Paradise Lost

Is this now a paradise lost

To an ancient contention?

A clanging of frozen wills

Where all is lost and nothing won?

Relentless crones in safe enclaves

Send nubile angels to war

Against an uncaring distant state

That seems light years a far.

Spots of blood on haunted streets

Invite the lurking vulture;

Windows barred in dread and shame

Protect a beleaguered culture.

Faces pelleted with holes

Are stoic in hopeless time;

Flesh and bone come apart

But spirits scream a defiant rhyme.

Love, trust, and covenant

Seem powerless to leap

The contest for ownership

Even if the price be fatally steep,

Lake and stream, Chinar and blossom

All sing a dirge as though

The Paradise belonged wholly now

To the elegy of the weeping willow.

Badri Raina