Eugene Datta’s recent work has appeared or is forthcoming in a number of publications, including The Dalhousie Review, Rust & Moth, Hamilton Stone Review, and Main Street Rag. He has received fellowships or residencies from Stiftung Laurenz-Haus, Ledig House International Writers’ Colony, and Fundación. Born in India, he lives in Aachen, Germany. His first collection of poetry, Water and Wave, was published by Redhawk Publications.
A Good Name
Do you remember that first flood
in Canning? she asked,
a bag of bones wrapped in what was left
of a mud-white sari. It took my son,
cows and home. Her clotted-
smoke eyes squinting against the heat
of the summer noon. I cannot see
well, and my girl – she, too, is old now –
is stone-blind. The other son brought us
to the city and died soon after – stones
in the stomach, they said. Dust-
caked feet shook in ancient Hawaiian
slippers with mismatched straps. Give me
what you can, baba.
The ding of a single one-rupee coin
dropped in the empty bowl
made a smile rise like a crescent
moon. My name, she said,
is Sumati (she who has good intent) –
it’s a good name. Give it to a daughter
if you have one, or a niece, or some child
you love as your own.
It Wouldn’t Be Alms
We didn’t have either the time or the willingness,
but couldn’t refuse the ride when he took off his phiran
and in one swift, unbroken move, in the blink of an eye,
folded the long wool garment into a neat cushion for two
and placed it on his rough-and-ready sled of raw, damp wood.
Guilt-ridden, we let him pull us along Gulmarg’s lonely
snow-covered promenade, so that it wouldn’t be alms
that he’d take from us, but payment for his labor. They’d had
no visitors there for days, thanks to the war, and he hadn’t had
any work. But he wouldn’t touch, he said to us, money he didn’t earn.