Thursday, June 10, 2021

A WREATH OF HAIKU

by Karan Kapoor


Children’s shoes and toys were placed in front of the former 7 after the remains of 215 children, some as young as 3, were found at the site this past week. Photo credit: Dennis Owen/Reuters via The New York Times, June 7, 2021.


a radar 
penetrates the ground:
215 little corpses

not corpses
remains
skeletons and screams

unmarked—
all burial sites
are not graves

laughter of children 
at a school,
a concentration camp

an escape plan:
jump
from the highest balcony

riddle: a four-letter word
with six more letters:
indigenous

let's play a game
stick out your tongue—
pins and needles

bless the Lord
you who serve Him,
undoing His will

we are children of god
let us show you the light
six feet underground


Karan Kapoor is the author of a novelette Maya and the co-author of a novel The Dreaming Reality, both independently published. Long-listed for Toto Funds the Arts awards, his poems have appeared in The Indian Quarterly, G5A Imprint, Stride, The New Verse News, and elsewhere. He's currently working on his debut poetry collection. When not reading or writing, he is obsessing over classical music. Currently in his final semester of MA in Literary Art Creative Writing, he wants to continue to live a life devoted to music and literature.