Slaves of God
Encircled by the crumbly lime-washed walls,
Yellowing here, blackening there
The cramped temple is murky even in broad daylight,
Its air always sultry with oil lamps, incense and camphor
Burning eternally like sorrow in our hearts
Or like despair or remorse.
The translucent white curtains
Now pushed to the extreme right and the extreme left
Along the curtain bar, nickel and hollow in the middle
Reveal the statue of a god in all his might
In all his divine splendour
Listening like a psychiatrist
With patronising silence
To the endless incantations intoned
By the ‘kapumahaththaya’
A bare-chested stocky old man in his late fifties
With a receding forehead and grey stubble
Who is the self-appointed go-between
With neither God nor his believers having any say here
On the matter of merit and selection criteria, however.
On the grapevine,
Here, God answers all prayers of his believers
And miracles keep happening all the time
Which keeps pulling the unsuspecting people
From all four corners of the island
Like a vacuum cleaner pulling the spiders.
Shadows of ignorance fallen on the mirror of wisdom
Seldom dispel themselves and darken the templestill further
Thus, a lie becomes a tale and a tale a myth.
In thrall to God in perpetuity
The puerile believers He is all ears all the time;
And a wordless promise to be fulfilled never
Seems more than enough to compensate
For a belief to be dissolved never.
Words: Jayashantha Jayawardhana
