The intrigue, of the, smoking gun
Whose bullet, slit the, sniper’s heart
So glorious, is more, whose paean
If martyrdom, is a, dead man’s art!

Swill, death’s nectar, from valor’s chalice,
Is this, the eternal, myth of war!
In legitimate murders, manufactured malice
Martyrs are, vainglory’s, metaphor!

The lad, who lost, last year, of his teens
He thought, war is a, child’s play
And the man, whose count we, smithereens
Are truths truer, than the, life’s hearsay!

Are passions spent? What’s left to glean?
A grain, of glory, in a fist, of sigh!
Our martyrs ain’t, what we, make them mean
Like a wailing rabbi, Dead Men Never Lie!

© 2018 Vikas Chandra