Living in Two Language Zones

No, Raqif
I finally got the answer.
We can’t ever be friends.

We live in two language zones
For me
A for Apple(Kashmiri)
And B for Bank Balance
And C for Car or Cash.
Oh, have I not told you
I have bought a new car!
I will grow old despite those
Anti ageing creams
And die pretty normally.
I live in a pretty ‘normal’ country.

And you, my friend (?)
A for Anda cell
B for Bail
C for Cartridge
And D for …Death.
Young, cold, dark and silent.

Between you and I
I have only silence.
What do you have?
I can never know.

My calls never reach you
In the fight between
who kills who
I lost you, Raqif.

Moumita Alam is a poet from West Bengal. Her poetry collection, The Musings of the Dark was published in 2020. The book has about a hundred poems written in protest against the humanitarian crisis from the abrogation of article 370, the Delhi riots, and the Shaheen Bagh movement to the unbearable sufferings of the migrant labourers due to the unplanned Covid-induced lockdown.

Featured image: Suhail lone / Unsplash