Abira Kannan
I hated sleeping in India
while travelling for a friend’s wedding.
a foreign bedroom of sweltering heat enveloped my sticky body
as I restlessly slapped pesty mosquitoes rambling in my ear.
to my left, a competition took place between the screeching fan on high-speed
and the uncle singing prayers in the other room.
who sings at 5 am?
where no one sings at all,
now when I wake up to the stillness of the melbournian streets,
with no lustrous silver tumbler brimmed with filter coffee,
I miss the reasons why
I hated sleeping in India.
