The Mushroom Cloud

Here is a poem by me. We are perfectly aware of the atomic bombs dropped over Hiroshima and Nagasaki. But was that really important? Didn't it result into annihilation of entire townships? This poem asks the importance of the mushroom cloud, the inevitable symbol of nuclear explosion. We cannot cook this particular 'mushroom'. So what's the purpose of such a thing?        

The poem is titled the Mushroom Cloud and goes like this:

What purpose does the mushroom cloud serve?

It is inedible, an entire waste.

Poison it is, poisonous taste.

You can’t cook it

No recipe in the books

You can’t roast it

Oh so deadly looks.

Only one purpose it seems it serves

It represents the kills

And it really hurts.

You Cannot Kill Ideas

"While revolutionaries as individuals can be murdered, you cannot kill ideas." said Thomas Sankara. This is true that a person might be killed or annihilated but his ideas never die. They continue to live among the hearts and minds of people and continue to inspire people.Nobody knows who the tank-man is or about his whereabouts but still he continues to motivate us. Similarly people like Gandhiji, Safdar Hashmi and Che Guevara might have been assassinated but their thoughts still live with us, in us.That is perhaps why I say :-

मैं आज हूँ, 

कल न रहूँगा,

यह कविता आज भी है,

और कल भी रहेगी.

I have also written a poem on the Tank-man, a man whose courage is worth admiration and taking inspiration from.

Tank man

You can kill me

You can annihilate me

Murder me if you can

But please remember one thing

Exterminating my body

Will not kill my ideas

I will be alive

In my ideas

My thoughts will continue to live.

    

Statistics

A thousand suns, a thousand stars,

A thousand days, a thousand nights,

A million truths, a million lies,

A million smiles, a million cries.

A thousand boons, a thousand banes,

A thousand lost, a thousand gains,

A million blessings, a million curses

A million soldiers, a million nurses.

A thousand guns, a thousand bombs,

A thousand ships, a thousand tanks,

A million planes, a million graves,

A thousand squadrons, a thousand ranks.

A thousand seas, a thousand skies,

A thousand wagons, a thousand carts,

A million heads, a million eyes

A million hands, yet zero hearts.