Colder Than the Winter — Badri Raina

 

It is an Arctic December,

The ice is everywhere;

But the heat of hate is colder still,

Congealing life into frozen fear.

 

Trees of old look at their roots

And find demonic spades at work;

They worry for their next foliage,

 As hot marauders go berserk

 

 With devouring red in their eyes,

And daggers in their pate;

They do not feel the cold at all —

They are keener in blazing hate.

 

A new world built of icicles

Is busily underway;

Painted in the wrongful blood

Of love and liberty.