gurkhas... my people

***

FROM A GURKHA TO A FALLEN SOLDIER

Smrithi Rumdali Rai

You lie in the cold soft snow
Your blood spilt for jihad.

My turn will come soon enough
Though nameless I’ll not lie.

The bugle will blow one last note
For the grinning Johnny Gurkha.

My brothers fall in foreign lands
Wants of home and hearth fulfilled.

Soldiers we are - We kill
If the pay is right.
Brother, to exist we fight.

Homeland we left far behind
To fight and protect foreign lands
From nameless faces foreign hands.

Was it not the same for you?

Your fight to protect the Protector
Is your fight to hold
Hunger at bay.

Was it not want that drove you here,
And not a promise to paradise?

Rest in peace O fallen foe,
You are a Gurkha too.

***

FADING OUT

Pranaya Gurung

The darkness fades
Sun that is coming out.

Who recalls the lamp
That has burnt the night out?

So it is with the Gurkhas
A fading out race are we.

Who shall recall brave deeds?
Neither friends nor their country!

Wars today are fought with corporate needs
Victory gained by squeezing enemy needs.

Bounties, not medals, are found abound
The cycle for the Gurkhas has surely come around.

In victory were we defeated
By the peace that we created.

Where to now, my Gurkhas,
Now that the tide has turned?

The darkness has passed, the sun is about
We the Gurkhas, are slowly fading out.