THE RESTLESS OCEANS by Achingliu Kamei

 THE RESTLESS OCEANS

It was on the bank of the sacred river not so long ago, 

when the body of a young boy floated down.

He stepped up and stood in the gap, they say. 

The boy’s dreadful tragedy was reported in the papers. 

The colour of his skin was indigo. 

Could be because it had been soaked in the sacred river for days?

Some men took him away from his home

And they locked him up and tortured him till the early hours of the day. 

The way he was tortured was too cruel to be written down. 

The reason was that he stood in the gap and spoke up against injustice.

His well-wishers and his teachers told him not to, for they feared for his life. 

When he was tortured, there were screams in the beginning 

And then groans and then he mooed like an injured animal.

They recounted and laughed.

                            The moon holds her breath

                            Sacred river records all

                            Innocent lives.

They laughed and took turns to mock and torture the boy. 

When they were exhausted, they took the body and threw it into the water.

The blood streaked the polluted water.

Red. Blue. Saffron. Black. Hasty funeral for this body. The funeral pyre unlit.

No goodbyes allowed to his family and relatives.

Immunity Shields the torturers carry.

Majority shuts their pain by staying mute. They fear for their own lives. 

They pretended not to hear. When asked, 

They changed subjects by talking about mundane politics. 

Lawyers, judges, and juries winked and yawned.

 They came up with absurd logics.

                            Sun’s fingers wrote

                            Humankind has gone too far

                            Vast sky.

The court is there for justice, eh? 

All dissenting voices throttled to death for centuries. 

A crime so evil went unnoticed. The victim a less than common man.

Not a celebrity. Will not be missed. No one dared speak out now.

They got families to look after. Think again.

They are coming for the ones you cared the most. 

Conniving and strategizing meticulously all the steps,

Branching out their reach and power. 

Till the weeds become the plants. The baobabs growing unchecked.

                         Man’s greed for power

                         The restless oceans pound

                         Bound to truth.

Till all such injustices to humankind be brought to light, 

The very light they strive to show will shear them. 

Their blinded, unjust, and unethical zeal will be their undoing.

About The Author

A short story writer, poet, and an ultra-runner, Achingliu Kamei teaches Literature in the English Department of ARSD College, D.U. She loves to pen down her day-to-day life in the form of Haiku. Some of her poems and haiku are published in anthologies and journals like ‘Caravan’, ‘The Looking Glass Anthology’, ‘Insulatus’ and in ‘International journal Setu’, ‘The Little Journal’, ‘Melbourne culture corner’, ‘Poetry pea journal of Haiku and Senryu’, ‘Imphal Free Press’ and other places. She believes that poetry can heal. Her keen interest in literature and art keeps her engaged in writing, despite her busy schedule as a teacher. She is currently working on her next book of folktales - ‘Morning Blush’ and a collection of poems - ‘Flower of Remembrance’. She is currently residing in Delhi, India, with her husband, two daughters, and Haru, the cat.