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Rehmat Ali's wife sat down
quietly and said
someone else had opened up
her head.
Raju's mother started laughing
and they had to call the Brahmin in.
Ayub Khan's auntie went to the khassi,
met her djinn,
and started to speak in foreign tongues.
Mala killed a chicken and cooked it
with all the feathers on.
Naseem set fire to the bed,
and promised next time
he'd be in it.
Mary ran naked down the street.
Someone threw a sheet over her.
Anita never spoke back
to her mother-in-law,
but one day the devil did.
Sarah put slugs
in the cooking-pot
and waited for her bridegroom
to arrive.
Fatima was buried alive
and crawled out next day.
Dhamyanti was sitting under a tree
when the spirit swallowed her soul
like a sparrow.
This is a narrow road,
but we are on it,
more of us every day,
shouting out loud to one another
as if we'd met before, somewhere
on the way.
They can say we're out of control.
They can say we've gone
to the devil.
We are able to hear each other
now, laughing, screaming,
singing
with one mouth.
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