“The Japs killed him in the Second World War”
Read the epitaph etched on a fallen wood
Who crossed the “Martyr” before “Major Knorr”
And scraped with knife “A Traitor – up to, no good”!

How much is truth and myth in this tale
Is the outlook of a passer-by
Better is blind man who learnt no Braille
Than one with eyes which always lie!

He sleeps below his silent shroud
An orphan mourned by no mother
With a name of shame could he be proud
“This Major’s, a Traitor, No Martyr”!

No one knows why the magpie trills
Her elegy for an erred hero
Whose passion towers above the hills
In A Tombstone On A Lone Plateau!

© 2023 Vikas Chandra