Dialogue: Past & Present

by Mahvesh Khan

We are the kings of the castle:
nobody's been here before.
If we don't live forever,
our legacy will endure.
(But you don't know the secrets
the pyramids still keep,
So dazzled by yourself,
you do not hear us weep.)
People long ago never
managed to do as well.
Ignorant, uncivilized-
what have they to tell?
(But the map of Peiri Reis
do you pretend you haven't seen?
and the Circles of the Stonehenges-
Beyond you have we been!)
They were a lot of Savages.
Probably they were like
the Native American or abo
before the advent of the white.
(Yet knowledge of medicine
you ask of those you despise,
and why does the earth cry
if it is you who are wise?)
Yes, we are well endowed
and we know what to do-
how to run this planet
much better than you.
(Step carefully, unthinking child
we have been here before
a thousand centuries, but a wink:
it is us whom you follow.)

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