Scenes of death
Scenes of death
When, during their invasion
deceit and magical scenes of malice
arose with the smoke,
The word mutated.
Idols were shattered.
Life lost its essence.
The doctor, who amputates without anaesthesia
the shrapnel-filled hands
of a two-and-a-half-year-old child,
is a god at this moment.
Her screaming mother,
with tearless eyes
is a demon.
Excerpted from Waking is Another Dream: Poems on the Genocide in Eelam, edited by Ravikumar.
Cheran is a major Tamil poet and playwright who has published seven anthologies of poetry in Tamil.
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