Glopowrimo 12

Day 12. April 12.  #GloPoWriMo.
Prompt  - 'this is’nt a poem
                   this is a cry of the Rohingya,
                   this a river of blood.'  - Bina Sarkar Ellias
                    

This isn't a poem
I'm removed distant detached
A remote observer
A dispassionate wordsmith.

Not a lover of displaced refugees
Fleeing the only home
They know
Running on empty
Desperate days
Demonized  lives.

I'm ensconced in a cosy home
A comfortable bed
My spouse chauffeurs me to supermarkets
To malls and movies
And casual coffee dates.
And the occasional poetry reading
Amongst friends.

I'm a poetess of pain.
Mine alone.
I'm a hopeless romantic.
In love always.
With myself.

What do I know?
Of displaced people or
Of frightened children?
Of terrified mothers
And fathers who have
Lost all hope,
In the humanity
Of their brethren?

I sit upon this one.
I pray upon this one.
I cannot bear to read.
I close my eyes
To editorials.

In bed I lie awake.
Waiting.
Incubating.

And it's growing.
A fecund egg
Of misery.

This childbirth will be
Difficult.
A breech delivery.
I abhor cerebral forceps.

I invoke the Muse
Of the helpless
The patron saints
Of the hopeless
I usher in Angels
Of lost travellers,
the homeless,
The displaced.

St Anthony
Archangel Raphael
Fill my mind
With understanding.

Magnify their pain
In my veins.

Till my efffete ears ring
My shallow heart pounds
And I can scream this
I can get it out.

This Not -Poem,
This Hate story.
This Genocidal
21st century exodus.

Let me shriek
A demented widow
A hungry exhausted orphan
A tormented  father.

'Save us
Help us
Find us
Find our home.'

This is
The cry of the Rohingya.,
This is a river of blood.

(c) Amrita Valan 2018

                   
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