Poems in Right filled Anger, Of Resistance
On November 16, 2016, the occasion of the KG Kannabiran Memorial Lecture at Madurai, feminist activist Vasanth Kannabiran read our three powerful pieces of writing. Teesta Setalvad, co-editor, Sabrangindia delivered the lecture. We reproduce these powerful poems of Vasanth Kannabiran, a fellow traveler in the democratic rights struggle, with a tribute to her.
I was angry, she told us, when I wrote them. And I am happy to share them with your platform. This is the first
Beef she said
Vasanth Kannabiran
Image: Paramjit Singh / Sahmat
Beef she said. I want beef curry ma.
I am hungry and need the juice from the meat
to wet my dried up nerves and wrinkling skin
My nerves are like dry tendons drained by the lust
of this mad carnivorous mob.
Devouring human flesh ,
feasting on youth, old men, women and babes
hacking and killing to cries of mother cow
holy mother holy cow.
Yes the cow is holy in our myths.
Gautama circling a birthing cow
Earned the merit of circling the world
But what is sacred needs to be consumed in gratitude
The coconuts, goats, chickens we offer to holy
Mother we treasure and feast on them.
Not let them rot because they are sacred
No we do not practice ahimsa.
Our creed is himsa
killing we plunder and pillage and burn
savagely without respite
We kill because we thirst for blood.
Let us celebrate our culture of savagery
Declare with pride and honour that we are vampires
Declare we kill because we love the smell of blood.
We killed Gandhi, and countless others, no matter.
Let us then eat beef cooking it tenderly with love
You and I and say that what is sacred is food.
No animal is our mother father or god.
No cow, elephant, monkey or mouse
There is no God save greed the glorious and great
Greed for wealth, land, power and pelf
Greed for blood.
Let us then declare our creed with pride
and eat, drink and make merry.
Beef will feed more people than a goat
The milk will not feed ten people.
Blow then the trumpets
Beat thou the drums,
Bring out the beef and lay the feast
This is ancient Bharat
the purest land in the world
let us flaunt our beliefs
quench our thirst for blood
what price the approval of the world
If we can harvest their capital?
[From Country Book Review]