Two Poems

    By Arya Gopi

    1. WHO PAUSED MY COUNTRY?

    1
    On the day of shame,
    a fanatic shot at history.
    Religion was his pistol.

    2
    On the day of shame,
    people awoke to unfreedom,
    that was a victory of sabotage.

    3
    On the day of shame,
    green Naxalites were
    put into deterrent custody.

    4
    On the day of shame
    a state disappeared
    under armed curfew.

    5
    On the day of shame,
    a fabricated map gauged
    waterboarding a nation.

    6
    On the day of shame,
    on the crucible of hate;
    an unholy stone was laid.

    7
    On the day of shame,
    A masjid was bulldozed;
    persuading it was a shrine.

    8
    On the day of shame,
    Prayers became baleful.
    Rituals became obscene.

    9
    On the day of shame,
    people misspelled God.
    Dogs were barking out.

    10
    On the day of shame,
    public elected a leader,
    on the borders of patriotism.

    11
    On the day of shame,
    a mess of concertina mesh
    fenced the election promises.

    12
    On the day of shame,
    Dracon was reborn and
    modest citizens disappeared.

    13
    On the day of shame,
    wattage of democracy
    sensed massacre of alieion.

    14
    On the day of shame,
    the atheist baptises in blood.
    The Theist erases mosaic gateways.

    15
    On the day of shame,
    apocalyptic surveillance dictated
    the fate of pauper gods.

    16
    On the day of shame,
    On the day of shame,
    On the day of shame,
    I am metamorphosed
    as an unmindful,
    anachronistic,
    drowning in the
    blood chamber!

    In between,
    Who paused my country?
    Who paused my country?
    Who paused my country?

    2. TRUISMS

    Fear matured
    in my mouth like concrete.
    I couldn’t twirl
    my tongue;
    it was stuck
    in my dialect.
    Household
    truisms that
    you find what
    you pay for.

    Words spelled
    doom. I have
    no gods
    to venerate.
    Our antiquities
    were infected;
    I sit on thresholds;
    light a cigarette,
    as a torch
    of impurity.
    I am tainted
    with a touch of
    the menstruating census.

    Arya Gopi is a bi-lingual poet who works both in English and Malayalam with more than half a dozen published books including five Malayalam poetry collections. Her first English title Sob of Strings was published in 2011.Her forthcoming books are A Biped Mammal (English poems) and After the Kiss (English poems). A contributor to major journals, she has won several awards which includes the Kerala State Sahitya Akademi Kanakasree Award. A PhD Holder in English literature, she teaches literature at Calicut University.

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