Kozhikode Air Crash - The Airport As Vulnerable As A Football Ground Poem by Bernedita Rosinha Pinto

Courage and compassion is more worthier in this time
when lives have been disarrayed by an air crash
as unexpected and unforeseen came this disaster.
Was it errors of foresight or weather that caused deaths
and injuries to those innocent passengers
or was it that the dreams of re-unions catapulted
across the walls of realities and dismay?

And as the plane split into two and fell in a gorge,
was helplessness and chaos escalated by the rains
or was it a ruthless destiny that was playing its game
as some pathetically perished in the crash,
while some survived amidst the belly of plane.

Was this tragedy worth its impetuousness
or was this a calamity for ignoring the weather conditions?
Was it the vulnerability of the airport that was overlooked
or was it the prediction of danger that was disregarded?
Was it that when journeys got completed caution was forgotten?
All these questions arise as to why the plane
had to overshoot the run way;
and will those survivors ever be able to forget their ordeal?

They must have awaited to disembark and go home
to the waiting arms of their loved ones
as they were flying home for safety
from the corona virus pandemic
but they did not imagine that an air crash
could somersault their expectations
when a long healthy life was all that
they wanted to live and cherish.

And as an eighty four year mother lost
her most valuable son
whom she had never expected to go
before her own weary eyes had closed forever;

how will this mother now ever wake up
with no tears in her eyes and no sorrow in her heart
as of his childhood memories
she is already beginning to remember and relate
with a pain and pride so distinct
that only mothers who have lost their sons
as pilots in a fatal air crash will know and understand
the depth of such a loss and its melancholy.

Yet to every one who has survived
and to everyone who has lost a family member
gift to them foremost the courage and compassion they seek
as life becomes a longer journey
when anguish and grief chooses to walk side by side
all along the runway of time.