Category: Daughters
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Kaali, at Scroll
My essay in Scroll on the word kaali: what my family said with love, why it stays in my children’s novel, and the summer I heard it in my own head.
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The Skin I Grew Up In
My essay in The Indian Express, for the She Said column: colourism, a paati’s first word for my daughter, and the systems we fight that live inside us.
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The Last Bit I Walk Alone
The alarm goes off at five forty-five. Maggi in a thermos, a transition reel, photos by the tree, and the last bit of the walk home alone.
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American-Indian, Indian-American
Collected in The Smudged Hyphen (2026). American by birth, Indian by virtue of being raised by us, the hyphen may define my twins more than either of the terms throughout their lives. “Scarlett eats meat!” M’s eyes are round, her tone incredulous. Before I can respond she adds, “We are vegetarian. We do not eat…
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Same, But Different
“I want to color my hair blue too!” My youngest, all of six years, holds my hand and swings as she walks. One of her older sisters walks a little ahead of us. We are on our daily evening stroll around our development. The sun has not yet set, bathing us all in a golden…
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My Shadow
She follows me from the first walk to the last, watching, learning, absorbing. On my youngest, the child I did not write down, and what it means to be seen by her.
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Three Different Mothers
Three daughters posted Mother’s Day tributes online — a scrapbook, a photo grid, a music video. Each one a different mother. An essay on being seen.
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Through the Door
My daughter was in the shower. The sentence that arrived before I was fully awake was: this is my child, but I don’t know her. A reflective essay on the week my daughters began to feel like strangers, and what my own mother said when I asked her the same question.
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Subject to the Jurisdiction Thereof
The courtroom seats filled early this morning. The president sat in the gallery, a first, as if the question of who belongs required his physical presence to adjudicate. Outside, cameras. Inside, two hours of oral argument over five words in the Fourteenth Amendment: subject to the jurisdiction thereof. My three daughters were born in the…
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Breaching New Frontiers
“You can get drunk as much as you want to…” Ammu says playfully in conversation where her dad and I talk about her and her twin getting their learner’s permits and eventually their drivers license. “Ani! Neva…” I call out laughing as I do and head back to my oasis that is my study. “True!…