Diwali

I sit by the window on a blue train from Mysore to Bangalore,

my forehead resting against the cold, metal bar that crosses all

the windows down the line of the train, watching the landscape

roll by like the frames of a film. It is night, but only a few seconds pass

between fireworks that illuminate palm trees, rice paddies, and

mounds of sugarcane stalks. With each strobe, a new scene:

women holding up their technicolored saris as they lead Nandi-bulls

through paddy spotted with spikes of rice plants. A huddle of

big-bellied, dhoti-clad men smoking bidis on their stationary motorcycles,

waiting for the train to pass. A painted elephant sauntering along

the dirt path parallel to the tracks, followed by men carrying lanterns.

The train pauses and I hear the constant whoosh-crack of fireworks,

the blaring, sharp Bollywood music crackling from cell phones,

the off-key singing of a blind woman who roams from car to car.

A few men leap off the train and rush to a mound of harvested sugarcane.

They yank out a few stalks and hurry back as the train begins to

creak forward. One man hacks them into foot-long pieces and hands

them to passengers who chew on the sweet meat of the cane.

Soon, the fields are filled in by low, palm-roofed houses and temples

where Carnatic singers and tablas and clanging bells call Hindus to celebrate

the triumph of Rama. Villages turn into the city: buildings stacked on buildings,

obscured by a yellow haze burning with constant explosions in the streets,

off the rooftops. The people are shadows with occasional faces when

the smoke cracks. Barefoot children, sparklers in hand, glow orange and

even from this far I see their white teeth and the whites of their eyes bright

against their smog-smudged faces. As the train reaches the station, 

the celebration is obscured. My white, ghostly reflection is superimposed against

the window: braided hair, bindi between my eyes, gold earrings and a hoop

in my nose, scarf draped around my neck and falling down my back.

The reflections of passengers behind me busy themselves with their luggage.

The train stops. I allow myself to be swept into the darkness, assured by

the hum of anticipation as the throng moves as one towards the light outside.

We burst out doors and separate in slow arcs, dissolving into the charged night.

Mysore Palace lit up for Diwali