me up in her arms and argues back:
One can also attain spiritual enlightenment through compassion.

Your name is Jiva,
Bapu says, as the screen door

slams behind him.
Don't forget.

Dear Maya,

Life is an illusion.

And as it turns out, so is death.

What is real?

What remains when we all fade away?

Two things: Love. Forgiveness.

Don't forget.

October 29–30, 1984

Home

India bubbles like lava.

Waves of heat stir the air into water.

Black asphalt turns to pitch.

The plane lands on the soft grey tarmac and sinks.

Bapu puts his turban on his head.

Balances Mata's ashes on his lap.

He sighs and whispers,
We're home.

He's not talking to me.

We've arrived

Not yet to Chandigarh,
City Beautiful
, where Mata's sisters weep and wail for the mourning month, not yet to the Golden State of Punjab and its angry air, but New Delhi. City of stink and noise. Streets clogged with flesh. Voices loud and soft.

Sounding of despair.

Smelling of pee.

No eat no eat

hungry

a one-armed woman pleads

hungry

her invisible hand

rupees

finds my arm

rupees

paws and paws

no eat

gives me shivers

give me rupees

her eyes are saucers

no eat one week

her skull a moon

hungry

white bone

hungry

white stone under skin

Look away, Jiva,
Bapu says.

But I can't.

no eat no eat

her children whimper

no eat no eat

sing their song of hunger

no eat no eat

with bellies swollen

no eat

like party balloons

Look away. You can't help them.

no eat

the mother bares her breast

no eat

a shriveled apple of sustenance

no eat

Look.

Away.

Rickshaw rickshaw

rickshaw rickshaw

you want rickshaw

No rickshaw,
Bapu says to the small brown man, but he pretends not to hear.

where you go

where you go

The man's skin is dry.

Veined and lined like leather.

my rickshaw fast

very very fast

His body twists and writhes, coils around Bapu's arm.

good price

just for you

returning son of India

My father has brought me to a country where snakes can talk.

where you go

I take you

come come

NO RICKSHAW
, Bapu shouts at the man. He shrinks to the ground, hissing.

good price

Chai

A hand tugs at my arm holds up a small earthen cup.

chai chai

It belongs to a boy, small, yet his face is old. He could be nine or twenty or thirty-seven.

one rupee chai

He puts the chai into my hand, presses my fingers around the unbaked clay.

drink now chai chai

The tea is brown like a puddle.

one rupee

And swirling like an eddy.

chai rupee rupee chai

I hear voices rising out of the cup.

chai rupee rupee

Crying.

chai rupee rupee chai

Weeping.

chai rupee chai chai

Like crows plucked alive.

eat rupee rupee eat aiii hungry rupee chai

The air rings with longing and pain.

aiii rupee aiii rupee

The ground shakes with heartbreak

and sorrow.

aiii rupee aiii chai

I raise the cup to my lips.

aiii aiii aiii

The tea slides down my throat and I swallow India.

Don't ever leave my side!

Bapu grabs my arm and the cup falls.

why you drop chai

It breaks into pieces.

you pay me one rupee

Clay shards returned to dust.

now now you pay me

But I am dragged away.

you pay you pay

Before I can pay.

Keep walking, Jiva, and close your ears.

But I cannot close my ears.

aiii aiii

The voices seep in.

aiii aiii

Spilled tea darkening the earth.

aiii aiii

A hungry chorus.

eat

Swallowing me.

eat eat

Until I am one of them.

aiii

Wanting.

hungry

Needing.

eat rupee rupee

We are sick in our wanting and need.

Don't listen!
Bapu shouts above the crowd.

eat rupee rupee chai

Don't listen?

That's the answer?

eat eat rupee rupee

Don't listen to hunger?

Don't listen to pain?

A bony hand reaches out and claws my father's arm. A woman swings a skinny baby close to his face.

a week a week

no eat a week

He stops.

Looks into the mother's eyes.

Her tears run flat streams.

Then eat your children,
Bapu says.

Who are you?

What would you have me do, Jiva?

Feed all the starving?

Buy them artificial limbs?

Buy their children?

No. Of course not,
I shout back.

Just see them.

See their pain.

Acknowledge their suffering.

I am tired of pain,
he says.

He grabs my hand.

Pulls me through the crowd.

I know I'm stepping on people's feet.

And besides, there's nothing we can do, Jiva. Perhaps they'll do better in their next life.

But I think he means they should have done better in their last.

Karma.

Returning son of India

I don't know this side of my father.

Cold.

Detached.

Cruel.

Walking proudly past the poor, the hungry, the wounded, the amputees of limb and soul.

Returning son of India.

How can he not see?

At home, he notices every person on the street.

(Their stares. Their downward glances.)

He smiles awkwardly and says hello.

He touches his turban, the nervous tick of forefinger to the temple.

He never puts his hand out first.

But here, he's different.

Confident.

Even strutting.

Is this his true home?

This country where he doesn't stick out like a sore thumb?

Home.

A place where no one stares.

And no one cares.

Dear Maya,

It's not easy to live in a country far from where you're born. It's not easy to go home.

Overheard on Main Street, Elsinore

-  You know the country's going to shit when they let the towel-heads in.

-  I heard he hides a knife under that hat.

-  And I heard he gives away a free carpet when you buy a set of tires!

-  Hey, Amar! Hope your head gets better soon!

-  Leave him alone, boys. You'll need Mr. Singh when your tractor breaks down.

Overheard at the I.G.A. grocery store

-  It's called a sari.

-  It must be hard to walk in.

-  Do you think it's only for going out?

-  For shopping in Elsinore? Kind of fancy for these parts.

-  Bob was in their house last week, you know, and he said she wears it at home too.

-  How would you do housework with that end flung over the shoulder?

-  I hear the old Franz place smells of curry.

Real spicy. Jack must be turning over in his grave.

-  Do you think it's made of silk?

-  I hear they're rich. Used to have servants.

Look at her jewelry. It's all gold, you know.

-  Well, if they're that well-off, what are they doing in Elsinore? Who in their right mind would move here?

The Sari Emporium

You must have something to wear,
Bapu insists as he pushes open a door on Arya Samaj Road.

The din of traffic fades away.

He means: something to wear to meet the relatives who only know me from photographs.

You must look Indian or they will not like you.

(Like I care.)

There are no Indian clothes in my suitcase at the hotel. I packed only jeans and T-shirts. Bapu shouted loudly when he discovered this fact too late.

They'll think you're a Western whore!

Well, Bapu, you're the one who encouraged Mata to wear pants and where has that gotten us?

I thought he might hit me.

(A first for me. Helen says she's smacked regularly.)

But Bapu didn't touch me. Instead his face turned grey and he walked out of the hotel room without saying a thing.

I wanted to yell like Mata used to:
Go ahead, leave me alone here. What do you care for how my life is?
But instead, I just lay on the bed and cried.

Silk

Inside the air-conditioned store, the staff of young women flutter around me like pretty birds. Their bracelets shake. They smile. Touch my clothes. Stroke my wavy unoiled hair that I refused to braid this morning.

See the scene you've caused
, Bapu says under his breath.

Because of my jeans.

(Because I tore up all my saris after Mata died.)

Because they know we're not from here.

(Orange silk blowing in an open prairie window.)

I shall have to pay more now.