Search for the India-Pakistan Border

TIMBER 2019 | Issue 9.2

Anishka Duggal

Anishka Duggal is an American poet born to Canadian immigrants. Currently, she lives between Vancouver, British Columbia and Seattle, Washington. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in Cirque Journal, New South, Inlandia, Austin Poets International’s Di-verse-city Anthology, and elsewhere.

I ask again to be served the difference

between cha and chai

over a meal I cannot refuse

            and mother invites me to taste

                        how well cha

                        mixes with samosas

                                    and how funny chai

                                    rolls off the tongue

            as if regional disputes

            on the other side of the

                        inflatable globe

            she bought me last Christmas

will matter in five months when it’s

                                                            Ramadan

            and father says Jamal and Yasmeen

            won’t be able to come over now

                        as if they ever could before

or in four more months when it’s

                                                            Patriot Day

            and sister texts me a warning

                        to not get blown up

                        as my tongue meets his

or now

            as I tell them how he pronounces it

                                                                        Chai

                        And how Chai tastes better with

                                                                                    Pakora