Christmas Eve in India

photo  courtesy of National Geographic

gymnasticating across Ahmadabad rooftops,

five long-tailed langur holy warriors dressed in gray

orchestrate a deliriously intoxicated street wedding procession below,

parading greenwhite Christmas cars

Amitabh Bachchan mud flapping rickshaws lining the streets,

while gushing rainbows of multicolor roses

streaming orangeyellowwhite callalilies explode flamboyantly,

all serenaded by a cacophony of tubas and dhols

with shiny black bamboo wooden sticks beating,

and greenscarlet saried women

dancing in effervescent Hindu-Horah Sufi circles,

oblivious to the tubby paan chewing street peddlers

flailing week old squash and green squishy oranges

it is here, across this vast mad subcontinent so ecstatic and undaunted,

where Mother India pauses tonight, converges,

then unanimously exhales signifying another rebirth

as our grateful planet heartens: “shabash! shabash!”!

Ahmadabad, India