A Time to Dance (2 page)

HOPING
and
WAITING

I race upstairs,

kick my sandals off outside our front door,

burst into our apartment. “I'm in the finals!”

My grandmother, Paati,

surges out of the kitchen like a ship in full sail,

her white sari dazzling

in the afternoon light that streams through our open windows.

I fling my arms around her.

Drink in the spicy-sweet basil-and-aloe scent of her soap.

Paati doesn't say congratulations. She doesn't need to.

I feel her words in the warmth of her hug.

“I knew you'd make it.” Pa plucks me

out of Paati's embrace into his arms.

“Finals of what?” Ma says.

I've only been talking

about the Bharatanatyam dance competition

for months.

Mostly to Paati, and to Pa, but Ma's hearing is perfect

and we don't live in a palace with soundproof walls.

Paati retreats into the kitchen.

Paati's told me she doesn't think it's her place

to interfere with her son and daughter-in-law.

Pa's eyes rove from Ma to me.

He's caught in the middle as always.

Ma's diamond earrings

—the only reminder of her wealthy past—

flash at me like angry eyes.

“Veda, you need to study hard.

If you don't do well in your exams this year—”

For once, my voice doesn't stick in my throat. “I am studying hard.

To be a dancer.

I'm not planning to become an engineer. Or a doctor.”

Or any other profession Ma finds respectable.

Ma launches into her usual lecture. “Dancing is no career for a middle-class girl.

You need to study something useful in college so you can get a well-paid job.”

I sigh extra-loud.

My dance teacher, Uday anna, isn't rich. But

his house is larger than ours.

Clearly, he earns more than

Ma at her bank job and Pa at his library.

Ma goes on and on.

Back when I was younger, I'd struggle to be better at school

for Ma's sake.

But numbers and letters soon grew too large for me to hold

and I grew far away from them

and Ma grew out of patience.

Paati places steaming
sojji,
my favorite snack, on our table.

The sweet, buttery smell of cooked semolina is tempting

but I leave the plate untouched.

March into the bedroom Paati and I share.

Slam the door.

Pa knocks. Says, “Come out, Veda. Eat something.”

“Leave her alone,” Ma says. “She knows where to find food if she's hungry.”

I probably shouldn't have slammed the door.

But Ma never even said congratulations.

She's never pretended my dancing made her happy.

But never has a performance mattered more to me

than being chosen for the finals of this competition.

All my life, Ma's been

hoping

I'll do well at science and mathematics

so I could end up becoming what she wanted to be:

an engineer.

All my life, I've been

waiting

for her to appreciate my love

of the one thing I excel at:

Bharatanatyam dance.

SPEAKING
with
HANDS

“Steps came to you early. Speech came late,” Paati said.

She'd tell how she watched me pull myself up by the bars

of my cradle at eight months,

eager to toddle on my own two feet.

Months before others my age, she said,

I could shape thoughts with my fingers.

My body wasn't shy.

While words stumbled in my throat

losing their way long before they reached my lips,

like lotus buds blossoming my hands spoke my first sentences

shaping themselves into
hasta mudras
:

the hand symbols of Indian classical dance.

Paati said, “It was as if you remembered

the sign language of Bharatanatyam

from a previous life you'd lived as a dancer

before being reincarnated as my granddaughter.”

Paati always understood everything I said with my hands.

DANCE
PRACTICE

I'm a palm tree swaying in a storm wind.

My dance teacher

sits cross-legged on the ground,

tapping beats out on

his hollow wooden block with a stick.

I leap and land on my sure feet,

excitement mounting as Uday anna's rhythm speeds,

challenging me to repeat my routine faster.

My heels strike the ground fast as fire-sparks.

Streams of sweat trickle down my neck.

My black braid lifts into the air, then whips around my waist.

Nothing else fills me with as much elation

as chasing down soaring music,

catching and pinning rhythms to the ground with my feet,

proud as a hunter rejoicing in his skill.

The climax brings me to the hardest pose of all:

Balancing on my left leg, I extend my right

upward in a vertical split.

Then I bend my right knee, bring my right foot near my ear,

showing how, when an earring fell off as He danced,

Shiva picked it up with His toes

and looped it back over His earlobe.

Locking my breath in my chest to keep from trembling,

I push myself to hold the pose

for an entire eight-beat cycle.

A familiar thrill shoots up my spine.

I enjoy testing

my stamina, my balance.

Uday anna's stick clatters to the floor. He claps.

“Pull that off and you're sure to win.”

Both feet on the ground again, I pirouette and leap,

rejoicing in the speed at which

my body obeys my mind's commands,

celebrating my strong, skilled body—

the center and source of my joy,

the one thing I can count on,

the one thing that never fails me.

LONE PALM

Kamini, my rival,

enters the classroom as I leave.

I extend my hand, saying, “Congratulations.

Heard you made it to the finals, too.”

“Thanks,” she says, sharp as a slap.

Sweeps past me,

ignoring my outstretched palm.

I want to tell her I truly think she's a wonderful dancer,

convince her we could be friendlier though we compete.

But as usual, the sentences I want to say

collapse in a jumbled heap in my brain.

I'm a lone palm tree

towering over grassy fronds of rice in a paddy field,

yearning to touch the sky although

I get lonelier

the higher I go.

TIME

Returning home after dancing, I trip

on the first step

of the shared stairwell of our apartment building,

one of thirty identical concrete high-rises built

to house lower-middle-income families:

teachers, accountants, librarians, bank tellers, clerks.

Mrs. Subramaniam, who lives in the apartment below ours,

calls out from her open door, “Careful!

You don't want to twist your ankle.”

Shobana, her youngest daughter—

who's a little older than me—waves.

I nod at them, too tired to move my tongue.

When we were younger

and Shobana's now-married sisters lived at home,

I'd see them at play in the street, running and shouting.

Mrs. Subramaniam would come upstairs and say, “Veda, go out.

Join their fun.”

“Soon,” I'd promise.

But I preferred to stay inside, dancing alone,

tiptoeing, twirling,

feeling as light as a jasmine's white petal

as my feet flitted across the floor

and time slipped away . . .

Too happy to stop

until darkness fell

and the street was empty.

BADGE
of
HONOR

Paati's sitting cross-legged on the floor

in front of our household altar.

When she sees me, she stops chanting

and puts her prayer books away.

My head pounds

like it's the ground beneath a dancer's feet,

my shoulders hurt from holding my arms upright for hours,

my thighs ache.

Paati gets a bowl of pungent sesame oil.

She brushes back the wet curls that cling to my forehead

and massages the dark oil into my scalp.

“I've got pain in muscles I didn't know existed.”

Paati knows I'm not complaining.

Pain is part of the path to success.

Pain is the passion

of muscles burning to be best,

the flame that rose within me

when I conquered my vertical split,

awaking a store of strength

lying unseen beneath my brown skin.

Pain is proof

of my hard work,

proof of my love for dance.