Antiman

by Rajiv Mohabir

Diem stared at my cigarette. “You been smoking long?” he asked.

  My ears started to burn out of embarrassment. “I’ve been smoking for about ten years,” I replied. God, I thought. I am all wrong for this place.

  Diem continued, “You know, if you put the effort into writing that you put into smoking you will go from performing thirty percent to one hundred percent.”

  I stared at my feet. He had a point. If I took the energy and time and money and kept it for writing only, then it would probably pay off somehow—at least I would stop smoking.

  Cynthia, a poet from the workshop, came up to me as Diem walked away.

  “Hey, can I have a light?” she asked.

  I handed her my lighter and had a hard time looking at her in the face. I coughed and sighed.

  “So you like Joy Harjo’s writing?” she said.

  “She’s simply spectacular.”

  “I’ve never read her.”

  “I can lend you my book.” I said as the scrub jay alit and looked in my direction. He flew closer to where Cynthia and I sat. She noticed my new friend.

  He spoke.

  I answered.

  He spoke.

  I answered.

  He spoke and I answered.

  Each person in the VONA workshop got to meet with the leader one-on-one for half an hour sometime during the week. Suheir had told us to bring our packets of poems with us when we came. She sat in the near-empty dining hall. Suheir greeted me with a warm smile.

  She looked directly into my eyes and said, “I don’t agree with what was said in class. In fact, I believe that if you can get your reader to trust you, you can get away with a lot.”

  I pulled out my poems from workshop, hoping that she would tell me what I could change to rescue my poems from their hideous state. I wanted to know how to make my reader trust me.

  Suheir looked at my packet and then at me. “You’re a new writer, I know. These poems,” she sighed through gritted teeth, “I think you are beyond these now.” You are nothing. No one will ever love you. You are fat and hairy. You are good-for-nothing.

  I looked at her and wanted to save face. I could feel the tears start to tickle my eyelashes and my throat start to close up. I changed the subject.

  “Tell me the story of how you came to poetry,” I asked, feeling sucker punched.

  I went to my room that night without eating dinner and cried for an hour until I collapsed from exhaustion. Being a poet was tough. I thought I had found my community, but instead I found a friend in Cynthia and the scrub jay whose words only made emotional sense.

  I left San Francisco, unsure of my steps. If these people didn’t think I was any good, the people who were supposed to understand a person of color’s struggles, what would the MFA be like? I wondered.

  I had applied to NYU’s MFA program, to the New School, and to Queens College. NYU rejected me outright and I was waitlisted for the New School. But one day while I was teaching, I got a call from Nicole Cooley at Queens College. She left a message.

  As soon as the art teacher came into my classroom to take over for a period, I listened to the message in the office adjoining my classroom, where I wrote my lesson plans and graded papers.

  “This message is for Rajiv Mohabir. My name is Nicole Cooley and I’m calling from Queens College to let you know that we are excited to welcome you into our program. Please call me back if you have any questions and to let me know if you will be attending. We hope the answer is yes.”

  I was stunned. I dialed her back.

  “Hello, Nicole Cooley? This is Rajiv Mohabir.”

  “Rajiv! Thank you for calling! I wanted to tell you how impressed we all were by your application. We really think it’s special that you love Queens so much and we will be glad to have you come aboard.” Nicole’s voice was true and unfaltering. Could it really be? I could do my graduate work while teaching full-time.

  I called my mother right away from the closet.

  “Ma?”

  “Hi, Raim, everything okay?”

  “Yes. I just wanted to tell you that I got accepted to Queens College to do my MFA!”

  Silence.

  “An MFA?” she asked.

  “What’s that?”

  “A master’s of fine arts,” I laughed.

  “Finally …” she said, “finally, a degree that makes sense!”

  I was puzzled by her support for my artistic inclination—I was always told to be practical. To know the difference between a career and a hobby.

  “Thanks, Ma, I never knew you would be so happy about this.”

  “A master of finance will serve you well.” She was smiling on the other end of the phone.

