Émigré

By Karen Battoo

I came over in a turbulent bird

Four thousand nervous miles over open sea

Thinking thinking of dropping out the sky

my new cold home spired vast out of the clouds

 

Nothing prepares you for the grey blanket

lightless weeks lacking vitamin d

the heater on the wall konks out every five days

my teeth grate waiting on the breaker reset

 

The apartment windows across the

five-lane highway stare at me

An egg could crack mine more easily

It is a prison only my dry dry hand can escape

 

Sometimes I see bright red blooms

and I wish, wish it to be a familiar

firecracker, croton or hibiscus

I wilt wilt each time I realize it is not

 

 This is a land of regular fire alarms

nobody jokes with the Monday midday testing testing

as the girl in room one hundred and ten

set it off just washing her hair

 

Colourless leafless winter

No avocado trees to scale or orange mango papayas

The only rainbow is the graffitied angel wings

placed for selfies in the prison courtyard

 

My eyes hunt the essence of shark and bake and curry crab

I only get stares here eating with my hands

I reminisce with the bottle of Hong Wing coffee slowly

disappearing I use it sparingly sparingly on days I feel lowest

 

The other comfort is a piece of my mom’s fruit cake

Double-wrapped in a ziplock bag inside my mini fridge

From which I will eat one square inch inch at a time

I am nerves thinking of when the coffee and cake runs out

 

There are no scents of freshly cut mahogany or teak

The laminate floors are scentless against my heels

So I walk, walk out in the green spaces savouring

the scent of grass and pine which is almost like home

 

Then weirdly the sun dries up the fog

A new season brings kinder winds and warmer sneers

The thunderstorms reveal blooms I have not seen before

And I feel for the first time I can like this new strange strange land

 

Author Bio: Karen Battoo is a proud Caribbeanite who has spent much of her life straddling the islands of St. Lucia and Trinidad & Tobago, the latter she currently calls home. With an MBA from Edinburgh Business School in Scotland, she has navigated diverse industries—from boat-building to architecture—and spent the last 15 years immersing herself in the world of tourism and five-star eco-hospitality. A lover of service and adventure, Karen is now on a one-year sabbatical, traveling the globe and weaving her experiences into her poetry. While her debut poetry collection is in the works, you’re just as likely to find her cross-stitching, scrapbooking or exploring new corners of the world, all while writing about her love for nature and the stories she encounters along the way. Stay tuned for her upcoming works and follow her journey at @tropicgirlkay.