A Hindu ceremony where crow
believed to be ancestors are fed
My brothers and sisters are calling
our ancestors from their hideout
in heaven where
they wait dead or denied,
mortally reminiscing
on the good food they ate,
until they grow wings
to sneak back as ravens.
It must be the smell itself
that gives them directions
to homes of relatives
who're cooking the burden.
A fat one eats only rice,
another pecks on pickles,
one grumbles about the cook,
another perches praising a niece
whose recipes came from a book.
A foreign dead asks for knives,
another circles the house
cawing directions
to a flock of frenetic wives.
Fed by the scriptures,
my ancestors
still remain unimpressed:
a burly beak declares flatly
my wife's curry is a sorry mess.
The last one to leave is a lecher,
sighs at my wife's sumptuous look,
signals he'll be back later,
for favors off the hook.