  “Fine arts. A master’s of FINE ARTS,” I clarified. “The exact opposite of what you thought,” I said.

  We both laughed at the mistake and hung up. She couldn’t hear fine arts, perhaps because it was so outside of the realm of her world—arts in America? Who would want to read my Coolie poems?

  I walked into the orientation, a kind of meet-and-greet. Nicole Cooley stood by Roger Sedarat, who was on his hands and knees attempting to plug in a microphone to a speaker.

  Nicole took my hand and shook it. “It’s so very wonderful to meet you. Roger, this is Rajiv—remember his application?”

  Roger smiled and nodded. “Yes,” he said. “We were all so excited to see your writing about how Queens is an important part of you.”

  Nicole sipped her wine and nodded agreement. “I am excited to see more of your multilingual poems. Kimiko, come meet Rajiv, he’s an incoming student in poetry.”

  Kimiko Hahn came over and took my hand with a “good to meet you” smile. Her scarf was light cotton and looked like a dupatta. I looked around at my future classmates.

  So many people of color, I thought as I poured wine, smiling to myself. I couldn’t believe the professors remembered my application so specifically. They even liked my multilingual poems. I took a deep sip. I’d always felt most at home in Queens.

  Brown Inclusion: Some Queens Definitions

  Brown – (adj) from:

  Old English – brūn: dark, shining

  Brown is a color produced by mixing the three primary colors together in equal amounts. It is the color ascribed to people who have dark skin, often used to refer to people whose ancestry is not just European or African.

  Inclusion – (n) from:

  Latin – inclusionem: to be made a part of

  Inclusion is the opposite of exclusion in that a person is seen as having in-group status, though sometimes temporarily, within a larger group. In acts of solidarity, disparate people can unite against a common oppressor.

  Brown Inclusion is when Zeke—a guy you’d met while out dancing in Manhattan—and his two friends, Analisa and Cindy, come to your house to celebrate Diwali. You drink chai and share stories. You tell the story of the Ramayana and represent it with all of its problems. You mention the fact that your grandmother was the last one in your family to speak her language.

  Zeke says, “We tell special stories on certain nights, too. The funny thing is, my grandmother is also the last speaker of her language and she’s trusted me with some of her songs.”

  “You should record as many as you can,” I said. “Tape recorders, journals, everything. Make sure you don’t forget.”

  That night he spends the night with you in your studio.

  Brown Inclusion is the watch billboard in Jackson Heights on 73rd and Broadway where Shah Rukh Khan shows off the white gold and diamonds on his wrist. Chak de, Jackson Heights!

  Brown Inclusion is being Mister Javier.

  Brown Inclusion is stumbling with Sarah toward a bar, through the crowd accumulating on 73rd Street, after reading through poetry submissions to the literary magazine you edit, Ozone Park Journal. You met in your MFA program and connected over astrology and your love of dive bars.

  South Asian men and women are crowded outside the wooden doors, dressed in colorful salwar kameez, s
aris, kurtas, and pajamas, watching a musical group set up tabla and microphones on a small makeshift stage wreathed in police tape.

  Sarah asks, “What’s going on?”

  Since you had just been talking about the pomp and glory of Jackson Heights in the festival season, you feel compelled to answer.

  You turn to the bearded man to your right just as the tabla starts introducing the tala. The man wears a short-sleeved button-down with a pair of khaki slacks.

  “Yahan kya ho raha hai abhi?” you ask in Hindi. “What’s happening here?”

  “Naba Barsho,” he replies in Bangla.

  Behind you, three white men exit the last Irish bar in the neighborhood raucously, disturbing the street celebration with swearing and drunkenness.

  “What’s that?” you ask again in Hindi.

  “Bengali New Year, these people are Hindus,” he answers laughingly in Urdu.

  It occurs to you that he read you as a Muslim and that your Hindi wasn’t Hindi but the spoken form of it, which was simultaneously Urdu and Hindi.

