New moon writing 6: at the Katmandu Kitchen

Tell me a story, of October sunflowers, dangling in the wind.

Talk to me of the sunsetting, and the pink skies you saw.

Or tell me a tale of the first time you tasted mango juice.

You thought you had found paradise.  A street seller handed you a plastic cup of juice, and you expected it to be orange.  But as the mango juice slowly brushed your cheek, your salivary glands secreted extra wet fluids.  Your mouth almost ached from it.  Your taste buds exploded.

Later, the others would warn you from buying food and drink from the street, but nothing ever tasted like this again.  This was your new base line, and a new shared memory of home.

Or tell me again about that time your cousin drove you 1000 km and you stopped to look at the fields of watermelon.  Your cousin was tired, so he slept in the car, and you wandered amongst the fruit as the sun went down.  Never had you heard fruit sigh before, but just this time you felt it.  The soil was full for the melons to thrive, and you could smell them in the wind.

Did you enjoy watching the melons grow, your cousin asked, as he re-started the car.

Or write to me quietly, from a land far away, where life (does) exist.  And ask me to explain the words to a small group of women in the Katmandu Kitchen, on a rainy night in Dublin.

“Although I don’t know you, and we might not meet.  But I love you and I pray for you.  Because it’s humanity that brings us closer together”.

At the Katmandu Kitchen, on a damp night this autumn. 

We’re thinking of you Sandos.

Thinking of you, with love.