What Is War?

The essence of KM Gaffoor’s Malayalam poem Yudham (War) could be translated this way: over small things, we lose our patience and cool, we grow in anger and revenge. When the food had a little less salt, we struck the table in frustration, and pushed the plate away. When someone gave a harsh feedback we banged the door so hard. When a glass slipped and shattered, we raised our hands in punishment. Over small things — a meal, a feedback, a mistake — we became storms. ‘This is us.’

And then we, seeing the horrors of war, ask, what is war? Why is there war? KM Gaffoor answers it plainly: ‘War is simply us, made larger.’ War is not something that happens out there, between nations and armies and strangers on maps. War is something that happens in here — in the kitchen, at the dinner table, in the spaces between people who are supposed to live with each other.

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SPRINGBOARDS and WALKING STICKS

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