Indian Arrival Day is celebrated throughout the Indo Caribbean Diaspora every year during the month of May. It is a day to reflect upon the hardships of our ancestors: Indentured Laborers who left India, journeyed across the Indian Ocean and Caribbean Sea, then dispersed throughout the islands. The history of indentureship is sad and complicated; it birthed this complex identity and fusion of culture, which many Indo Caribbeans are still trying to find balance within.
My great-great-grandparents came to Trinidad via sea voyage, I believe from Uttar Pradesh. However, like most West Indians, I am not entirely sure where my ancestors once called home. My great-grandfather, my Par-aaja, was an ox cart driver on a sugar cane plantation. He didn’t cut cane, but was responsible for driving the vehicle that the cane was loaded onto, then transported to sugar mills and factories. One day, he died in an accident, when that same ox cart fell over and killed him. It was dangerous, arduous, harrowing work, but they did what they had to, in order to build their lives in a new world.
“Sugar, sugar” was the first poem I ever wrote about my Indo-Caribbean heritage. At the time, I was taking a poetry class at my university, where we studied how writers have channeled the histories and struggles of their people and turned it into art. I wanted to create a piece that detailed the history of indentureship, to teach my classmates about my people’s legacy. I’ve always wanted to teach others about my identity, and the complexities of being both South Asian and Caribbean. Ours is a history and a people often overlooked, with little documentation or representation. Thus, “Sugar, Sugar” was born out of the need to share my history and to educate others.
Baking rum and black cake is a Christmas tradition in most Caribbean households, one that my mother and I make a point to upkeep. In the poem, I reflect on our heritage through the ingredients used to make black cake — sugar in particular, because of our connection to sugar cane plantations.
Throughout “Sugar, Sugar,” we see the movement of sugar throughout time, culminating into a black cake and the speaker’s reflection on a bittersweet past. On Indian Arrival Day, may we all reflect upon our history, and the connection we share to India and the Caribbean — bound by sugar.
Sugar, Sugar
Small white crystals stream through cracks in my hand,
rushing towards the basin below.
As mother sifts flour,
with little grains shining in cake batter,
she tells me our story.
She turns ingredients as she speaks,
churning sugar and butter to white-sand beaches:
the shores of Port of Spain…
where a crowded ship, vexed and malnourished
released the runaway Indians.
Over the hilltops a generous horizon gleamed,
the promise of progress peaking through palm trees.
“Coolie” they were named, the replacement for the slave.
The penny-paid paupers of a paradise bought and sold
set to work on plantations of tall, thick stalks,
a grove of sugar gold.
My grandmother weaved through a jungle with no trees,
only long brown rods whose jutting leaves
swayed in island breeze.
An abundant field for foreigners to harvest,
cultivating, cutting, pulling from the ground
the longest batons in the lush heat of the sun.
“What is this?”
Hidden behind bark but with cutlass lashes,
pure sweet sugar cane, freed.
The ‘crunch’ it cries as she bites
into sacred, saccharine, honeyed juice
slippery, syrupy and sweet as it drips
running past her lips like sweetened drool,
cooling her skin, falling onto fingertips
she licks long after the yield is sold.
The taste stays on her tongue,
the one that carried ancient colloquies across the sea. Coloniza, you cut my grandmother’s tongue,
severing the sounds that should’ve been passed onto me.
But sucrose crystallizes and soothes the sore,
and soon enough she forgets the land of spice.
Turns from Sanskrit to Bible hymns,
from lassi to rum,
and with broken tongue,
through broken lips,
speaks a broken English.
Assimilation reigns when you can’t remember how to say your name.
…the radio in the back plays Calypso and Chutney,
a blended heritage from our blended past.
My mother sings, her tongue intact,
while she tells me that rum is just fermented sugar
and pours the elixir into the mixture.
While it bakes, I contemplate —
she used to call me “sugar babe.”
Am I the child of sugar?
If so, then I guess —
This cake is my inheritance.
When it’s cooled, mother cuts me a slice.
These bittersweet bites echo with the beats
of a sad steel pan blues,
and the soft shaking of ghungroos.
However, one chooses to remember the day we must highlight its existence. With poor record-keeping and harsh treatment, we must remember the plight of our South Asian ancestors that is now fused with West Indian culture’s Indo Caribbean.
Photo Courtesy of Suhana Rampersad
For more poems on Indo Caribbean culture including a reading of “Sugar, sugar,” find Suhana K. R. on Instagram.
The opinions expressed by the guest writer/blogger and those providing comments are theirs alone and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Brown Girl Magazine, Inc., or any employee thereof. Brown Girl Magazine is not responsible for the accuracy of any of the information supplied by the guest writer/bloggers. This work is the opinion of the blogger. It is not the intention of Brown Girl Magazine to malign any religion, ethnic group, club, organization, company, or individual. If you’d like to submit a guest post, please follow the guidelines we’ve set forth here.
“Take what you want//Take everything” reflects on a time with my partner and our cat, Layla. It’s a retelling of the chaotic night I adopted her. I didn’t know why Layla hid from me. When I chased her around, it scared her more. “Take what you want//Take everything” juxtaposes our first night, filled with misunderstanding, with the rest of the time we spent together. My fond memories call back to the loving moments Layla and I shared.
