Trinidad Charlie and Other Poems

By Kapil Kachru

Shades of Movement I

In the beginning:

opinionated middle-aged techno yuppie

in upscale old city tourist trap peddling

assorted Asian curiosities, pronouncing

judgment on artistic achievement with

deliberate delicate gestures, while he’s

at it, fragile self-indulgent fingers fashion

miniature porcelain statues of himself

& place them on exotically overpriced

glass shelves, shapeless elastic shadows

leap elaborate across cold marble floor

I remember when apartment hunting

was fun in this city, he says with bitter

backlit syllables. Hope Quebec secedes

from Canada soon

in solitude &

weed grass, a pearl

tirelessly hides &

gathers moon beams

The Last Time

I raised my voice in song,

in a temple,

about eighty years ago –

A light-headed breeze

floated through the courtyard

bearing the delicate intoxication of blossoming hydrangea.

The last time

Silk banners fluttered from painted rafters,

bending and folding calligraphy for the fun of it.

Walls and windows basked in the soft red shade

of rice paper lanterns.

I listened in to the noisy gossip

of brown eared bulbuls.

Fireflies flickered in my bronze face.

The last time

Heaven bestowed ten thousand

strategic bombs on our sleepy heads.

Bright and early the next morning

an excruciating symphony shredded the air.

It took many bodies to feed the hungry flames.

American sailors found me on my side,

mostly unharmed, covered in soot and wreckage.

The last time

They shipped me straight to Liberty’s shore,

where bells still chimed its virtues.

And twice on weekends.

I’ve been sitting around silently ever since

in the public parks of this prudish city.

Troubled by its tradition of dumping perfectly good tea.

The last time

Flamboyant as an alien acrobat, a tree bends backwards

to caress the ornamental dragons on my crown

with trembling wooden tentacles. 

Anxious by nature,

light leaves earlier than usual, without saying goodbye.

An awkward guest, always eager to be somewhere else.

The last time.

Trinidad Charlie

Navel-gazing summer sky makes promises

it doesn’t plan to keep. Too distant to care,

too vain to admit it’s too busy admiring its

reflection in the shallow glimmer of a glassy bay,

while you’re being entertained by a bearded face

that’s everywhere in St. John on an iconic bottle

of pepper sauce. The best you’ve tasted & you’ve

tasted your share in your short time. I was named

after my father, he says, in an earthy tone,

without romance or regret. Europe’s only halfway,

my old man carried that name clear across

the world. Took the high road out of Bihar,

rolled into Trini on a bullock cart, with a gleam

in his eye & a song in his heart. A half Spanish lady,

half Native, all sunshine, smiled on him, brought him

wine, tapped his tune out with her Venezuelan feet

& laughed, like trickling water. The rest is family history,

frayed & faded, not forgotten. Be right back, Charlie says,

beaming a smile bright as a flashlight in a dusky grove.

Anything goes in the salty stickiness of island nights –

crickets chirp up storms, tree frogs croak their throats out,

seeking soul mates willing to listen. We’ve got stories & songs

from days of old when rum was sold in wooden casks

by the imperial gallon, & long before. You just heard one,

earlier, about a Carib elder who took his canoe

out for a paddle after dinner in the moonlit wash

of a nearby cove. Gently he paddled, back in 1493

& paddled some more. Stopped some distance

from shore to smoke his pipe. Before he pressed carved

wood to his chiseled lips, gloom spread over him –

deeper than any dark he’d known, moon ensnared in its

arrogant grip. He shivered. His tongue failed to recognize

the terror that invaded eyes. His hand shook. The pipe fell.

A three-masted caravela redonda on its second voyage

to the New World towered over him. Below deck,

Columbus scribbled piously in his leather book,

elated at being the first European to cast colonial eyes

on this abundant land, which reminded him of

eleven thousand virgins. Strictly for saintly reasons,

of course. The bearded face of pepper sauce,

bottled with love in St. John, doesn’t care to comment.

His silence speaks spicy volumes. Charles Dayal Singh

returns with a tray of bright bowls. Best not dwell

on it, he says, handing you a salad of fresh picked

mangoes & cucumbers from his garden,

it ruins the flavor.

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Born in Lucknow. Based in Boston. Kapil’s poems and stories have appeared in journals, magazines and anthologies in India, Japan, The Netherlands, UK and the US. Including Inverse Journal, La Piccioletta Barca, NOON: journal of the short poem, The Bangalore Review and The Bombay Literary Magazine. ‘Negligible Inertia’, his debut collection of poems was published by Writers Workshop, India.

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