The real war, my darling girl

Are you scared that we don't die when we bleed
Like men invariably do?
Do you think your threats would stop us
speaking up, breaking down the doors
which you built to contain us?
They forget that I come from a long
lines of witches, we have slayed
bigger monsters than you.
The wars between nation-states are fought
by men in the name of land and women,
Using our names to satiate their egoes,
A fight in which men inevitably wins.
That is no war for you and me
Th real wars, my darling girl,
is going to be fought in our homes.

To outgrow all your friends

Is a sad and lonely process

May isolation fare you better.

Warning to trespassers

When I was younger and still wanted to be loved
I asked you to come visit my home
I wanted to take you to the Langol hills
I grew up climbing
and that little island in Loktak
But you were scared of guns and bandhs
And never came.
But by now I know who you all really are
And that we are just a dot in your map
which you have bled red.
To think that I loved you all once,
All of you with your shiny futures
Your uncomplicated loves
Made true by our sufferings, our deaths,
You have never known hate perhaps
 Because you kill and maim us
without thinking of us, and perhaps
you think us non-human because we don't
look like you, speak like you, eat like you
By now I know that if you come
you will only make it worse
with your ready words, your misinterpretations
For you, we are just stories confined to four lines
in the fourth page of your newspaper
But if you do come to my land
even after I have warned you
It would do you good
If you remembered we were once
head-hunters, fire-eaters and spear-throwers
And that we once had freedom before
you snatched it away from us.