Such memories defined us; they reverberated in my partnership. I wonder if my partner, like Layla, only remembers her fear of me, over our shared moments of love. The title, a Kanye West lyric, is an acknowledgment that their happiness together–without me–destroyed my sense of self. When I see their photos, I wonder if I can see myself reflected in their eyes. I wonder if they still keep kind moments of our time together.
I remember when she would look at me from behind a laundry basket.
A small simple cat with green owl eyes. She was afraid of her new home and its owner. Shit, I remember the night I got her, she hid under my bed, in the middle just out of my reach for maybe 6 hours, watching me. She didn’t eat anything the entire day. When the night fell I was afraid she’d starve or come out and attack me. I was just scared. I didn’t have a childhood pet, I’m not white, I didn’t know what to do. I picked up the whole bed and yelled that she needed to move. I chased her into the closet with a vacuum cleaner. When she ran in, I called my lover and yelled to her that she wasn’t helping enough, she needed to be there to help me. That was our first day together, me and that cat. No one will ever have that memory but me and maybe her.
It was during Ramadan, my first year fasting.
Our problems had already begun by then. Enough so that I decided to fast and show retribution. I’d try to change into a more patient and understanding self. Like the Prophet (SAW) I guess. To become someone that my lover could feel safe around. Somehow, getting a cat felt like it fit into that picture. I’d be a cat dad, you know, gentle. We’d raise her. I’d fast and become New Again. Maybe I’d wrap an inked tasbih around myself and show I’m a man of God.
I don’t know how a cat remembers fear any more than I know how a lover does.
I know her body stored it. My cat’s must have stored it too. That first night, I wish I could tell her that I was afraid too. It doesn’t make sense that I was afraid really — I’m bigger, more threatening. We don’t speak the same language anyway, so how could I ever tell her? She learned to trust me though, in her own way. Her small bean paws would press on my chest in the mornings. She’d meow to berate me for locking her out some nights, or when I was away from home too long.
She lives with my lover now. They share photos with me, they’re happy together.
I saw my lover once, it was on 55th and 7th, Broadway shined blue performance lights over us. She wore a red sacral dress. She said her mental health has never been better. I think she was trying to tell me that she’s doing well, because she knows I care for her. I don’t think she was trying to say she’s happier without me. We don’t speak the same language. I actually think they are happier with just each other. And I loved them both, so it hurts. Sometimes, not all the time. And it doesn’t always hurt that bad. Other times it does get pretty bad, though. I probably owe it to myself to say that.
I look back at the photos, the ones of our life together, and the ones of their new life.
Two green owl eyes, and two brown moonlit eyes. I look for myself in them.
I organize play dates for my children. They’re friendships remind me of when I was younger when Fridays were consistently set aside for my friends. Now, it seems play is indeed meant for childhood and work is for aging adults. We often can’t find time for ourselves, let alone our friends, who are busy working mothers like ourselves. Or we moved into unreachable corners of this globe, far away from any means of physical communication. It’s fair to say, it’s hard to stay close to friends like when we were in college. Nowadays, it’s easier to travel, but more difficult to bond with others. “My Friend” asserts that we should not end let our friendships fall by the wayside. Even with physical distance and conflicting schedules, we keep our friendships close with kind words on phone calls, regular FaceTime calls, or even encouraging social media comments. Friendship doesn’t end once we become adults.
The opinions expressed by the guest writer/blogger and those providing comments are theirs alone and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Brown Girl Magazine, Inc., or any employee thereof. Brown Girl Magazine is not responsible for the accuracy of any of the information supplied by the guest writer/bloggers. This work is the opinion of the blogger. It is not the intention of Brown Girl Magazine to malign any religion, ethnic group, club, organization, company, or individual. If you’d like to submit a guest post, please follow the guidelines we’ve set forth here.
“Confessions to a Moonless Sky” is a meditation on the new moon and guilt. I wrote it when I was living in Dallas and was driving back from a dusk prayer. The new moon terrified me on that drive. I was diseased by the knowledge that my partner, at the time, had seen the worst parts of me. There’s immense shame in this piece—it seized my self-image. If the moon could become brand new, then I could start over.
I often ponder on the moon’s reflective nature and pairs of eyes. I’m hyper-fixated on how I am seen by others. Unfortunately, the brilliance of seeing your reflection in another person leads to negativity. After all, those who are too keen on their own reflection are the same people who suffer from it. It is possible to use shame to fuel one’s retribution and personal growth, without becoming consumed by it.
We can look to Shah Rukh Khan succumbing to alcoholism in his own sorrow and then later imbibing his sadness in Chandramukhi. “Confessions to a Moonless Sky” is a lesson for us: Don’t be Shah Rukh Khan in Devdas, instead embody pre-incarnation Shah Rukh Khan in Om Shanti Om!
Sometimes when the moon abandons the sky, I wonder if I drove her away.
If she comes back, will she be the same? How I wish she would come back new, truly new! That way she’d have no memory of the sin I’ve confessed to her. You noxious insect. Sin-loving, ego-imbibing pest. You are no monster, for at least a monster has ideology, it sins with purpose. You sin just to chase ignominy.
But the moon won’t say that, she never does. She’ll just leave the sky and return days later, slowly. And I’ll wonder if she’s new, perhaps she won’t remember my past confessions. What does it matter? Were the moon replaced with one from a different god, I’d drive her away, too.
