O Father! I was not the enemy..

Originally written on: March 23rd, 2011

My love for soldiers, respect for the sacrifices of their family & curiosity for wars made me come up with this one.. It might be hard for some to relate to this but some would find their story in my story..
Inspiration: Pink Floyd
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The battle field was drafted; the soil was staring right in to the face,
The guns were loaded, the horses were fed & your armor was on the place.
Drenched in vengeance at the first sun ray, while you were ready to defend,
did you not know there was someone to arrive at the other end?

Miles across the battle-ground, under a weak roof, a mother moaned.
For it was not the ache of birth, it was for you, who to the pain, was unknown.
It were the promises that were broken, it was your absence that was your token.
Not with your love but, with your betrayal, I was born.


While you designed to knock on the heaven's door, I was knocking to hell.
While you planned to destroy, I was created, for I never knew where to dispel.
Why were you always the opposite?
O Father! I was not the enemy..


The one who was just a bride when you departed, is now a mother,
She want no husband for she learnt to wait but, for her son she needed his father.
Bullets and bombs and bloodshed was what she watched on TV that night..
She knew the war started and she was worried for her brave knight.
Though it scared her to death, she smiled and sang to me my lullaby,
Kissing me she said to herself, it's yet not the time to say good-bye.


She was chanting her prayers,
she was feeling so proud,
she noticed no pain & wished for your victory, so loud..


I did no sin, I made no one cry..
Why were you not there to pay, when I so badly wanted a toy.
O Father! I was not the enemy..


The enemies were in full glory, over their ruined land,
tempting for your blood, they made their entry grand.
Revenge in their eyes, rage in their hearts,
without clemency they started tearing you apart.


You indeed were a fearless warrior, mother was so right.
You spared no one, you crushed everyone in your sight.
They attacked our land, they shook our countrymen & that is what they deserved that night..
But, O Father! I was not the enemy..


Hours passed, dawn was about to emerge,
Mother never slept all night, she was praying for you in the church..
The combat was to end & you knew you have won,
right that moment there was something to stun..


A bullet so strong, so fierce, so fast,
Traveled around the field to reside in you and last.
Was that the connection of blood or me conveying,
I started crying so loudly & mother had to stop praying..


Your bright grey eyes, your handsome young face,
along with the bleeding chest, touched the earth surface.
You fell on knees so hard; the field shook with fear,
Along with mine was mother's precious tear..
Loud firing in your ears, loud crying in mother’s
She never knew we would never see each other.


Uttering the god's name followed by your wife & unnamed child,
You wished we always love you, for that pain for you was still so mild.
Looking around the hazy field you were assured about the victory,
assured that your sacrifice will be embossed in our history..


Now I am old enough to read you in my history book,
The questions never end & I always want to say,
O Father! I was not the enemy..


The loudest doubt will always be a worry,
Why her un-dried tears says "Son, you will join the military".
Did I do wrong or was it just mother's destiny?
O Father! I was not the enemy..
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When I marched away from your mother,
All I asked was this..
"If I won’t see the victory, would you let him do that, please?"
I loved my bride, my wife, your mother,
For protecting the motherland was my destiny..
O son..
O my son, I was not your enemy....

The summoning of the re-incarnation

She woke up to the usual morning, with the birds playing euphonies, the enigmatic sun rays embracing the earth's surface, but even the intense gracefulness of nature failed to win a smile of composure on her face.

She wandered in her abandoned house like an erratic spirit seeking for salvation. She folded the quilt in the neatest possible way, placed it at the tail of the bed, and puffed the pillow. She grabbed the hair chopstick from the side table and crafted it in her hair. The tiny chopstick performed a kind of martial art inside her tresses before resting still. Ending the daily morning chores in a timely manner, she walked out of the bathroom, dripping water from her hair, on the soft snowy carpet. She looked like an ordinary girl, like any woman would, in the morning; beautiful and vulnerable. 

