First Anniversary, With Monkeys

By Aimee Nezhukumatathil Aimee Nezhukumatathil

Periyar Nature Preserve

There is no crumbly frozen cake to thaw.

Today, we are in the jungle. I mean mosquito. I mean

tigers and elephants sludging their way

to the lake for a drink and Don’t make sudden moves

or snakes startled from an afternoon nap

will greet you fang first. I think we are lost. Too hot

for any cold confection to survive. Even my tube

of sunblock is as warm as a baby’s bottle. You get

to those places I can’t reach, those places I dared

not even whisper before I walked down the aisle

in white. You never worried if our families

would clash, if they would clang like the clutch

of pale monkeys clanging the thin branches of the treetrops,

begging for our trail mix. You never worried

about my relatives staring at your pale, muscled calves—

things not usually seen outside of the bedroom. You wore

hiking shorts anyway. And still, they lavished ladle-fuls

of food on your plate. I think we are lost. My eyes are dark

and wet as that wild deer that walked right past us,

a little off the trail. I think we are lost, but for once

I don't mind. Eventually you turn us back to a place

not on any map, but I know I can trace it back with my finger

if we ever need it again. We made it one year

without a compass and we’re not about to start now.

Source: At the Drive-In Volcano (Tupelo Press, 2007)

Biography

Aimee Nezhukumatathil is the author of Miracle Fruit (2003), winner of the ForeWord Magazine Poetry Book of the Year and the Global Filipino Literary Award; At the Drive-In Volcano (2007), winner of the Balcones Prize; and Lucky Fish (2011). Her work has appeared in Ploughshares, FIELD, and American Poetry Review. Her honors and awards include a Pushcart Prize and a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts. She is . . .

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