Brijnath Betab's poem titled Maet-aab. A sombre but forceful description of the fateful night when loudspeakers from all mosques and city centers were pronoucing "death to infidels" and "defiling of their women"....
A poet in despair,fear,agony,disbelief......murmurs the night as the morning refuses to come by..... Full text ...please read on.....
(transliteration by the poet himself)
From sleep, deep, I was waken,
Like a fire blast on an iceberg, a thunder;
Some whisper, this dark night, spread apace
What happened oh friend, I wonder?
This night to me appears with a different face.
This night has a different contour
This night has changed its glance
This night made me bolt every door
This night death and destruction dance
This night shivers with havoc roar
This night is darkened by lawlessness
This night is the night of a destruction trail
This night inflicted death blow on my children
This night I weep in helplessness.
This night my nerves fail
This night, death looms large on every road,
Laying a siege for someone in his room
Putting a trap for someone at his abode
This night has broken all my fallacies
This night has moved from dark to doom.
This night is the night of rejoice for ‘brides’
This night is for ‘bridegrooms’ the night of hope
Witness this night, the dance, Tandava;
This night is the night to ponder
This night shall re- write our horoscope?
This night the Kouravas are terrifying
This night the Pandavas are vulnerable
This night has to re-write Ramayana for us
This night is the night of the ‘last crack of dawn’
This night is the night of human fuss.
This night sleep not please
This night, may be, has to dispossess
This night, may be, grants something to us
This night pray for your safety
This night defend your integrity.
This night has to test the neighbors
This night is the night of ‘last dawn’
This night catch at any straw, brave fears
This night shall test your brain and brawn &nbs p; This nigh is the night of nightmares
This night is different
Nothing tonight is advantageous
The people around have altered
This night nothing belongs to us
This night, oh friend, Betab’s voice faltered
This night,
I hold in support
My blood soaked Phiran,
As the night shall move again
To some safe heaven,
Crying in pain.
Bandaging the blood oozing wounds
This night shall now flee away,
Far away, far far away and far away,
Tomorrow of course when the morning breeze
Shall come to enquire about us
Scattered we shall be
Like a chopped off body.
In the deserts
Devastated as we shall be
Holding our back
To the support of huge stones
Under the blistering heat
In the open,
This city of our ancestors
Shall look like a town of ghosts.
That night,
Saving my life
I fled
That nigh,
My nightmares began
That night,
Started the process
Of my family’s disintegration
That night,
I left my home and hearth
That night,
I left the place of my birth
That night
I brought my body
That limps today
That night,
I left my soul there.
Scattered in pieces today
Through the globe,
I recall that horrifying night.
That night,
Darkness engulfed in the skies blue
My future hope for sunshine bright
That night,
I lost everything dear
That night,
I lost my relations near
That night,
The night, stood in front of me
Lurking in horror and fear
That night,
With loom, doom and gloom
I fled and left my whole there,
That night,
I left my soul there.
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