Poetry – Jhilam Adhikary

The Battle Scar

When you take the knife and you cut
And blood drips out of your body
Tears roll down, the throat gets dry
Slowly slowly…You die.
And it leaves behind something
That should be a “battle scar”,
A scar that would remain.
It will be mourned by people you never knew
And you will get love from those who killed you,
And it would soon be gone
As they burn you.
Had you been a soldier,
Had youdied for your country,
There would have been medals and praises
And they would call it an “honour”, a “duty”.
But since you died to save yourself,
They’ll call you a coward who ran away,
For death shouldn’t be an option, they say.
And your battle won’t be remembered
It won’t be mentioned on your grave.
They might remember the scar for a while,
And make it a topic to discuss, a time-pass,
But they will forget the war too soon,
And send someone else on the warfront,
And the same warwould go on,
And someone else would get the scar
Andno one would bother to stop them.