by Indran Amirthanayagam
We are gathering in Kansas City,
poets and publishers, writers
and editors: our people, friends,
colleagues, rivals. But I am
skipping the encounters. I don't
want to rub anything or anyone
except for the keyboard where
I compose this letter of resig-
nation, aware of the moving
staircase, the precipice, rocks
falling from the sky, aware
of train. bus and car wrecks
to come, bombs dropped
on friends' homes and cultures,
fireballs rolling through Chile's
Viña del Mar, vine now of fire
and mourning, through hills
near Valparaiso where
I fear cobblers and tailors
and hardware stores with
their giant signs have
become ash, in memory,
thy kingdom come, thy will…
how can we explain our
suicidal impulse, this expelling
of hot gas, assaulting
of children and women
in Gaza, famine threatening
that strip, and Ethiopia
again in 2024. Are you
ready for Live Aid
once more, the concert
for Bangladesh? How
can we reply when the prompt
calls for murder,
by climate, by dictator?
Indran Amirthanayagam is the translator of Origami: Selected Poems of Manuel Ulacia (Dialogos Books). Mad Hat Press has just published his love song to Haiti: Powèt Nan Pò A (Poet of the Port). Ten Thousand Steps Against the Tyrant (BroadstoneBooks) is a collection of Indran's poems. 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 Lírica a tiempo (Mesa Redonda, Lima). He edits The Beltway Poetry Quarterly and helps curate Ablucionistas. He hosts the Poetry Channel on YouTube and publishes poetry books with Sara Cahill Marron at Beltway Editions.
