Beauty and the Beast

By Arthit Kumar Dutta

War had come,
and war had left,
as swiftly as the wind,
but the land still shivered,
scarred beyond a thousand lifetimes.

The earth lay hollowed,
drier than the breath of the dying,
barren of all that once clung to it.
Life, selfish in its ways,
flees from those who do not nurture it.
Can we fault it for feeling the same?

I wonder—
Is death merely the absence of life?
Or do they drift past one another,
trading places in quiet succession,
never touching,
never merging?
Or have I already crossed the threshold?
Yet again, I do not know.

Beside the wasteland, untouched,
the fields glow golden,
the waters shimmer,
and the wheat sways in defiance
of all that was lost.

And there, upon the lake’s quiet surface,
I see myself—
but only as a reflection.

It is strange, is it not?
That when I lived,
the world tore itself apart in agony,
and now, in death,
I am met with beauty.

Perhaps I was mistaken,
perhaps it was life that bore the weight of sorrow,
and death—
death was only watching,
waiting,
to offer something gentler.