Soldier amidst the blood moon: An elegy

Crimson blood splattered amongst the ravaged lands

The blood moon stands high and mighty

Dripping red onto our lands,

painting its own masterpiece of bloodshed

The long night has come

Like mist it engulfs the nation

The thick ebony liquid of destruction cascades

Down the foreheads of men, women and children

Like matchsticks they stand, starved and emaciated

a single mighty sweep to shatter them apart

To stomp on their brittle legs, slash their thin rags and sever their limbs

Like children tormenting a cockroach do

The politicians torment these poor souls

They have forgotten themselves,

Names are of no significance to them

Instead, they are numbers and tags

Herded by the soldier amidst the blood moon,

Their sole guide leading them to inevitable slaughter

He, the soldier, pawn of the monarch

that works under the guises of democracy

He, the soldier, nameless, eternally forgotten

Only an expendable piece in a chessboard

He, the soldier, breadwinner of the matchstick family

He, the soldier, an unmarked grave shall he be paid with

He, the soldier, not human, not beast, only a gun to shoot

He is the defender of his homeland made by the former colonisers

He is the oppressor, it matters not who wins, who shall oppress?

The foreigners or the colonisers?

The desert lands have endured enough violence

Yet the colour red is still demanded and coveted by the blood moon

The ghouls and mindless zombies of the

Warring aristocrats are set loose upon a

field of peace and fertility

Now dry and barren lands for the crows and vultures

They walk along a line, straight and narrow, on a razor's edge

The soldier amidst the blood moon observes the woeful snails

Walk along the edge of a straight razor

Blood!! War!! Intestines and innards!! Arms and legs!! Heads and torsos!!

Twisted, deformed and lying exposed along an urban road

Among the kingdom of trash and garbage

Anarchy reigns for the time-being

The Gods of war manifest themselves

In the souls of the soldiers amidst the blood moon

And the vampires await their tribute of blood to suck on

What to buy? What to eat for the pitiful scholar and the woeful worker?

Is there food for thought, a penny for labour?

No human wins this war, only the blood moon rejoices

Even the soldiers who serve the blood moon dutifully die a lonely death

The matchsticks lie quietly on the fields

And roads like loose straw

Strewn upon a floor

None win this war, yet we fight our petty squabbles over abstract thoughts

Remaining woefully ignorant of the long night that has come

And of the matchsticks whose heads burn

From whom shrill screams emanate

Only famine, misery, blood and tragedy

Can build their kingdom in these ruins of the new land

Areez Sharaf studies in class 10 at Scholastica, Uttara.