It was only when I saw you again that I understood how broken I’d been
I hadn’t seen you since the last full moon, every phone call we had turned violent with frustration
So in the unwanted absence of you I’d gone into survival mode
When he told her he was coming to the city but not to see her, she was angry
Not because she’d miss the way he would have smiled when he spotted her from a mile away
Heartbreak like this make me yearn for comforts I never even had
The urge to bask in my motherland’s South Asian sunshine and feel warm rainwater splashing down my back
Elders calling me their child in Urdu, sending me to sleep with head massages laced with coconut oil
Bare feet, long braids, eating food on the floor with my hands
Heartbreak that makes me want to start again in my mother’s footsteps because starting afresh in my own shoes won’t be enough to make me forget
Heartbreak that makes me wish I wasn’t here
So I start to daydream about not being here
Not being dead
But being reborn in the country that flows through my veins
Then I’d never have met you
And I can imagine I wouldn’t ever have to know what it feels like
To be heartbroken like this
She always lay beneath the moon, forever at service to the earth that held her and the ocean lapping softly at her feet
My whole life, I thought I was lacking