  Brown Inclusion is the Pakistani woman at work who asks you where you’re from. You say Guyana and she assumes that you are Muslim because your last name ends in -ir. You don’t correct her. Every time you run into her in the hallway, she greets you by your last name and speaks to you in Urdu to explain the goings-on of her family life. She asks you if you know anyone, any man between the ages of twenty-seven and thirty-five, who needs to get married. Since you are not native-fluent in Urdu or Punjabi she automatically disqualifies you for some things.

  Brown Inclusion is the Punjabi cab driver who picks you, your sister, and mother up from the corner of Lefferts and Liberty in Little Guyana to take you back to Little India in Jackson Heights. He speaks to you in English at first then slips into Urdu, assuming you and your mother and sister all speak it because of what you look like and your destination.

  When you reply to his questions (in Urdu) and explain that you are not recently from India or Pakistan, he is surprised to hear that you are Guyanese. He says, “You are tall and with your beard you are looking proper Punjabi.”

  Your sister asks in Urdu, “If you thought we were Punjabi why did you speak to us in Urdu?”

  Brown Inclusion is the eighty-four-year-old Trinidadian uncle with the henna-red hair in Flushing Meadows Park in Queens whom you meet at the Hosay reenactment and who approaches you out of a crowd of a hundred and talks to you about Islam and its true meaning. “Islam is not a violent religion, people make bad choices, you know you must contact Pritha for my number and I will tell you everything that I learned. The Koran says that men and women are equal. It never says that women are less. But today everybody is mixed up.”

  E Train to Roosevelt Ave Making All Local Stops in Queens

  14th St (Transfer Here for the A, C, L)

  Tonight Union Square was a whiskey wheeze. A curtain of second-hand smoke and steam rose from the manhole. I looked onto the street, clutching my Johnnie Black on the rocks and gritting my teeth. The door slid open. The bald Punjabi man next to me made eye contact and smiled. Tonight was the Sholay party—the monthly queer South Asian party—but instead of the Prince Street location, it was at Webster Hall.

  I’d never been to Webster Hall before, its three-floored circus packed with young college students was a nightmare I could do without. But I loved to dance.

  “Buy you a drink?” I asked.

  “Is it payday?” he sneered. “Sure.” I closed my H&M jacket tight around my chest.

  The bartender brought the whiskey ginger.

  “You Punjabi?” he asked.

  “No. Guyanese.”

  “Oh,” he sounded disappointed. “A darkie. I’m Nav.”

  I smiled at Nav and downed the cold fire of my drink, ice cubes nearly slicing my throat. “I’m Rajiv,” I said.

  DJ Bobby started spinning “Beedi” from the new movie Omkara starring Saif Ali Khan. I fumbled to the dance floor, not giving one fuck who was here or that I was by myself, or whether Nav thought I was an idiot, dancing chutney and not bhangra.

  A man sidled up next to me and we began to dance together. He was tall, broad-shouldered, with long hair. Clearly, I thought, this man was Punjabi. Were there only Punjabis in this city? I fingered his hair.

  “Tussi jat ho?” I asked in my broken Punjabi.

  “What?” he asked. The music bumped.

  I could feel it in my temples, throbbing—my blood thinned by alcohol.

  I repeated my question.

  “No. I’m not Indian. I’m Guyanese.” “I’m Rajiv.”

  “Hi Rajiv, I’m Zane,” he said and placed my hand on his crotch. He went outside to smoke a Newport. I got another drink and fell down a flight of stairs. Somewhere that night he gashed his leg. Our meeting started with pain. I knew I was going to fall in love with him. I decided that tonight would be perfect.

  “Let’s take the E train to my place. It’s going local though,” I said.

  DELAY: WE ARE BEING HELD MOMENTARILY AT THE STATION

  “I’m seeing someone else,” I said. I wanted to be cruel to Sef. “I met this guy at a bar, his name is Zane and he’s Guyanese, too.” I puffed out my chest and locked my knees.

