The Name They Gave It

By Sini Jerome

The doctor’s pen clicked three times

before she wrote it down.

A word I couldn’t pronounce—

long, English,

like something from a serial.

It stuck like overcooked rice

to the roof of my mouth.

I wore it to the market,

let it explain why I stood

staring at the bhindi for ten minutes.

Let it apologise

when my hands shook

pouring chai, changing nappies,

counting coins for the auto-rickshaw.

But I’m not the shaking.

Not the fog that makes me forget

my neighbour’s name mid-sentence.

Not the pins and needles at 3 a.m.,

when the first local trains

rattle past and I’m already awake.

I’m the one who noticed

something was wrong.

Who stood in line for four hours

at KEM Hospital

with a crying baby on my hip.

Who keeps coming back

even when the medicine

burns my stomach.

I’m the breath I take

before I say it out loud—

‘I have this thing,’

not ‘I am this thing.’

There’s a difference.

Even if my mother

doesn’t hear it.

Even if the neighbours

have already decided what it means.

I’m not cured.

The word’s still there—

written in some file,

whispered over cutting chai.

But I’m learning

to let it sit, not settle—

like a coin tucked in my blouse,

not a stamp pressed on my forehead.

Some days I forget it entirely.

I laugh at my brother’s joke,

burn the dal,

argue over two rupees with the sabziwala,

sing off-key to the radio.

I am not my symptom.

I’m the person

who lives around it,

through it,

despite it.

And that should count.

By Sini Jerome