Double Magic…. 

That’s the name of my shawl

Woven by women who own sheep

Have children

Live in shelters

Made from mossy rocks

In tiny villages that dot

The Himalayan snow

Remote to everything

But poverty.

The children grow like children do

The sheep know their own way home

My friend teaches them to knit

In her shelter big enough for her

And her four dogs

And the women who come to knit

To weave their food

To knit an education for their children

And to support each other.

Sitting here in my other home

Aching to be in two places at one time

I wrap myself in the warmth of wool

And feel that sari and dupatta

And my Indian-ness surround me

I smell the sheep and the hot chai

I am transported

Two allegiances

Double the love

Double the pain

Double magic.

Written by Kusum Jain…a friend from medical college years, a friend who loves to flit between verse and continents and people and solitude and dogs and fun and so much more.  When she opened a gift package, given by another friend from those medical college years, she found this Double Magic shawl, waiting for her.

As she wrapped the shawl, sat down on her desk in sunny California, found me online and soaked in the specifics of the knitting circle, she arranged her words into verse and wrote it all down.

Here are some more…to bring out the poetry within!

Surajmukhi…  yellow flowers and grey skies

Chutney…Green leaves ground in a brown pestle

..

Sindoor….Red vermillion on black hair

Mehendi…when green leaves turn into the orange hues of henna

Chaand…Silver moonlight making dark blue shadows

.