Lotus - A Prose Poem
The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
x
So is the lotus with its petals. So goes my first impression.
As I enter the center, I wipe my sole of cow shit and joke "good luck".
As I try awkwardly shift my arms to embrace India, Zuzu's flower comes to mind.
"Paste it". Paste India together. It broke. It's wilting.
x
At Frankfurt Airport the bud beat back the frost of ticket agents not
moved by actors words, wanting paper and proof. What's new?
When it rains it pours. Our flow is redirected and halved to Delhi and Mumbai.
Half got a hotel. A separate half got our luggage. Eight hour flights and waits.
x
We're here. Varanasi. Ravidash Ghat. I'm here. Overwhelmed. Scattered.
In this spiritual center traffic is a ballet of invisible auras
barely redirecting bumpers around nestled island temples,
rickshaws, pedestrians, sumos, and chai-colored flood.
x
Before I came here I thought gray was the absense of color.
The monsoon's afterflow between rickity streets taught me different.
The color is brewed of thick milk, sickly tea leaves, and deluge
steeped in trash and cupped in the crone's hands of badly irrigated streets.
x
So many colors. A "Dora the Explorer" backpack passes, and I wonder if he knows.
Cigarrettes that stain teeth yellow are exchanged for rolled pan leaves that stain red.
I watch men pissing against rubble, and later hear moos clear outside my bathroom.
The power flickers, and I wait for the generator. "Shiva?" I ask the dark.
x
Leaflets of Indian's Kahani make another decrepid petal out of upcycled
crumbling establishment redefined as indepent civilization.
The sun drums, and I'd expect it's rythm to create more nakedness, not less.
Only the faded advertisements follow this formula, like home, in this Time Square of tin and cloth.
x
Beggers swarm like the mosquitos I take malaria pills for;
"Nahi" and "English" and "Ignorant" and "Spoiled" our only defense against them and
Spiders the span of our palms. At home we'd squash these problems.
Here they're too large, too present to ignore.
x
Cold showers by headlamp are as sweet as hot candle-lit baths.
Indian sweets are just as sweet as state-side sweets.
Their difference makes some scrape their tongue with teeth
until they can brush them with bottled water and toothpaste.
x
A battery-operated will-o'-the-wisp guides my caked shirts to the filled sink.
Next my skin. I wash off pellets of bugspray, sunscreen and today's walk to Gyan Pravah
when a crane broke down and put the dance of bat-like traffic in an actors
hold amongst the sonar honking of "I am here. Where are you?"
x
We take our lunch break outside on the parked bus, our stomachs welcoming egg sandwitches
ostrasized by vegan regulations. Forced off-campus like smokers in high-school.
My internal stage manager vents about me being in costume.
Actor. Assimulated. American. Caucasian. Cultured. Calm.
x
Finished consuming, my structure unfurls, yet fights to bend each vertebrae.
I place a rectangular wildflower seed amongst more of the same.
The hillside in overtaken by building blocks of trash:
a new tower of babel for cows to travel up and reach nirvana by.
x
We brought our child here to be raised by a village.
India is defined by its villages, or so a native tells me.
We were afraid, the womb of US so different
than the vaginal canal of the river Ganga.
x
He thrives, healthily screaming with the same vivaciousness as the vivid
contrast between hiked up sari and ankle-deep monsoon.
I project, each syllable bulstering our play like a mother's foot under a child's.
We came to touch people. Not teach. All of us relearn how to walk.
x
We return, flies tongue's french-pecking emaciated cows.
We pass beloved peepal trees, their midriff's belted by red and reflecting white bands.
the spade leaf's abundant shade reminds me of the Indian way: Kind, hardworking,
Resourceful. we fix with duct tape and super glue. They fix with tin and cloth.
x
We're in 7 hindi newspapers, our names and stature disciplined curves and lines.
One day we'll be pressed into paper plates for simosas.
We don't get that kind of attention or intimacy at home.
India has pressed us, pressed us into something notable and sustaining.
x
In corridors an armspread apart we navigate props around cows and their pies.
They lead to the east, to the river Gangi, the collector of spirits and sewage.
Swim, and you step on skulls and osmose cremated ashes into your pores.
washed saris press into the steps like accordion folds. This river is their life.
x
I connect, making contact with people and pillars that once housed monks 200 years ago.
