Groundviews

Party

To spoil a party, call the police to enforce
noise laws or prohibitions against drinking

by minors, we can understand as a necessary
if unpleasant right of a neighbor who cannot

sleep or is bothered by willful disregard
for children. But to say, do not come to literary

feasting at Galle because journalists are killed,
or kidnapped, or forced to go abroad to save

their lives, this I read is an attack on the country,
which allows murder, rape and kidnapping

to bypass judicial review, and will not accept
responsibility for those who drive around

without license plates on its roads, or unfortunate
trapping of human beings on a killing spit of land

between lagoon and sea, which allows a minister
to chain a constituent to a tree, denies visas to left

and sundry, detaining a pesky lawyer from
Tamil Nadu at a checkpoint near former Tiger

dominions, meanwhile English elite, including me
on one occasion, have enjoyed, and will, liberty

at the party in Galle sponsored by Tourism Board
and interested businesses, hotels principally.

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