The Lamenting Soldier

He sits in a bombed bunker
with his gun and bullets feeding his mission.
The heavy suit burdens him with
“Why is he here!”

Once the boiling blood craved
for blood and heads;
for a fountain of red fluids
raping the land of refugees
and now the chance has been utilized
and with it his life too.

His foe and his partners look alike
after death with same bullets
responsible for their fall.

He knows, when he crosses
the border and walks to the land
his army have captured the soils
will too look alike.

“So was this fight to pass some time
in practising revolt against God?”

He is now a sinner, no martyr
in the court of the almighty.

- Sonnet Mondal

(featured in the poetry forum 12.06.11)

editor's note: This is the reward for all who battle; the same question, "Is the prize worth the price?" - mh

Gazing Through the Mud Hole

Through a narrow hole
in the mud wall of a hut
I see broken planks of house
of the richest man in the city.

While winter and summer creeps
in to turn the hut into a hell,
the broken window of the mansion
has gathered a crowd
to set it in same design.

The hole indicates the stature of the poor
and the life suitable for them in a
so called third world country.
They are just meant to gaze
at rich wonders here.

- Sonnet Mondal

(featured in the poetry forum 10.12.11)

editor's note: Hmmm. Adds a different spin to when we toast each other with, "Here's mud in your eye!" - mh

Blue-Collar Twister

Sweat tries to swim upwards through the hairs
of a labourer building the statue of the herald
but fails and falls in the soil sucked up by heat,
Vanishes as a struggling animal in quicksand;
Dreams drain and entity turns into fossils as slippers
walk over it.
His weapons are a chisel and spade;
He lifts them to protest but vacuum wailing in the curves
of his muscles make it fall again on the mummified ground;
just to dig, dig the ground for
the Herald's statue must stand firm
or his existence will be buried under its
falling weight.
Toils will evaporate with the smile of the moon
The dawn will hear sounds again-
sounds of iron striking against rocks.
The air waits to weave those sounds
and strike a twister with them-
Tall enough for the world to see
bold enough to step over mountains
Clear enough to show the waving hands
begging a day out of slavery.

- Sonnet Mondal

(featured in the poetry forum 06.23.11)

editor's note: Massive monuments of man’s misanthropic malevolence to man say as much of the beauty we’re capable of as it does of the horror we can inflict upon the one who holds the chisel, not the whip. In the poem, the moon seems ambivalent to suffering; the sun certainly isn’t going to take it easy on the chiselling chattel when it comes to shed light on the sufferer. The hands of a slave are an artist’s hands, a beautiful concept from Mr. Mondal. - tm