When I feel down, like a small bulb dying
among a crowd of condescending moons,
my guilty eyes see only one martyr.
He is a devoted, withering trunk
holding countless boughs, twigs, leaves, flowers, fruits.
Unmoved by his perpetual pain, like
greedy worms we feasted on his glory.
We picked up huge stones to stone him, sometimes.
Each dewy morning, the massive mountain
is losing his soil to the angry waves.
He walks around leaning against the walls
of the house he built but can no more own.
Like a scarecrow he kept us safe and fed
our fields, but since the avalanche of white
hair, he is toothless and frightens no birds.
And, when I spend the afternoon over
the bridge watching the fragile fish carry
their blissful bodies down the river, I
feel his youth in the rhythmic ripples and
know he would lie about his evening grief
Amit Parmessur