Jarawa
They do not know that this is her; the girl who walks barefooted, who eats with her hands, who climbs trees to sit in the cradle of crooked branches to gaze at the blue sky with her toes pressed against light brown bark.
She wishes now to not see people, not to be with people. She longs for the quiet of dark nights where the only sounds are cricket song, the wind in the avocado tree and the distant thunder of the ocean crashing on the rocks down by the bay.
Down by the bay where the watermelons grow,
Back to my home I dare not go
For if I do, my mother will say,
“Have you ever seen a dream, swimming in cream?”
Down by the bay…”
The tv blasts a constant flow of static noise across the passerelle. The noise of it grates on her nerves. She wishes she were a Jarawa.