Archive for the ‘Poetry’

Howling

What shall I do, living in Peru, with this report of systemic failure in U.N. monitoring in Sri Lanka, how bureaucrats drove away from the disaster to come, buried hard- earned stats about civilian deaths and allowed themselves to be brow-beaten, harassed, shouted into silence while 40,000 humans died , mostly from battering shells rained from fighter jets? I belong to the family of nations. I have a vote in one democracy, dream of serving humanity, in the Secretariat of the United Nations. of inside influence, reform within, extracting the worm, of keeping a job close to the Secretary General, speaking into his ear, saying fix your flank, Man. Souls are howling. Repost This Article

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Happiness Blues, Sri Lanka

I don’t know what to say, my friend, I have some blues that don’t seem right, too light and fancy free, happiness and all that putty you poke and pat, grinning silly, but love is the matter with me, I have plenty and I want to start sharing the bounty. How lucky can a man be, used to melancholy and raving at the Moon about family buried by the lagoon, who will catch the drift along with snowflakes in this far Northern and European town that tried to make peace back in the viper-ridden Vanni and failed; yet somehow, miraculously, cousins survived and are making their way out of the jungle, heads held high; and throughout the planet family is saying this effort to settle foundation stones of our piece of earth will continue until the end of time; so nobody should rest on laurels, or dream of bitter death, happiness has me up tonight, generous and lively. Are you…

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The Writer Fighter

Have you become a lance corporal, wing commander, lieutenant, private, sergeant, major general? Or are you a writer transporting yourself into trenches to wield a saber against a vague menace, bespectacled, sitting at a computer, trying to finish his latest report on the war without witnesses that went wrong somehow because the witnesses and warriors snapped photos on cell phones and sent them to scribes composing on computers eternal odes to mere privates in trenches, launching projectiles from bazookas, following orders, not responsible for blood baths beyond gun sites, in no man’s land, no fire zones? Repost This Article

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Lance Corporal

I’m tired. It’s midnight. I’m propped up Against the mud Like a cannon gun, To fight The battles you Criticise From behind Your trenches Of ink. My blood. Your right. That’s not so hard To rationalise, When I’m out here And you’re safe in there. Your sovereignty Well intact. Our skies are not the same. Mine and yours. Mine is black. You’ve taken my stars Away. Away. To stud Your darkness With my light. I was like you When I signed my name. Just a father, A son, A lover. A friend. But today I am a coin in your Treasury of blood. Cold, worthless blood You so casually Spend. Repost This Article

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From the Hold

I don’t merit praise, who am I to suggest inventing the west moon for the Lankan imagination, or that one day a Tamil child will rise from fires to claim the rights of his tribe? Boat people, Tamils, flee Serendip. Governing criminals are stopping the motors, forcing families to remain in their island prison. Who shouts in the Hague, on Downing Street, outside the White House? More Tamils, defenders of human rights, liberals, Don Quijotes, while the murderer, and jail keep, licks his mutton chops. Repost This Article

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Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow

This request to write in 25 words or less the hint of a larger narrative teases my Muse to dance on a pin, prick the skin and bleed monsters, unnecessary to acknowledge, given commitment to impart common knowledge even after the Enlightenment, which should have solved essential dilemmas but did not lead to an end to history or discovery, a particle that gathers mass is making the rounds on Sunday Morning talk shows, Wikipedia open to the blessed with internet; while have nots, no- internauts, are obliged to meditate on joining the global race to be in, not out. Repost This Article

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The burning of the Jaffna library: 31 years on

books burning_high

31 years ago, the public library in Jaffna was burnt. As noted online, at the time of its destruction, the library was one of the biggest in Asia, containing over 97,000 books and manuscripts. Nothing survived the flames. Anchored to an event in Colombo, an article commemorating the burning of the library published on Groundviews last year noted, Some one quite rightly pointed out that it was a crime against humanity. No doubt, it is a crime which struck at the very heart of Tamil culture and civilization- a crime which is tantamount to rape, as described by the speaker – a rape not of the body but of the hearts and minds – for this repository of knowledge, culture and history represented the pride and dignity of the Tamil people. The following poem was sent to us some months ago. It seems apt to publish it today. Originally written in Tamil by Prof. M. A. Nuhman, the translation is by S….

