The Queen is dead. This afternoon
at Balmoral Castle, on the eighth
of September. We mourn her
throughout the Commonwealth
and much of the planet. This is
no easy passing, from the world
before and the world to come.
When she assumed her brief
India and Ceylon had just won
their latest independence.
When she traveled to Ceylon
in 1954 to see the fledgling
new nation she charmed
everyone she met, from mahout
to rickshaw driver to staff
at the Queen's Hotel
in Kandy. I imagine
she stayed at Galle Face too,
and Sir Chittampalam
Gardiner led the royal couple
to their rooms. Dignity
is the word. Quiet resolve.
Memory of how Britain
survived the Blitz, how
it let go of its imperial
arrogance to later become
part of Europe, one among
equals—how it lost great
comics to homogenization
of the transatlantic
championing of money
above all values. She
saw Monty Python,
Dave Allen, the Two
Ronnies, Peter Sellers,
and other geniuses on stage,
in music, on television,
leave their wit in history
books of a golden age.
She lived through many
and leaves us now to balance
our nostalgia against
the return of a would-be
iron lady to Downing Street.
God forbid Truss may
just bring out the artists
again, born in suffering,
a new Mersey sound,
a Notting Hill dub,
English revolution,
Commonwealth invasion.
Indran Amirthanayagam's newest book is Ten Thousand Steps Against the Tyrant (BroadstoneBooks). Recently published is Blue Window (Ventana Azul), translated by Jennifer Rathbun.(Dialogos Books). In 2020, Indran produced a “world" record by publishing three new poetry books written in three languages: The Migrant States (Hanging Loose Press, New York), Sur l'île nostalgique (L’Harmattan, Paris) and LÃrica a tiempo (Mesa Redonda, Lima). He writes in English, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Haitian Creole and has twenty poetry books as well as a music album Rankont Dout. He edits The Beltway Poetry Quarterly and helps curate Ablucionistas. He won the Paterson Prize and received fellowships from The Foundation for the Contemporary Arts, New York Foundation for the Arts, US/Mexico Fund For Culture, and the MacDowell Colony. He hosts the Poetry Channel on YouTube and publishes poetry books with Sara Cahill Marron at Beltway Editions.
