habits of my homeland

"Thalaya"
my foreign name.
silent, "h" like history
his story is her story and you don’t even wanna pick up the book.
history like family, birthed and hereditary.
my foreign name on your native tongue
holding heavy
phonetics you weren’t taught to pronounce in school.
this alphabet
so Alien so Bold so Cutting so Deeply Exotic.
Finds Greatness 
Hidden Inside
Jaded Kashmiri Legacies.
you will learn more about culture in the womb than you will in the classroom.
habits of your Abu’s sweet tooth,
Grandmother’s Mother and
samosa pastry and glue.
you will hear your mother sing stories of her youth,
nurturing nature, 
mothering jasmine, sunflowers, and the heaven beneath her feet.
lullabies in Urdu, Punjabi and English too.
prayers in Arabic, supplication to your Lord. 

you have 20 years lived now, and living your 21st,
and She, your Mother remains your best teacher through it all,
her broken English so many years ago laid 
the bricks that made this house a home.
you acknowledge you wouldn’t know warmth so well, 
or a fridge so full, if it wasn’t for your Father.
your Father. Abu. Dad. 
a sweet and sharp mix of dry humour, burrowed brows and one too many cups of chai. 

living my 21st, but my 1st began 
when my culture was cultivated before i left my Mother’s belly, 
and now i see, the world outside isn’t as welcoming.
stop harvesting your heart brown girl,
walk in the direction of love.
this space is yours too, 
brown has always been beautiful.
before it was bottled, packaged and sold for a price.
before it was for blonde haired, blue eyed, bronzed becky.
brown has always been beautiful.
don’t hold your tongue in letting them know.
live truly, live unapologetically, live absolute.
this space is yours too.