You Cannot Blame Me

In there, all that I was and all that I knew were surrounded by the sea;
I've had toys fashioned from polished coconut shells for heads, palm leaves twisted around for flesh,
scratched out smiles and pouts,
I've had castles made of sand, our drinking water has always had a touch of saline;
Our looking mirrors have always been puddles of clear water;
Yes I grew up in that tiny little island.
It was never a routine to spot a tug or tanker, or a ship,
To just let them come and go, like occasional meteors shooting across the sky;
And you cannot blame a child for her curiosity,
And you cannot blame me now, when decades later, I stand on this alien land,
run out to what they call 'the beaches' every noon and spot my crying dolls floating amidst the tides, waving their torn-out, palm-leaf skins at me...
And you cannot blame a grown up woman out at the shore, on her knees, wailing out to the sea, as though she just lost her baby...