MIRACLE FRUIT poems by Aimee Nezhukumatathil
Dorset, Vermont: Tupelo Press, 2003

Table Manners

In India, Northerners pride themselves
on eating only with their fingertips,
while Southerners enjoy their foods
with the entire hand, to the wrist if need be.

No wonder JoAnn and I sit stunned
at the dinner table as our cousins
scoop and slurp their lunch: dried fish
in gingilly oil, poori soaked first

in sambar then cooled in cucumber rayta.
I motion to Oomana, the servant girl:
do you have fork, spoon? She laughs
a little longer than necessary, then

disappears into the storage room.
Each finger-lick makes us grimace
but secretly I want to join them
in slick-smacking this beautiful food.

The three-year-old sees my fork
and cries until he gets one
of his own to bang and draw
lines in his plate of sauce.

No one here ever wishes
you happiness and now I know why:
this is supposed to be of your own doing,
your own relish, of your own open hands.

© Aimee Nezhukumatathil