Introduction to Naamkaran and Other Rituals by Laura Lee Washburn

it was happening to her

it was happening to her
fluttering body
panicked gasps
a hand trying to reach the button to call the nurse
but failing

i could only see it through a slit in my curtain
so i woke up sammy
who was hunched in an awkward chair next to my bed
i had been sure hours ago that it would happen to me

soon an echo of
a malayalee nurse
singing soothing english sentences by bed no 4
we also have parents
grandparents
we will take care of you
don’t worry don’t worry don’t worry

but none of us are robots despite the
multiple wires coming in
and out
the beeping sounds
that accompany our movements
so we worry anyway

it is dark and sammy is holding my hand
but this anxiety is giving birth to a kinship
as one of my wires is turning
into a tentacle wanting
to reach out to bed no 4

she might be an old white lady
and i might be one of the only
two brown patients in this ward but right now
as i go to sleep
i know we have something in common

at first it feels like another antibiotics-into-my-veins fever dream
the woman who had a panic attack last night
is waking me up– but not on purpose

 her shriveled hand is holding a phone
and she is speaking to an adult child who
she believes should have been standing by her side

there are only chinese people here
only speaking chinese
mandarin (she corrects, feeling proud of her progressiveness)

 no english people
no english people here
only chinese

i got so scared
i had a panic attack last night
did not feel like i was in england

when it is afternoon again
i request for the curtain to be shut tighter
my tentacle has long been cut off
in an attempt to count the number of chinese individuals
that were on the floor last night

maybe one? maybe not?
maybe all people of colour are called chinese in english and
i never knew till we were there in
big enough numbers
to scare someone in a way that is now medically recorded
on their file

the other brown lady in bed no 1
plays azaan on her phone
“do you think this will cause her to have another panic attack?”
sammy makes me laugh
and the doctors start their rounds for today.

the poet’s reflection in water

She spends her days
using the pigment of
purple corals
to draw pictures
on the walls of
sea caves.

Come night,
she catches the
reflections of stars
and writes verses
on the waters of
the rising waves–

unafraid of who
she might encounter
in the dark corners
of the ocean–

unbothered with
sharing her location
with the other
creatures of the sea.

My mermaid self
does not spend her life
stuck to the ocean bed,
sifting through the granules
of the sand

searching for a pair
of wavy seashells
that are 34 (sea)
to mask her breasts–
throwing out pearl after pearl
on the off-chance

that a sailor might spot her
once every hundred years.
Instead

she keeps a collection
of prickly seaweed
and dull, green moss

to mark the graves
of trespassing gazes
who dare cross her path
as she dances through the currents.

lucknow love poem
After Nicole Cooley

I am cutting the stems diagonally
and adding water to the vase
to display the bouquet you gave me
and thinking of how a
media professor once claimed that
she would have loved to live
in the world of mirzapur
we who live in UP and Awadh at once
know better because
we have seen the alfaaz of urdu
blending with the sounds of stones being thrown
and the nakhra of romance
being beaten with sticks of regressiveness
we know of the cafes where ishq blossoms
and the night clubs that shut down
because somebody fired a gunshot.
Love and loving might be in the spirit
of the city but that spirit is trapped
in a body that has to wear an ankle-length
anarkali and be home before sunset
I am cutting the stems diagonally
and adding water to the vase
to display this bouquet you gave me
this is my tiny inquilaab.

oranges

My family tree sprawls over the forest
Where the fruit grows pre-segmented
Clinging to the branches with a tight grip
Split from the centre, hoping
That the tree which grew it this way
Will make up for the empty core
By clinging back to it.
Suspended mid-air, it hasn’t yet decided
That it would rather let go than stay sour.

my school has 4.4 stars on google maps

my school has 4.4 stars on google maps

5. i see flashbacks of parent-teacher meetings about how i have potential but refuse to apply myself (and instead focus on asking too many questions), i see my principal’s office where she called my entire class to discuss my depression (an approach that seemed to confuse all the eighth-graders, finally resulting in me having something in common with my peers), i see christmas celebrations that start a month early (and no mention of diwali), i see my bag being held hostage till i arrange a hundred-rupee fine (for being late– which i used to be on purpose), i see my name on the chalkboard under ‘bg’ (or bad girls)

4. i touch the curly hair that a friend would hurriedly turn into a braid (right before the uniform inspection), i touch the eyes that would read books under the benches (once i realised that the teachers were not going to answer my questions anyway), i touch the mouth that had to ask permission to drink water (because letting us drink it at will could have caused a mutiny), i touch the point of my waist where a teacher put her hand in my skirt’s band to pull me closer in the middle of scolding me (a totally normal thing to do)

3. i hear hushed whispers about the existence of a ‘lesbian’ (a mystical creature that is at once omnipresent and invisible in an ‘all-girls’ school), i hear proclamations of how girls with a convent education make good housewives (to a good businessman from a sanskaari family), i hear the bell signalling the end of the day (and my feet against the floor as i rush to leave the classroom)

2. i smell the sweat on my forehead when a teacher said that being gay is a biological defect (that was the only time i did not raise my hand to argue with an authority figure), i smell the plants outside the staff room (that i often hurried past– afraid that teacher would spot me and use me as entertainment)

