Salaam Bombay

Salaam Bombay

I try so much to think of loving you,

And I fail miserably –

Like the lone child on the street side.

For I cannot see through

Descending acrid smoke of burning flesh

I can’t turn my eyes away from the child –

Its flesh ripped and shred of impact

As he sits there, over the charred remains

Of its inconsequential social connect.

I cannot see how we all are not thus orphaned,

For where I stand – what I see

Everybody has been stripped bare –

Down to the inherited, bestial flesh and blood

I try hard to look through the chaos

Of uncertain lives fleeing in anticipation

I try hard to recollect our dreams, in my mind.

But the smoke stings, it pains so bad – so deep.

This earth, a sky seems unimaginably shattered

And through all this – my dear

I silently cry out loud to you

I kneel before you my beloved.

I pray to you – pull back the reins of time

And put me two moments before

The unforgiven, unwilling child of human wrath burst.

For a moment I will see the child lisp in its mother’s lap.

For a moment I will look up and bid goodbye to you.

Come to me now – my beloved,

For I try so hard to think of loving you.

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