Now it houses our production, our toddler. Make-up runs.
There is something magical about the environment between
the audience and our bodies and the heat of our words.
x
We went out: out to the market, out for South Indian food, out for a religious ceremony.
As we walk, a man slaps a rambunctious cow. Our guide cups her cheek as we pass.
A row of men in arches sing, pull bells, pray with out-stretched palms, and religiously
wave feather-duster fly swatters like old ladies with fans. It reminds me of church.
x
I wake up batting the air in fluttering panic against swarms of itching polka-dots.
The sleeping form of my roommate grounds me. It's just fan air, electricity willing, for now.
Hair goes up. On goes Gold Bond, Degree, Nutregena (40 strength), Off! and Coloricon.
Teva Tirras are slipped halfway on, then respectfully off for breakfast.
x
When walks are canceled due to heat and rain, Pepsi is purchased for the equivalent of seven cents.
When rehearsal is canceled due to 3.5 sick and 100% tired, we re-center under spinning fans.
I toy with my Azithromycin pill, hoping my parastaltic rushes don't rush more.
I'm the .5. We've embraced the slowness of India. It's just a momentary traffic jam.
x
Ankle bells purchased at the market for one hundred rupees, or two dollars tinkle
hopeful songs of wind as my left foot rolls a half-moon imprint to pivot me on my right.
I try to relearn my center of gravity like Antony of Mumbai suggested.
Shiva destroyed my perceptions and now creates in me. Broken becomes stoic.
x
Our plastic, returnable glass, toilet paper, chrome, cubicles, scaffolding, and insulation
is traded for biodegradable clay, reused bottles, water, brick, alcoves, bamboo, and generators.
Sleep and running and filtered water and general stability may come and go, but
If you jam-pack America's United States inside, there's no room for India.
x
It takes two days for sink-washed clothes to unabsorb. Two days to fully absorb two days ago.
You have to ditch your watch. Embrace India. Just like our luggage, when you stop calling out it will come.
As I reexamine the petals, the lotus rises from the mud and flourishes amidst
trash heaps, lean-tos, temples, trees, and tourists.
x
The parts are greater than the sum of its whole.
McKenna Kring
The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
x
So is the lotus with its petals. So goes my first impression.
As I enter the center, I wipe my sole of cow shit and joke "good luck".
As I try awkwardly shift my arms to embrace India, Zuzu's flower comes to mind.
"Paste it". Paste India together. It broke. It's wilting.
x
At Frankfurt Airport the bud beat back the frost of ticket agents not
moved by actors words, wanting paper and proof. What's new?
When it rains it pours. Our flow is redirected and halved to Delhi and Mumbai.
Half got a hotel. A separate half got our luggage. Eight hour flights and waits.
x
We're here. Varanasi. Ravidash Ghat. I'm here. Overwhelmed. Scattered.
In this spiritual center traffic is a ballet of invisible auras
barely redirecting bumpers around nestled island temples,
rickshaws, pedestrians, sumos, and chai-colored flood.
x
Before I came here I thought gray was the absense of color.
The monsoon's afterflow between rickity streets taught me different.
The color is brewed of thick milk, sickly tea leaves, and deluge
steeped in trash and cupped in the crone's hands of badly irrigated streets.
x
So many colors. A "Dora the Explorer" backpack passes, and I wonder if he knows.
Cigarrettes that stain teeth yellow are exchanged for rolled pan leaves that stain red.
I watch men pissing against rubble, and later hear moos clear outside my bathroom.
The power flickers, and I wait for the generator. "Shiva?" I ask the dark.
x
Leaflets of Indian's Kahani make another decrepid petal out of upcycled
crumbling establishment redefined as indepent civilization.
The sun drums, and I'd expect it's rythm to create more nakedness, not less.
Only the faded advertisements follow this formula, like home, in this Time Square of tin and cloth.
x
Beggers swarm like the mosquitos I take malaria pills for;
"Nahi" and "English" and "Ignorant" and "Spoiled" our only defense against them and
Spiders the span of our palms. At home we'd squash these problems.
Here they're too large, too present to ignore.
x
Cold showers by headlamp are as sweet as hot candle-lit baths.
Indian sweets are just as sweet as state-side sweets.
