Divya Victor
SELECTED POEMS
an excerpt from Family Portraits
A.
Kanyakumari District, 'Tamil Nadu, India.
21 May 1991I am 8 years old and waking up to my mother whispering in
my ear: “I’m going to tell you something. When you wake up
everyone will be talking about this. Rajiv Gandhi has been
assassinated. You don't have to wake up right away."When Rajiv Gandhi was pausing to hug children on his campaign
trail, Thenmozhi Rajaratnam, a young girl, had walked up to
him with 700 grams of RDX explosives snug under her clothes.
They said she was a girl soldier for the Liberation Tigers of Tamil
Eelam (Tamil Tigers).For days after that, the photographic aftermath of the
assassination sprawls on miles or inky front pages. The Hindu and
Dinakaran are damp with splayed bodies edged in neon purple
or blackened by the RGB rush or grainy and mealy in black and
white. Rubber chappals are scattered everywhere— everywhere
unpaired. Many things are without context or continuity. Necks
end where they shouldn't. Ankles on their own.I hold the front page up to my face framed by two thick black
braids. I hold the Reuters photographs one inch away from my
eyes. When no one is looking, I try to peer into the holes in
the bodies— peer sideways into the lacerations. I try to match
scattered body parts from different newspapers; I beg my older
cousins to buy the evening post. the morning post, the socialist
post. They buy me rose milk at the newspaper stand. I insist,
pressing the translucent broadsheets to the TV screen waiting for
the right thigh or left foot to line up. The dots are disconnected;
the crayon is clutched.
by Divya Victor
from Kith (2017)
