in blissful ignorance


Punjab
has a pleasant ring.
Punjab
is a word
a noun
a place
I've read about
in ragged-paged tomes—
the authors of said books are inevitably English.
Punjab
is a Majic word,
a mythic word
and logic decrees
that I reach for the atlas
to verify its existence, but

I've no honest desire to do so.


McHale used to grant his Navy
shore leave,
R & R
to the enchanted isle of
New Caledonia
right before my seven-year old,
network hypnotized
eyes
and the sheer joy, the raw thrill
in rolling
New Caledonia
off my tongue and out
into the room
where it soared to the very ceiling
and spread—
blanketing that most ordinary
of rooms
with fruit-laden palm trees,
huge-beak-ed birds in vibrant colours
and the music of breaking waves
set my tiny heart to pounding.
What outfit could possibly be
any better to possess
than a grass skirt and a coconut bra?

The spell cast by those six syllables
broke
in the fourth grade. Shattered
by the study of a thing called

Geography.

New Caledonia was actual, factual
and I was fairly certain
that Caledonian children
were forced
to attend dreary classes
and tidy their rooms
and
the magic was gone.
Pfffffft!

So,
all you cynics,
if you know of Punjab,
looked it up,
been there,
took pictures, walked its streets
in search of tourist treats—
please. . .
do not tell me.
Keep it to yourself.
I want to own
Punjab
in my most secret
of fantasies.
You don't tell me
about
Punjab
and I won't tell you
about Santa Claus.



© P. Gomes 2003