No Grand Landing

It clings to you, like a liquid rock, burns your skin. You get a chemosignal. Tethered on a rope your clenched iron fist remains dysfunctional. From the elite enclave red smoke billows like a jinni unleashed from the bottle. A stray mortar sends olfactory fumes. The land concludes a twist, becomes unforgiving.The debris was a cluttered, goaded inheritance. When it was not there I eat the guns. Mission accomplished of death and destruction, you start a prayer near an incapacitated tank. Today, like everyday the war failed us. Mother and son, father and daughter sleep in death’s embrace. SATISH VERMA