Foreigner
by Jyotsna Das
(1)
I have never been more curious than when I first took off your clothes.
I turned the light that I might see if the hair between your marble thighs
is also western chrome.
Your arms were never longer than when you held my tiny body.
Wide Asian hips. Small Asian breasts, growing firm under the roughness of your giant palms.
I have never been so brown than against the milky white of your flesh,
or more native than in your gaze, when it goes searching out for mystery
in my oriental face.
(2)
You seemed surprised when you came home last night
that I had cooked for you.
No man had ever such a look of gratitude
for such an obvious thing.
I saw you by the kitchen door
and I swept the screaming lids
from the cooking pots on the stoves.
What smell arrested you I cannot tell,
but I saw you breathe in the steam,
before you pressed me to the wall,
and moved your alien mouth along
the spices on my neck.
(3)
In your eyes,
I am a wild exotic fruit,
ripe and bursting
with abundance,
full of bright flesh,
and the warmth
of tropic summers.
One you travelled
the world to pick—
a lingering taste
of spice and earth
and raspy smells,
that you will savour
when you are home
in another continent.