Three times I was the beneficiary

of the Hugging Saint’s embraces.

Once as a scrawny teenager in India

when the dark moon-faced lady,

draped in white, wreathed in smiles,

enfolded me in a mother of all hugs

and impressed me by soothing my aunt

about her relationship to her daughter,

something she couldn’t have known about

without her spiritual powers.

Then, oozing with affection, she proceeded 

to hug the rest of the people in line.

The second time was in Massachusetts 

when it was my turn to be held.

I whispered my wish to be a mother

and she slipped an apple into my hand

before she released me.

The third time was with my five-year-old

into whose palms she pressed Hershey’s kisses

and bestowed unforgettable hugs on us

and everyone who waited.

Now, reeling from the atrocities 

that the Palestinians are suffering,

I feel like hugging every one of them

and listening to their heartbreaking stories

until I turn into a stone statue of sadness

and leak a never-ending fountain of tears.

---

Tara Menon is an Indian-American writer based in Lexington, Massachusetts. More than eighty of her poems have been published in magazines, literary journals, and anthologies. Menon was a finalist for the Willow Run Poetry Book Award 2023/2024. Her latest poems have appeared in “Sheila-Na-Gig,” “Tipton Poetry Journal,” “Adanna Literary Journal,” “Arlington Poetry Journal,” and “A Plate of Pandemic.”