To love a country as if you've lost one 

Is to feel the freezing sun on your body

Form icicles on your cheeks as you train your feet

To dance hopscotch on rough asphalt;

Too harsh- they say, the air aching with the 

Scent of magnolias that curl around your toes,

It's not your fault, you think, you were raised to play war-

Those old games of kabaddi and ful tukka when Ma

Tackled you to the ground, caking your dress in mud,

And there you lay, until she pulled you up, 

bangles clinking with each movement, to teach you how to fight. 

To love a country as if you've lost one 

Is to sound out foreign syllables on your tongue,

Go home to saffron-scented rooms where

Every sundown, the smell of incense burns your  nose,

To taste the sweet juice of the mango your uncle

Smuggled in through customs- as reparations, he laughed-

To recite poems to yourself through paved empty streets, 

Breathing in the scent of cherry blossoms and suburbia,

To let the tulsi leaf sit on your tongue, bitterness slowly seeping in

As your mother braids your hair with stolen flowers and

Tells you why you must marry. 

To love a country as if you've lost one
Is to trace the alphabet along the cool metal of a lamp post,
Watching the smooth bare legs of the woman in front of you as
Your mother wraps her scarf tightly around your body,
Casting you a warning gaze- when the light turns green,
She saunters towards you, amber in the cooling sun,
Your eyes meet- and there's a moment
Where you know her- tired, homesick, missing her dog,
You feel that she knows you too, and your fingers brush as
She passes by, your mother pulling you into her body.

To love a country is this: you learn to live in a world 

Where the winters are white, summers are yellow,

And monsoon never comes- you watch the leaves wilt from

Your bedroom window and wonder why the cicadas chirp 

Through the night, you think of democracy and freedom and feel it 

Sink into your bones like an anchor you never knew existed

You follow the pines until they lead you into a shady grove,

Where you lie on dew-stained grass, settle among foreign reeds

And wonder if you can forgive yourself. 

Born and raised in Dhaka, Tapti is currently a senior at Milton Academy in Massachusetts, USA.