backs against the tide

holding back the tide

backs pressed against monsoon mud,

decades of Kashmiri tears

wash onto Pakistani streets,

smothering drowning schools,

mothers and children clinging to trees:

roaring rivers

oceans of water

holding back the tide

golden silk saris are used as sponges,

wooden poles and steel beams crumble

and chapatti fires cook no more

while rice fields are swallowed by the Arabian Sea

and every night it comes,

every afternoon more Sindhi disappear:

and Karachi is perplexed

Islamabad has no plans

while predictably Delhi considers karma

in these biblical times

these rains topple our mortality,

remind us that borderstreatieslives are ephemeral

and wash away,

with faith growing as empty as Lahori stomachs,

sunlit journeys erased by

prophetic midnight downpours

and torrents of empty promises

no, the world cannot betray

turn its back

waver nor tsk tsk:

this is a deluge without end,

and Pakistan floods 

with fathomless green tears

9/12/10

Delray Beach, FL