Poetry As Evidence - Outlook's Next Issue Poetry As Evidence - Outlook's Next Issue 
De Souza Prabhu
No, I am not going todelve deep down and discoverI’m really de Souza Prabhueven if Prabhu was no fooland got the best of both worlds.(Catholic Brahmin!I can hear his fat chuckle still.)
No matter thatmy name is Greekmy surname Portuguesemy language alien.There are ways of belonging.I belong with the lame ducks
I heard it saidmy parents wanted a boy.I’ve done my best to qualify.I hid the bloodstainson my clothesand let my breasts sag.Words the weaponto crucify
Eunice de Souza, Maharashtra
(Eunice de Souza (1940–2017) was an Indian-English poet, literary critic and novelist. Among her notable books of poetry are Women in Dutch Painting (1988), Ways of Belonging (1990), and Learn From the Almond Leaf (2016). She published two novels, and was also the editor of a number of anthologies of poetry, folktales, and literary criticism.)
Gadapa (Threshold)Pedavva cried her last words,“Gadapa duram, khaadee deggera”
Gadapa is the site of our experience always nearing almost touching like a wish.It is where you will find our land,which we neither own, nor belong in–—
Women slapped against walls nailed with framesof ancestors & blessing gods,sit at the gadapatalking with the neighbouring women. Hanumavva with more than tobacco-packet in her bosomwaits at the gate for more than a bus to the next village. Nagarajutraded his body for some touch at the bank where the stillbornare let in the river Mogulappa cried. The women who raised me accuse meof appropriating & violating their carework of loving.I love like it’s the only skill needed to survivein this country–—I can’t love like your men. A blind bull tricked, left on its ownin the crowded Monday bazaar.Pedavva cried like the waves of flood that transgressedinto our thresholds with all its laborious forceon 26th July, 2005. She entered life like the wavesto collapse a home built to bury her body.Like gutter flood she broke in through the roof & cracks,claimed from the toilet drain. Now squatting across the line, skillfully siftingthe city sludge in sieves, we strained no gold.Only a wasteful amount of soil, soggy cooked rice& plastic. Just like our dreams
of breaking the world & the Mithi streamingwith flamingos—
Shripaad Sinnakaar, Maharashtra
(Shripad Sinnakaar is a poet and a researcher from Mumbai. His poems have appeared in The White Reviewpera7, Dalit Art Archive and Mumbai Urban Art Festival, and are translated in Telugu and Marathi. He runs a literary project called Flamingos in Mithi. He is working on his forthcoming collection of poems.)