Fearless


A poem excerpted from We Called the River Red in the January 2010 issue of Pratilipi


[Read some other poems:Tejimolā Forever; Mother Goddess Kamakhya; Manufacturing Memories; For Nilikesh da, Shot Dead; End of Ennui; From Exile (1); After This Sky; Tryst; Would I Be A Poet Still; elegaic; A History of Violence, Fearless, The Rains Come from Behind the Curtains, Love has a way of happening]

I will walk down the streets of my city without fear

I will not be slapped like my cousin
Because he walked on the pavement
Where ‘Black Cat’ commandos
Brandished machine guns behind sand bags
Securing us against insurgents.
He was only sixteen.

I will not be interviewed on television
Lying half naked, faint, prodded by microphones
And asked to narrate how and why I got caught
In a crossfire in somebody else’s war.
My war is not being fought
Those who did have died,
Those who kill now live.

I will not smell the smell
Of burnt explosives clotted blood
Charred flesh outside my house
I will not watch the people
Sifting among mangled vehicles broken glass
Cast away footwear looking for the dead

I will walk to school everyday
I will greet everyone on the way
I will go out alone to play
Yes, I will dream everyday

I will walk down the streets of my city
Without fear today.