Lesung Batu (Mortar and Pestle)

Tok, tok, tok

a thumb of tumeric

splintered into gnarly marmalade bits

a wedge of shallot

flattened into sibilant mash

moisture slowly dribbles down your chin,

creating three puddles on your kaftan pants

Tok, tok, tok

chili padis cut into slits

desiccated into vermillion threads

two and a half cloves of garlic

smoothened into pungent paste

you know that Cik Ahmad, our old neighbour, is

dead

his body was rotting when they found him

can you believe that?

Tok, tok, tok

fibres of tumeric

and slivers of light mauve skins

collide into each other

acerbic juices squelching beneath

only 30, his daughter, yet a successful lawyer and married

while you sit cross-legged on the linoelum floor

unwed, fingers pallid

Tok, tok, tok

the back of a stainless steel spoon scraping

against smooth mortar

an indiscernible mound that looks nothing like what

it had emerged from

Mak, can you stop? Stop talking, just stop.

but the words never escape from glued lips

swallow it back like foul

piss

Tok, tok, tok

Tok, tok, tok.