04 January 2019

Losing Lasantha


your loss tastes like
newspapers

soaked in blood for breakfast
newsprint gathering dust in darkness
printing presses silenced by State machinery

windshield glass mixed with sand
spent bullets trampled into the dirt

(the bullets didn't break your body or brain:
to eliminate you they had
cattle-prods)

deafness to a decade’s screaming
a strangling of leads
leading nowhere

ink rendered invisible
your silenced laughter
spilling into the earth

forebodings of what would follow
with Kilinochchi withdrawal
Elephant Pass abandonment

the weight of all those doctors
bearing down on you
to bring you back

the names of those
who wanted you dead
still laughing

printing in reverse
unchewed pens
tears.

(8 January 2019 marks 10 years since Lasantha was assassinated.)

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