Elegy for Thirst: A Plea to the Polluters

 

         Volume - 1                             Issue -2                     March 2025     

Elegy for Thirst: A Plea to the Polluters

The rivers once sang in crystalline tongues,
Their currents a hymn where the heron had sprung.
Now bottles and wrappers choke their blue throats,
Asphalt and poison seep into their notes—
Will we heed the dirge of the waters unsung?

The pond was a mirror for dragonfly wings,
A cradle for lilies, a wellspring for springs.
Now sludge paints its surface, a greasy disguise,
Plastic confetti where minnows once rise—
What ghosts will drink from the ruin we bring?

The lakes held the moon in a liquid embrace,
Their depths nursed the salmon, their shores carved with grace.
But toxins now ripple like shadows unkind,
A debt left for children we’ve chosen to blind—
Will their parched throats curse us to history’s disgrace?

The oceans, vast vaults where the whales hymn and roam,
Now choke on our hubris, our apathy’s foam.
Microplastics glint where the starfish once clung,
Acid tides rise where the coral was young—
What wars will we wage for a flask of fresh foam?

You, who dump waste where the tadpoles once swam,
Who drain factory filth into wetlands’ sweet dam:
The earth keeps a ledger, each sin etched in mud,
Each choked stream, each poisoned well, each tainted flood—
Your grandchildren’s lips will bleed drought’s bitter jam.

For water is life’s final psalm and first vow,
A relic we’ve squandered—yet demand it now.
When taps cough dust and the skies withhold rain,
No wealth can bribe mercy, no tech rinse the stain—
The future’s cracked cup waits. What choice have we now?

So let the land breathe, let the rivers run clear,
Unstop the choked springs, hold the wetlands dear.
For every drained marsh, a thirst yet unborn,
For every oil spill, a harvest of scorn—
The clock’s ticking liquid. The end hovers near.

Rebuild what you’ve broken. Let conscience command.
The earth’s veins are bleeding; we hold the last bandage.
Or else, when the last drop is traded and sold,
Our epitaph’s ink will be rust, thirst, and mold—
And the tale of our drowning… will die with the land.

                                                - Sivakumar Raman