Fifteen minutes later there stood an entirely different individual in front of the mirror, a lean, mean, and a numb, corporate dame. She attired herself in a perfect pin-striped black business suit. She pulled out the shirt’s cuffs from the sleeves of her suit's jacket and examined herself again in the mirror. She felt like a mannequin.

She saw a bitter woman not fancied by many owing to her solid rigid lamination she wore on her true self. She saw her inner age a decade older than she really was. She knew the reason why she was loved before and why she was hated now, but she didn't understand what to make out of her, she didn't understand If she was a winner with an attitude of a loser or vice-versa. Her eyes she saw were an ocean of grief. She tried hard to find the girl she had in her some years ago and she failed miserably. She landed her eyes on her diary on her work desk, opened the usual last page, and read to her, her self-written sonnet to begin her day. And that was her daily routine:

When the early dawn seemed blazing, I glimpsed out of the window,
and the entirety embossed like a blight.
The demons in my creed kept staring,
At the tear in my smile like a stubborn parasite.
I yearn to shed the outfit of stress, wish to don a cactus dress,
Like the shining armor of a ferocious knight.
A crowd is noisy, so desert my mess,
I am a lone warrior to embark upon this fight.
The rampant chaos is my melody I cherish,
The anguish is the moon of my dark night.
When all the sufferings once will perish,
My languid spirit will endure in bright.
The rain of my ancient memories will downpour,
With the beat of the drums, I'll march ahead for my war.

She felt a profound feeling of boldness together with courage and she was composed to encounter the day. She adored her camouflaged cactus dress and smiled. A dress to keep everyone away with the fear of its thorns, as for the one in thorns can never be pricked.

While she walked on the streets of the foreign land, she tried to read those cold faces as they passed by. She wished she could peek deep down into their souls and see if they were like hers, frigid from outside, but entirely distinct from inside. The unfamiliarity in their eyes pinched her and she always searched for a home. She kept swaying on the street like an invisible flow of wind.

As closer as she was getting to her destination, she was feeling a sense of attachment, a sense of belonging, a sense of tranquility. She tried to seal her soul like one would close their eyes and thought how bizarre her journey was. The guiltless, happy decade of her childhood expired in a blink and the time from then never craved to move ahead. She thought of the separation from her loved ones, separation for education, and then the separation for career, and then the future separation for the rituals and the hypocrisy of mankind called Marriage. The bunch of orchids in her hand surfaced the irony in a more absolute way. 

When she walked more on the street, she questioned her existence, not in this world but, in the city where there existed no part of her own. She recollected the time when she ran to keep pace with people. She recalled how she tried to await those friendly eyes but, finally ended up embracing all the coldness with a fake warm smile and with a moaning heart inside.

When she was less than a foot away from her destination, she took a deep breath closing her eyes and swallowed the silence which rode around. It was her homecoming. She entered into the soothing serene ambiance and it tempted her.  She pictured the anguish and cries the place accumulated inside it. She saw bouquets and she saw tombstones. She saw life inside each and she saw death outside them, ironically. Demise embossed in the form of names. She knew which one was calling for her. She walked swiftly and knelt down as the earth beneath magnetized her.

©mycactusdress

With the most elegant way, she blew the dust from the stone and placed the orchids in the center. She didn’t feel the need to pray, she didn’t feel the need to have a selfish chat with a god, where she could ask for more. The gushing breeze blew her hair and she could hear it as the unsaid prayer. She swallowed all the emptiness of the place and merged it with the emptiness inside her. She was the murderer, the person behind the death of the one inside the tombstone. After spending a few unspoken moments with the dead, she stood up and felt again the same sense of boldness, and this time, assembled with blackness. As she started to leave, she turned back for the final time, for the final closure, and generated the first genuine smile of the day while she read the tombstone.....

¨ME¨

The anguish is the moon of my dark night

When all the sufferings once will perish

My languid spirit will endure in bright.

The rain of my ancient memories will downpour,

With the beat of the drums, I'll march ahead for my war