The Diseased River Poem by Md. Ziaul Haque

O the diseased river!
Where is your power?
Where is your glory,
That we used to see?

Are you destroying yourself,
Like a machine that can terminate itself?
Or it's the humans' inattention,
That has caused this devastation.

I can't look at you river,
You were youthful like a young girl earlier,
Now so lean have you become,
As if AIDS in your bosom has made a home!

Like the flow of time,
And the passing airstream,
Civilisation moves blindly on,
Alas! None for you cares to mourn.

Who will save you ‘poor river'?
I gravely wonder,
When will you move like a snake again?
Will I ever be there to witness that scene?