my teacher talks of a sri lankan english-poem ii
(a responsive thing)

by sumathy

ooo, how sad that
thing called a sri lankan-thing
who
thinging this thing of
of englees or inglisss
has no capacity, no?
for funny funny joking thing
in the morning,
day, evening or
night. only thing
he, boyfriend, can find is thing
that, thing this, and good old papa shakes
peare, no great shakes
but sitting on the fence of the globe, passing on
this or that thing frommm
eliza to james, accumulating
primitively othello’s thing? of course,
this is way above the ways of pearl,
bin dalen or the pumpkin lovers of the
fricative z, but
write i, nevertheless, of
the base indian, richer than all his tribe,
this thing, no caring no, meyler’s
injunction against poetry
in the sri lankan
that thing.

killinochchi town getting ready…
may 2010

19th may. you have nothing
to say? i can only
falteringly
mouth, nothing of ….
nothing begets nothing, a king says, and
launches a war
against garrulous daughters and sulking ones;
and i think of an
other daughter, too too loud or too soft,
of other wars and other deaths, slipped between
a pillow and its case, a letter, a bomb, a whisper, slipped
between the familiar and the family, the nation and its engender.

on 19th may, 1991, sivaramani,
took her own positive life, her cry strangled
with that strenuous cord, blazing a trail of blood
of the nation and its many stories;
300, 000 slipped between
a miserable soul-dead wretch, who
would not take his life and the dark
of a …

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there was a lovely tree in the yard at the back of our house. a lovely sinewy and tall mango tree.             
one day in the morning we were woken to the sound of a thousand parrots in uproar.
they were hawing the tree down. we watched the whatever you call it uproot the tree. the roots we’re pulled out.

the parrots displaced.

we wondered about why they cut the tree down. the parrots found another home.

this morning we woke up to the sound of a humming drill. a shed with an asbestos cover
stood in its place.

my old school had a bicycle shed like that.

[Editors note: These poems respond to Indran Amirthanayagam's poems here, here and here. They are both part of the Writers Under Siege collection on Groundviews.]

1

i am not a writer

i am not a writer
nor am i under siege,
i do not frequent
the commons, nor the
poetic corner.

2

i, savage

why do i write
when i had promised myself
aching silence
after kethesh’s fall
and maheswary’s stunted end?
why talk suddenly
of the siege now,
when i have stood at
death’s door,
refused its dare
and now can finally
slumber,
in a snow stirring fantasy
surrounding turkey’s trouble
with its torture
chambers, lulled by the
bewitching tones of
orhan’s magic?

why the artist
and the writer and colombo’s array
of poets, rushing to versify,
riding on
guilt ridden stirrings …

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