108. Proud to be Assamese!

“Ask not what your country can do for you but ask what you can do for your country.” J F Kennedy in his inaugural address of January, 1961.

These lines have remained seeded in my head since I was a little girl and when I feverishly composed poems for my country, I was branded by my friends and family as the new age Kanaklata. Ok, so I am. Just ‘cause I am not fighting the enemy with a firebrand or sword in my hand, it doesn’t even come close to mean that I am not patriotic.

When I say Assam is mine, I love it like a lover would to a point of madness; inhaling its musky smell, kissing its air and sensuously touching it. I have always seen it as an ethereal being, my God, a supreme power which has mesmerized me with its enchanting beauty; and I am privileged to be a part of its dreams and aspirations! And I love to take a piece of my Assam wherever I go!

(May 6th was quite a day when I had the opportunity to interact with Ministers and Speakers from all the eight Northeastern States of India at the 14th Annual Conference of the NERCPA, that is, The Northeast Regional Commonwealth People's Association and the day-long topic of discussion was Combating Corruption. Quite a task at hand!)

TO MY COUNTRY (A poem from my book 10:20)

The purple sunset

Cloaked, in her dark stead;

Then wolves –

Are they not but, the

Follies of men?

To bring hyenas and

Bats!.......Racing

Towards the mortal?

Who is he (here)

That laughs – without

A tear in the eye

“I” she whispers –

But she’s mottled – the

Jarring sound of chains

Blotting the song on her lips

She’s now banished

From her loved one – but

She was the one – for

Whom, the war was fought!

T’was a bloody battle

Ages old,

Reminiscence of heroes

In tombs?

Why? We are

But gullible

Flocking the street

Mocking the democrat

Wounding –

The dead, the sick,

Why?

Are we thus so weak?....

Unable to pluck

The thorns from her feet

A shrouded figure

Now creeps

With bloodshot eyes….

Spreading the plague

Thrashing the old

And bleeding the young;

In disguise?

A mother weeps

In the hearth

Consoling her child

Just born.