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Hate

Tell me, do you feel it every day? When you’re buying groceries, taking a train to somewhere; when you smoke, eat or dream? Does it take a toll? Make your feet drag, perhaps, or your head ache? * Tell me, Does it get away from you sometimes? Have people around you sensed something not quite right, caught that glint in your eye (there for just a second, and gone the next) and wondered what it was that made their skin crawl? Or have they wished you good morning every day, sat down to lunch with you, asked how your mother was, without ever having a clue? * Tell me, where does it hide? What shape does it take? I imagine a boiling lava, burning in the pit of your stomach, roaring with something other than hunger. Or a demon that sits on both your shoulders, having laid waste to the angel of good conscience, whispering secrets and schemes into your…

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Extra Time

The latest news from the family-run, once independent island, is the appointment of a presidential committee to decide upon which recommendations to adopt regarding the erstwhile ethnic question, which has been subsumed into the unitary enterprise of the war-fighting, now North and East-occupying, government dedicated to paying appropriate attention to the international human rights lobby and European and American states. Nothing like a committee to push the football away, like the many formed and dissolved in the past without achieving laws, but which gained time for the family to work and play. Repost This Article

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Defending the Country

They cry foul in that cauldron of a news room, saying these human rights defenders are traitors, publishing their names and photographs, inciting fears of death squads preparing to drive white vans to their residences. The warning by the UN Human Rights Commissioner to protect witnesses is welcome, quixotic. How will her office stop disappearances when government has rejected the resolution, said it will push back reconciliation, which I presume to mean more islanders vanished, bloodshed, people living in fear and loathing, keeping quiet or moving out, accompanied to the airport by diplomats from a friendly mission, leaving their homes to caretakers, a new life abroad for champions of human rights at home? And for those who stay, negotiating protections, waiting for a post- midnight call by an elite team of assassins, like the ones who shot prisoners at Nandikadal, stopping motorbikes in the intersection to beat Lasantha to death, dressed in black with black glasses, or as drivers of…

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Off the Field

In the end we have only ourselves to pick up from the grass, the bed, the gymnasium floor. The dead will have their say in dreams, and fond ones too, how the boy used to laugh when chasing the ball on Duplication Road, or the girl back in the village, shyly accept the glance of her neighbor’s son, by the well, over a garden wall, the victims, the left behind after the tsunami or the shelling without end, abroad, processed, rebuilding their lives in the company of Australians or Canadians, new people, while the distant war on its nightly visit to parents, single or a pair, does not curse the kid born away, who loves the latest fad on satellite radio and the girl in his class who sports an infectious laugh. Repost This Article

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We Are Resolved

Sri Lanka is small but the government thinks big, always has; since independence its growth rate in ministries and delegations the envy of Asia, and now defeat of the resolution the charge of 52 valiant diplomats whose arrack flows in hospitality suites at night, while mornings are spent chatting about contracts, coal-fired plants, fish meal, everything as long as the other party speaking does the needful, as we say in our language, to save the gentleman’s agreement, the brilliant and home-grown war on terror strategy and abstains, or much better for later tabling and closing of reports, votes against. Repost This Article

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The Island Abstains

The decision by the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka to abstain from the General Assembly vote calling for an end to violence in Syria, and stepping down of its president, cannot be accused of inconsistency, given the island republic’s wish to continue importing Iranian oil, serve tea at official Syrian garden parties, and its pummel- the- minority most successful bombing strategy, that just three years ago seemed to be the talk of Colombo town. Unfortunately, the government faces a resolution of its own, upcoming in Geneva, and perhaps the abstaining route indicates a not unsubtle wish that it may go unperceived in the noise of those who said yes or no. Some of us noticed, however, the way Lankan diplomats exercised the popular will and we present evidence here in the court of poetry. Repost This Article

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Killer Representative

I am assembling the scene, a local hood and his gang come to a Christmas Eve gathering at a beach hotel, want to dance with foreign women, see a bloke from town trotting high with a blonde, but when they ask for a spin, are spurned, although they are hot shots in the area, their chief an elected representative; they have guns and knives in their pockets, or placed discreetly on their reserved table, and they tear a woman from her boyfriend, cutting her up and him, then shooting. Government in a tither, keeping press at bay, we cannot have these stories displayed in the West where similar incidents take place in the most respected capitals, says another representative, and the perpetrators have been booked, are under investigation, although the head of the local governing council has been known to kill in the past but nobody is sure who can, or will, introduce historical evidence. Repost This Article

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Measuring (After Nandikadal)

An embarrassment, to forget over short eats, ignore the bundle on his back, that sloshed set of poetry he cannot avoid carrying, an appendix, reptilian brain, fascination with naming elements of the crime, breadth of carpet strafing of civilians in tents on banks of the lagoon, while tails for the ball are rented and we sit down to quail and goose, although elements of the meal have no political meaning. They are foods for festive or special occasions: here fundraising, so ordinary citizens can travel to see the miscreant dictatorship, dressed in civvies, mixed in with the crowd, not in a killing field, drawn up in advance, but the larger and harder-to-manage masses of the post-war streets, and report what they find before the police visit. Repost This Article

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About Groundviews

Located at the Centre for Policy Alternatives in Colombo, Sri Lanka, Groundviews is a citizen journalism website that uses a range of genres and media to highlight critical perspectives on governance, reconciliation, human rights, the arts and literature, democracy and other issues. The site has won two international awards, including the prestigious Manthan Award South Asia in 2009. The grand jury's evaluation of the site noted, "What no media dares to report, Groundviews publicly exposes. It's a new age media for a new Sri Lanka... Free media at it's very best!"

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