Indo-Pak Border

Soldiers strengthen the fence of iron wires.
Border looks like a fair face, disfigured by
smallpox. Virus is still active. Infiltrators
crawl through the mist into India’s heart.
They are brave, but brainless.

A myriad of men waste their sweat in the
nearby militant camps, while wheat farms
lie locked with weeds. They harvest tears.

Machine-guns and mines can never sooth
stomachs. Both sides spend millions on
missiles, when many starve and struggle.

It’s midnight, yet guns roar again, sparks
of pain fall down.

This side loathes green, and the other side,
saffron. These are everybody’s colors. Alas!
Soldiers and citizens are conditioned.

I say, ‘I’m Indian.’ You say, ‘I’m Pakistani.’
When will we say, ‘We’re men?’

Stop production of widows and orphans;
invest in the infrastructure.

Remember, once we’re one. We’ve to share
and care again. We’ve to barter the unwanted
with the wanted. Life rusts in revenge and rivalry.

First published in "Verbal Art : A Global Journal Devoted to Poets & Poetry", India
Reprinted in "Selected Poems Anthology 2018" by Pendle War Poetry, the UK