Poetry 2017 Featured, Simran Arora

1947

Crisp, cold and crimson red
Herculean bodies sealed in futility,
Laid on the bed of their homeland,
Absorbing the smell of sweating flowers-
Blossoming, no longer;

Hot autumn shedding of tattered saffron, white and green;
Resignation from ancestral homes for a no mans land;
Shielding oneself from the unnecessary slaughter
By donning immortal courage on mortal skin;

Blood rained,
Falling like tears of estranged lovers;
Molten dusks were swallowed by Chenab and Sutlej,
That sipped the scented wine of final serenity
Before the tumultuous storm;

The sun and the moon
Sobbed in reciprocity;
On the sight of the birth of modern birds,
In this enduring summer,
Birthed to never call their birthplace their own;

The bruised flesh that growled
Was a mere reaction to the noises
That meant to thrust breathing skeletons under their own land
Beneath the opaque manure of the leaves of those left
To fertile the same soil for the first steps of newborn;

Some are offsprings of two countries now;
Words pregnant with anger
and feelings born
In the hour of turmoil;

Partition,
Just a wall, right?
Between people who look, feel
And smell alike, just like colourful bouquets
With sprayed crystals of plastic poison;

Dividing them stands these intricately handcrafted threads of separation,
'Manufactured' by handcuffing religions, their fatal mythical hymns and the deaf followers-
Who could hear no last gasps of humanity.