A Few Lines on Patriotism
 
Poem in Malayalam  : Rafeeq Ahmed
Translation                 : K Ramachandran

Birds of the Border
Are big trouble makers
With no sense of discrimination,
They fly hither and thither.
By the time you aim at a bird,
Its citizenship may change.

After winning the war,
I reached the border;
Joined the celebrations.
The area of my patriotism
Has now expanded by
24.75 square kilometers.

Certain evil forces are fighting
To break away from this nation.
If they win, they would become enemies.
what an uncertainty about
The arithmetic of patriotism!

You who keep guard
On ice cold, snow clad peaks
Or burning hot deserts
For my comfortable sleep,
Can you assure me that
The point of your bayonet will not
turn against me?
I just want to sleep peacefully.

Farmers who killed themselves,
Remembering good harvests,
Were dancing in the dead silence of the midnight.
Then they heard the national anthem from afar.
The ghosts suddenly stood in attention.
"Don't do that"- chief of the ghosts told them
"We are the dead;
We shouldn't make it appear
That it is the anthem of dead people".