The Killing Field

Yaksha asked Yudhisthira
“What is amazing?”
Yudhisthira said
“Human beings see death every day, every where
But can never think
That will happen to them personally.”

It is hard to imagine certain incidents in life
Like the death of our parents, siblings and children
And still harder
To imagine our own demise,
Even though that is a given.
Birth comes with the guarantee of a death.

Every morning
The world offers me in the form of news
Death and more death
Mud slides in Philippines,
Boat disasters in Indonesia
Mine disasters in China

In USA
about five people die in car accident per hour
Not to speak of how many died in Vietnam by bombing
Nor die now in Iraq, thanks to our tax dollar.

We killed
And still love to kill our kind
In the name of God
Or in the name of race or tribe or politics
In old west, Europe, India, Japan, Cambodia, Yugoslavia
And Burundi

Like a drop of water on a taro leaf
Life is so fragile
Nature's fury
in the form of earthquake, cyclone, tsunami, hurricane
Drought and flood
Added to the constant human effort
To kill more and more faster and more painfully
Transforms this world to a killing field