gandhi godse

Look, pal,

You are the resurrection day

of a nation and

I am the remembrance day

of the Father of the same nation.

In a way we are closely related too

being neighbours divided by just four days.

Yet, I am sad to say that there is truly nothing

common in between us.

 

I am a minute’s silent prayer.

You are a noisy carnival passing through a wide boulevard.

I am a joined palm with a bowed head.

You are a finger of cannon aiming the sky.

While I bend down and look for a sweeper’s broom

You straighten you back and tilt your head up

to enjoy the formation of a fleet of fighter planes.

 

Not only that, pal.
One cannot hide the fact that

These days the distance between us

has widened a bit.

The reasons may be many, but

Can’t but say this if onlyto remember.

It was the hero of compassion

in a story about a bird’s anguished cry

when felled by a hunter’s arrow

that he called out to as “he Ram!”

Not a God of war.

 

To see the same poetic justice of an epic that

began with the word ‘Please don’t’

in a life that ended with the same word

carries many meanings.

 

The three bullets that reddened my day

at 5:12 in the evening

definitely belonged to that hunter.

When your day is again decorated

with weapons,

when you stand with your chest

thrust out in pride greeting them,

it is good to remember all this.

Translation by Ra Sh


SIGN UP FOR COUNTERCURRENTS DAILY NEWS LETTER


 


Countercurrents is answerable only to our readers. Support honest journalism because we have no PLANET B. Become a Patron at Patreon Subscribe to our Telegram channel


GET COUNTERCURRENTS DAILY NEWSLETTER STRAIGHT TO YOUR INBOX


Tags:

Comments are closed.

Translate »