Living with Earthquakes

When He comes
Out of the blue
A meteorite
Shattering your home
Be sure
God is visiting you.

                TUKARAM
                     (translated by Dilip Chitre)

You thought you asked for peace,

thought there would be time

to contemplate

a modular kitchen,

a beloved’s eyes over a glass of rosé,

        a world spinning gracefully out of orbit

        outside a soundproof window.

You never expected this architecture

of thinning girder,

    collapsing

        beam,

this glass elevator

    plummeting

past picnicking families,

Pomeranians in suburban gardens,

sturdy investment bankers,

vaporising faces,

names losing their voltage –

this scaffold of air.

You didn’t smell the danger,

never picked up the clues.

Outside, the view blurs –

sun-baked pyramid to pagoda,

river valley to moraine –

and the devourer of form,

once a genteel termite,

now at your jugular, foaming,

inflamed

by bloodlust, almost

familiar.

So this is what you summoned

those nights

when the universe seemed not to listen,

not peace,

but this carnival

                    of unmooring,

this catamaran love.