
How prayers that stood on tongue tips,
Carving plumes of noise, as
She, the lady of Paris, resists the dragons,
Looming like the sun at sunset, and still,
She will rise to the heavens, unlike Babel,
To prove that no man can
Vanquish Notre Dame, or decimate
The memory of pilgrims scattered all over this planet.
The first dame of Paris, like a damsel in distress
Flames crackling, bursting, rising far,
Blazing in the contemporary and a legacy
That from the powder of shelved ashes,
Will resurrect, the fallen nave.
The roofs arching above, will be restored,
For the Parisians, to cry “Hail Mary”, their palms
Held heaven-wise. While people look at a belfry,
Where a bell used to be, now vacant,
Like a fallen city without a palpitating heart.
While they see the tall tapering roofs,
Come down in a hurry; pews ablaze,
The alter charred, windows cracked in the middle,
And the spirit of her, braver than Joan
Of Arc on a stake, now covered in soot;
While a broken spire, which like
A bent raceme, becomes to
The bystanders, something to pluck,
And place inside a blue vase,
Brimming of melancholia.
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Published by Curiosity-driven life (Dilantha Gunawardana)
Dr Dilantha Gunawardana graduated from the University of Melbourne, as a molecular biologist, and moonlights as a poet. He currently serves as a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Botany, University of Sri Jayewardenepura. Dilantha lives in a chimeric universe of science and poetry. Dilantha’s poems have been accepted for publication /published in HeartWood Literary Magazine, Canary Literary Magazine, Boston Accent, Forage, Kitaab, Eastlit, American Journal of Poetry, Zingara Poetry Review, The Wagon and Ravens Perch, among others. Dilantha too has two anthologies of poetry, 'Kite Dreams' (2016) and 'Driftwood' (2017), both brought to the readership by Sarasavi Publishers, and is working on his third poetry collection (The Many Constellations of Home). Dilantha’s pet areas of teaching and research, include, Nitrogen Fixation, RNA biology, Phytoremediation, Agricultural Biology, and Bioethics & Biosafety. Dilantha blogs at – https://meandererworld.wordpress.com/ -, where he has nearly 2000 poems.
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