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Blue Marble Review

Literary Journal for Young Writers

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This is Not a Poem

By Aarushi Bhardwaj

This is not a poem

and I am not a poet

when I can’t find eloquent words to describe

that more blacks are incarcerated in America right now

than in apartheid South Africa

when beautiful words fail me and I can’t express

the worries of the deprived through the complexity of language

that our key policy makers and leading civil servants

have never had a job outside of politics

that sixty percent of Jews identify as atheists since the holocaust

no, I am not a poet

when I can’t find crafty words to illustrate the fact

that before 2008 Mandela had been on America’s list

of most dangerous terrorists for more than half a century

that

massacres and genocides and partitions and conflicts

give way to erratic sensationalizing where no one can hear the cries

that when the ending is unsatisfactory

not many stick around to watch

some wax lyrical about the tragedy and the shock

about something tangible lost by something intangible

the pleasures of life lost to the end of a sharp knife

the joy of living lost in a bullet wound

but the real comedy is how some fail to acknowledge it at all

chaos befallen on them who dared to utter a syllable

lest someone knows it was their fault

the plot twist is that there is no plot twist

and I wish there was some metaphor

to lower you into this grief

but that is why this is not a poem

and I am not a poet

but it’s fair to say

the heart’s crafted to evermore persist

a rugged pioneer of time, relentless optimist

that sometimes it’s an act of bravery even to exist

but you see

I’ve crossed lines, not followed traditional poetic form

failed to construct elaborate metaphors to explain

that immigration isn’t a choice

that a person probably has more Muslim blood

than the people in the mosque they conspire to blast

never is survival available to all those who deserve it

and so it goes

how do I explain all this and still retain artistic worth?

the wanderers, the grievers- here they are doomed to roam

hatred boils in them and sears the world like a blazing scar

and humanity falls when tyrants are hailed

but how can one be falling, if flying feels the same?

how does man forgive himself

for all the things he did not become?

a refugee buried within suffering

for a war he cannot comprehend

but it’s all done now

anger surrounds us

hate courses through us

yet this hate is unaware

of the humanity she births into us

we are made of all the things that break us

just to keep us alive

maybe I should’ve just said that, but I didn’t

because

this is not a poem

and I am not a poet

of things that seem out of place in today’s world

like writing a poem which isn’t one

 

Aarushi Bhardwaj is a school student from India and has been previously published in Teen Ink Magazine and The Hindustan Times.

 

Filed Under: Poetry Tagged With: Summer 2018

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