Many thanks for all your comments on this, and for my delay in responding. I
think this is one I need to put away for a while. I really want it to work,
because I like Marjani so much, but there are obviously problems. Christina
commented with justice that it seems too 'unreal'.
 
Many thanks,
Margaret



----- Original Message ----- 
From: grasshopper 
To: [log in to unmask] 
Sent: Friday, November 24, 2006 6:54 AM
Subject: New sub: Shopping for Fruit


          Shopping for Fruit
.......
        ('Every morn and every night
........Some are born to sweet delight.' - William Blake)
Marjani walks to the market with her sister,
the houseboy three respectful steps behind.
Her lowered eyes travel on her feet
which sweep like brush-twigs, swirling
the dust. Her sandals sweep away the thoughts
that crowd her path, sweet thorn, the span
of gnat-wings, a mountain's shadow, all
inside her head, circled by a tussah scarf.

Her fingertips linger on a bolt of indigo cloth, plump
as a thrush's breast. It sings to her of arches,
deep-shadowed gardens, marble fountains
behind elaborate gates. Then it slides beneath
her grasp. She curves her palm on a melon,
fat and orange, presses its navel to test
the ripeness, lifts the small heavy bellies
of figs, green weights sweat-sticky on her flesh.

Beyond a white wall, prayer rises to heaven
in a hundred coloured strands. The sky is the holiest sight,
she thinks. Surely God's eyes are blue. Her sister
cradles plantains. They both wait for the needful child.
This evening, with well-washed hands, she will prepare
a meal for the unknown husband who comes near
only at night. Marriage is strange and sharp as smells
that curl from the Somali neighbour's kitchen. Spices stirred
by gold-bangled black hands, pink when they open.

When her husband is away and his mother snores,
Marjani steals outside and unveils her shoulders
to the stars. Today she holds bright air in her fingers,
tastes the sun on her tongue. Once she had words,
but they flew away on a blue silk bird, beyond the hills
inside the sky. Now she smiles, silent as a new-laid egg.

 

                                                   (M.A.Griffiths)