  Sef got up from his side of the bed and went to the bathroom. “What does that mean for us?” he asked. “Will we still hang out sometimes?” A chill hung about the room; the air conditioner kicked into high gear and frightened the pigeons perched on the windowsill.

  “I don’t think so,” I said. “I am going to try monogamy with this guy. I think he wants it and I’m ready to try it, too. He’s out to his family at least.”

  Sef’s eyes opened widely and his jaw dropped. He mumbled, “I thought you didn’t believe in monogamy. Sher kabse nali ka pani peene laga?” When did the proud lion start drinking water from the gutter? He washed his face with water so hot, the mirror fogged up.

  Sundar, depressed, sings to Radha as he plays the piano.

  You embraced me trembling

  quaking breath—

  If it wasn’t you, then who was it—

  the one who wept tears as pearls

  at our parting. If it wasn’t you,

  then who was it? It only could have been you.

  The night’s intoxication leaves

  no trace of our joy.

  Radha looks confused. She doesn’t know what to do. Will she marry Sundar? Will she fuck Gopal?

  34th St–Penn Station (Transfer Here for the A, C)

  “Karma is a bitch,” Zane said of his drag persona, Lotay. The name recalled that of a long thread of a holy mantra that led to nirvana. Or at least it led to a better rebirth if you said it right and often enough. Zane’s thread dealt exclusively with his eyebrows. But the way Zane changed it from Lotus to Lotay had different connotations—either lotay as in lotela, or as in water pitcher.

  We moved in together in the summertime. My Jackson Heights flat was closer to his work than his five-bedroom three-story house on Long Island. His house was excessive, a mess of cheap Playboy memorabilia and tchotchkes. He had a room devoted to “Asia,” an Orientalist fantasy of paper fans, Ming-style vases, and dull katanas. Zane lived in this palace of excess with his brother and his brother’s then-girlfriend.

  “I bought this house with my mother because it was important to her that her sons be well off,” he said.

  “That’s really nice. I don’t think I’ll ever have that kind of help from my parents,” I replied.

  “Well, they wanted me and Lisa to be happy together and start a family,” he spoke looking off, past the tacky, cheaply made vases. “I was married to Lisa for less than a year and we are getting a divorce.”

  “You mean you’re married now?” I tried to keep the earthquake in my chest still. My cell phone vibrated against my leg. Sef was calling. I sent the call to voicemail.

  “Yeah, my father didn’t want me to get married because he knew, but my mom didn’t care. She thought it was for the best. So, I got rea
lly stoned with my father and brother and went through with it.” He smiled, “It’s not a big deal.”

  “Does she get half of your assets?” I asked. “How involved are you both at this point?”

  “We will be fine if we move in together and I don’t put my name on the lease.”

  We decided to live in my place until the lease was up and then we would find our own place together. I paid all of the rent and all of the bills while he continued to pay the mortgage on his house; his brother and his brother’s girlfriend paid almost nothing.

  “Why are they not contributing?” I asked once.

  “Rafi is young. I wish I had the opportunity that I am affording him now when I was his age.”

  “No, instead you married a woman and bought a house ten times what you make in a year.” I was vexed. “What about this life we have together?”

  “When we move in together it will be a different story,” Zane promised.

  42nd St–Port Authority (Transfer Here for the A, C, N, Q, R, S, 1, 2, 3, 7}

  The first time Zane attacked me was when he came to my parents’ home. We had been dating for four months. I hadn’t been home in about a year, and I was excited for him to meet my mother and father. My sister, my young cousin Clara, and my sister’s gay friends, Justin and Ronnel, were planning to go to Parliament House—a gay bar in Orlando. Ronnel had been begging me to go with them. I knew Ronnel and Justin from the time they were eleven and I was fifteen. Now they were man-size and had blossomed into delicious twinks.

  We got to Parliament House and I lost Emily almost immediately. She had more gay friends than I ever did. Zane and I went to get a drink at the bar. Britney’s “Toxic” played in a trance mix. All of the gay boys were sweaty with excitement. Justin came by and stood next to me and Zane.