1.i taste nothing (maybe it is time for a palette cleanser)

i press the 1 star button

my partner (who has never set foot in my town) presses it too

my school has 4.3 stars on google maps

int: a room in the palace  

rumi’s promise

years later when the light takes me a thunderstorm is born from my feet shaking the floors of heaven as i run around looking for the field where you and i are supposed to meet when my eyes finally tire from searching white horizons populated only with lies i walk out of indra’s pompous gates and knock on no man’s land standing between saints and sinners the stretch of dirt beckons me when the apsaras guarding the door ask me if i would like a parting gift i request the gajras in their tresses barefoot i walk the grainy ground carrying our memories on my back till the soil gives way under their weight and i can plant a constellation of white flowers in its cosy lap in gratitude i empty my pockets of our parting tears and the granules swallow them almost accidentally as they are mid-gulp in an attempt to put on a brave face slowly green vines start peeping out and joyously embrace me till i am covered in their blooming buds i am at once a person and a field and we both lie
waiting for you.

a list of things that your colleagues don’t want to know

1. your new year’s resolution is to brush your teeth when you wake up everyday not after the first meal not every second day not just rinsing your mouth with listerine your mental health is the arch nemesis of oral hygiene when you have just two spoons a day it can feel like a ridiculous decision to use one on something that has no immediate consequences but you did a cost-benefit analysis on microsoft excel and you can see that dr. sharma’s bills for rotten teeth would take away all the spoons at once so for 365 days now you will be like the perky girl in the commercial about the happy family

2. your wi-fi is not the one with bandwidth issues so your camera is off because you are exhausted after brushing your teeth and now cannot dictate your usual script in your head smile smile again ask about the weekend laugh at that joke now nod your head nod again smile once more everyone is nodding nod again smile wide while waving stop waving

3. you did not have anything for lunch but the two biscuits that were within your hands’ reach while you lay on your bed to deal with the fact that there is so much work so little energy you could have reheated yesterday’s dinner but after brushing you had only one spoon left and no energy to wash it

4. your plans after work are to be wrapped up in your blanket and mix a cocktail of wine and sleeping pills to force yourself to sleep while trying not to think about the layer of alcohol coating your teeth

5. there is no repair person scheduled to come in to your place tomorrow the reason why you said that you will be working from home is you not being sure that when you wake up you will have the energy to brush again you are already entering the office with two missed deadlines you cannot bring in bad breath too

6. you know they wonder why you don’t just walk away they whisper that you clearly have no idea what you are doing HR says that you have used up all of your sick days you also want to leave but you log in because you wonder how else you will buy toothpaste

i like the hat

I realised I loved you
the moment that I realised
that Carol loved Therese.  

The thing about growing up
without a name is that you realise that
nobody ever wanted to talk about you
or to you.

I had come home from school
and my mother was
watching an oscar nominated film.

I left home a few years ago
to see what it would be like
to travel through a space where my name
is not just known but also taken. 

There were these two women
and they were looking at each other
(something familiar tugged at my heart).  

One day I found people
who told me that there was an orchard 
of names that I could choose from-
Or I could grow my own.

They went on a trip
not to a place
but away from everything and everyone.  

I gathered the possibilities and devoured
them hungrily-- licking the juice
off my fingers to make sure that
consonants don’t drop to the ground.  

The Indian TV executives
had cut the sex scene
to keep the country’s morality intact.  

When I went back home
I could not fit into the doorway.
my hunger had added pounds and inches–
it felt like this was the first time I had eaten.

They had, for some reason,
not thought that seeing Carol
yearn for Therese was dangerous,  

‘Can’t you just get a bigger door?’
I sobbed at my family over the hedge
‘Can’t you just lose the weight?’
they shouted back, ‘You used to fit in just fine!’ 

That scene did not teach me a
new word- it gave me
permission to use the ones I already knew.  

Our mother tongue does not have a name for us
or at least one that we were taught growing up
that it can shout at our retreating backs
in one last attempt to make us stay. 

You and I once ended up inviting
our language home.
We gave her a cup of chai
and then noticed that the strong, brown palm
that she holds it with
has a long line tracing the destiny of lovers.
And of love.
There are words for that.
Pyaar, Prem, Mohabbat.
And we knew that she was telling us
that we could use these words
to stitch whatever names we wanted.
Our mother tongue promised us
that she had always, always loved us-
it was those who had stood in between
that had never wanted that love to reach me and you.

Naamkaran and Other Rituals
— Winner of the Washburn Prize, 2025 —

Copyright © 2026 Khushi Bajaj
Foreword by Laura Lee Washburn
Image cover by Avirat Bajaj
Cover design by Diana Baltag
Book design and layout by Diana Baltag
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or republished without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law.
Harbor Review
Joplin, MO 64870
harborreviewmagazine@gmail.com
www.harbor-review.com

Khushi Bajaj (she/her) is a multilingual poet and writer from Lucknow, India. Her work has been published by Penguin Random House, The Bombay Literary Magazine, Blood+Honey, and more. Her debut chapbook The Girl Who Ate Words (Parlyaree Press) came out in July 2026.

Find her work here: linktr.ee/khushibajaj