Their difference makes some scrape their tongue with teeth
until they can brush them with bottled water and toothpaste.
x
A battery-operated will-o'-the-wisp guides my caked shirts to the filled sink.
Next my skin. I wash off pellets of bugspray, sunscreen and today's walk to Gyan Pravah
when a crane broke down and put the dance of bat-like traffic in an actors
hold amongst the sonar honking of "I am here. Where are you?"
x
We take our lunch break outside on the parked bus, our stomachs welcoming egg sandwitches
ostrasized by vegan regulations. Forced off-campus like smokers in high-school.
My internal stage manager vents about me being in costume.
Actor. Assimulated. American. Caucasian. Cultured. Calm.
x
Finished consuming, my structure unfurls, yet fights to bend each vertebrae.
I place a rectangular wildflower seed amongst more of the same.
The hillside in overtaken by building blocks of trash:
a new tower of babel for cows to travel up and reach nirvana by.
x
We brought our child here to be raised by a village.
India is defined by its villages, or so a native tells me.
We were afraid, the womb of US so different
than the vaginal canal of the river Ganga.
x
He thrives, healthily screaming with the same vivaciousness as the vivid
contrast between hiked up sari and ankle-deep monsoon.
I project, each syllable bulstering our play like a mother's foot under a child's.
We came to touch people. Not teach. All of us relearn how to walk.
x
We return, flies tongue's french-pecking emaciated cows.
We pass beloved peepal trees, their midriff's belted by red and reflecting white bands.
the spade leaf's abundant shade reminds me of the Indian way: Kind, hardworking,
Resourceful. we fix with duct tape and super glue. They fix with tin and cloth.
x
We're in 7 hindi newspapers, our names and stature disciplined curves and lines.
One day we'll be pressed into paper plates for simosas.
We don't get that kind of attention or intimacy at home.
India has pressed us, pressed us into something notable and sustaining.
x
In corridors an armspread apart we navigate props around cows and their pies.
They lead to the east, to the river Gangi, the collector of spirits and sewage.
Swim, and you step on skulls and osmose cremated ashes into your pores.
washed saris press into the steps like accordion folds. This river is their life.
x
I connect, making contact with people and pillars that once housed monks 200 years ago.
Now it houses our production, our toddler. Make-up runs.
There is something magical about the environment between
the audience and our bodies and the heat of our words.
x
We went out: out to the market, out for South Indian food, out for a religious ceremony.
As we walk, a man slaps a rambunctious cow. Our guide cups her cheek as we pass.
A row of men in arches sing, pull bells, pray with out-stretched palms, and religiously
wave feather-duster fly swatters like old ladies with fans. It reminds me of church.
x
I wake up batting the air in fluttering panic against swarms of itching polka-dots.
The sleeping form of my roommate grounds me. It's just fan air, electricity willing, for now.
Hair goes up. On goes Gold Bond, Degree, Nutregena (40 strength), Off! and Coloricon.
Teva Tirras are slipped halfway on, then respectfully off for breakfast.
x
When walks are canceled due to heat and rain, Pepsi is purchased for the equivalent of seven cents.
When rehearsal is canceled due to 3.5 sick and 100% tired, we re-center under spinning fans.
I toy with my Azithromycin pill, hoping my parastaltic rushes don't rush more.
I'm the .5. We've embraced the slowness of India. It's just a momentary traffic jam.
x
Ankle bells purchased at the market for one hundred rupees, or two dollars tinkle
hopeful songs of wind as my left foot rolls a half-moon imprint to pivot me on my right.
I try to relearn my center of gravity like Antony of Mumbai suggested.
Shiva destroyed my perceptions and now creates in me. Broken becomes stoic.
x
Our plastic, returnable glass, toilet paper, chrome, cubicles, scaffolding, and insulation
is traded for biodegradable clay, reused bottles, water, brick, alcoves, bamboo, and generators.
Sleep and running and filtered water and general stability may come and go, but
If you jam-pack America's United States inside, there's no room for India.
x
It takes two days for sink-washed clothes to unabsorb. Two days to fully absorb two days ago.
You have to ditch your watch. Embrace India. Just like our luggage, when you stop calling out it will come.
As I reexamine the petals, the lotus rises from the mud and flourishes amidst
trash heaps, lean-tos, temples, trees, and tourists.
x
The parts are greater than the sum of its whole.
McKenna Kring
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