Babitha Marina Justin

were charred

to white ash.

And then up floated droves

of dead pot-bellied fish.

Bulldozers clawed

their way through the slush,

chasing away egrets

and butterflies.

Trucks tipped in

smooth hillocks

of fine sand.

In two days, Aakkulam lake

was dead flat, bone-dry

and all set.

Months later,

I can still hear

murmuring mermen

warped in rotting reeds,
warbling in the depths

of a lake that

loved the sky.

A receding fringe of green

wages a war

of resistance and resilience

while a heart-shaped swathe of water

beats a tremulous tune,

mirroring the last shards

of sky.

I will come to see your orchards,

your valleys freckled with fear.

I will come to see the beauty

of terror budding on

your saffron fields,

armed men breaking and keeping peace,

history bathing its body

with blood and tears.

I will come to see your tremor

when they shout for a freedom

that can kill, exile and

strip down your skin

with shame.

I will come from the land

laced with palms

and the smell of cloves

to see your saintly peaks shiver

their silver crowns sutured

with pine-thorns of pain.

I will see those ruins

huddling in silence

to be awakened by a distant rustle,

the bustle of your valleys which

exiled happiness long ago,

I will walk your mountain passes

stalked by messiahs of death.

I will come to your

bullet-burnt skies

bleeding in the brim

like a framed traitor.

I will come to see

your mustard fields

where your women

dread to walk alone.

I will haunt your

shikharas every summer to

to smell the scent of

your wanton youth.

I will come to your valley

to write a handful of verses

for your chinar trees,

your walnut trunks

ripe with folklore, to pick

your water chestnuts

before they are buried

under memory’s snow,

our nation’s forgetful snow.