Trapped in a Graveyard- Day Four of NaPoWriMo 2022

Amongst the vestiges of times elapsed,
Amongst the rubble of monuments collapsed,
Standing destitute, between two worlds that collided,
With a tenuous fate, then left undecided.

There was a ‘morrow I never knew,
Following a childhood I fast outgrew,
And when I came to be, the man you see,
I was told, it is time to flee.

Being just 10, surrounded by men, who seem to have seen the worst,
The foreign community watched from afar, as we died of starvation and thirst.
Oh what use is, thy elaborate procedures, and sophistications of thy making,
If countries are mere tokens with its citizens, ripe for slaughter and taking.

A war for self determination, with citizens barred from expatriation,
With young blood hunting men for recreation.
Warm blood trickles down my spine,
As I can’t feel the hands that were once mine.

I may just be 10, but I learnt a lot,
A big man said war, and a war was fought,
I tried to do right even when life got hard,
And yet I lay, perpetually, trapped in a graveyard.

And the questions that poses, and the answers I seek,
Make me realize, how I wasn’t unique,
Life never deals its cards fair,
As my innocence washed up, that truth became clear.

And now I’m left all alone,
With a terrible fate, set in stone,
In a grave unmarked, in a cemetery forlorn,
Symbolizing the ruin of the world I’d known.

Written by Aditij Dhamija for MTTN

Featured Artwork by Shreya Jain for MTTN