Three Poems by Kavita Ezekiel Mendonca

 

Leaving

Three short poems on the theme of Expat Angst, Belonging and Identity. Previously published in the recent anthology 'Angst.'

Packing

What is leaving after all?

It’s taking yourself along

Every place you go

So you’ve never really left

You’ve packed yourself in the luggage

Your name is written on it.

Like Hansel and Gretel

I threw crumbs in the forest

The birds ate them

I can’t find my way home.

Perhaps the birds have returned home

Carried me on their wings.

 

Lost

Father told me not to leave

Stay and do something for my country

I closed my ears and my mind

Now I can’t find my way home

To where I really belong.

Wondering why I didn’t heed the message

I am like the plant

A ‘Wandering Jew.’

Will I wander in the wilderness

For forty more years?

I need Moses to lead me out of the desert.

 

 

The Forest

Hansel and Gretel

Threw white pebbles in the forest

To mark their way back home

The first time they succeeded

How many pebbles will it take

To trace my steps?

How much moonlight

From this continent to mine?

Will the pebbles gleam in the moonlight?

Be my compass, point the way?

 I stand here by the shining lake

Tossing pebbles in the water.

 

Kavita Ezekiel Mendonca - In a career spanning over four decades, Kavita Ezekiel Mendonca has taught English in Indian colleges, AP English in an International School nestled in the foothills of the Himalayan mountains in India, and French and Spanish in private schools in Canada. Her poems are featured in various journals and anthologies, including the Journal Of Indian Literature published by the Sahitya Akademi and the Yearbook of Indian Poetry in English. Kavita has authored two collections of poetry, ‘Family Sunday and Other Poems’ and ‘Light of The Sabbath.’ Her poem ‘How To Light Up a Poem,’ was nominated for a Pushcart prize in 2020. Kavita is the daughter of the late poet Nissim Ezekiel. Her name Kavita means poem in Sanskrit.  She was born and raised in Bombay, India, and currently lives in Calgary, Canada. Many of her poems celebrate the city of her birth and her Indian Jewish heritage.