The lips that you see

Death Row

The lips that you see
Make no doubt,
On my part, I have none –
They are not that of a dead man.

Dry and crusted though they appear -

Tightly controlled muscles,
That remained glued and sealed -
They do palpitate and transpire

Don’t be fooled,

They are hiding behind
A story - so tragic
They would not want to be the vehicle
For it to be revealed.

And the eyes ----
Are in cahoots with the lips
Scanning the surrounds

They have long desisted.

Though they are not closed
To aid your imagination think
The man is long dead.
Opened they remained,

But fixed at a target
Navigating the mind so as not to deviate,
Destination to reach
They have never been before.
And from such fixation
No person, however close,
No exiting an event however colourful,
No smooth talker,
Or a preacher offering life after,
Would detract his focus
And bring him back to this world
He had already left long before
They were then preparing him to leave.
The stillness amid the commotion
Of the preachers,
Prison guards,
Photographers,
Newspaper foot-soldiers
Trying to catch the glimpse
Of his disappearing self,
Makes him the only one sane person
In an insane world, he once
Happened to be in the lead,
Till he committed a heinous crime
Battering his wife to death and putting
Out a child’s life,
Who shared his genetic blood.
Killing them was unforgivable madness
That he did, in an act of desperation and pain
Of loneliness. The man had, one
Could hardly say, any conscience left.

It remains to b e said the nation’s conscience,
In putting up a show
To put out a life after a long wait in a death row
Compared with that of the criminal

Who lost his mind
Lacks higher moral ground.
The trouble: when the state trundle on the road show
Be it to hack the necks or
Lassoed in the gallows
It is that of charters hitherto it did not know.