Neetha Kunaratnam

Vigilant/e

In which the young heir to
an industrialist’s empire
is beset by tunnel vision —
pearls trickling like gunshots
down the dark spine of an alley;
his parents unexpectedly slain
in a first world allegory
that transcends its station,
as if vengeance is an urge
common to all humanity.
In which teenage therapy with
an overpriced shrink helps him
manage his anger; and in
guided shamanic visions,
he’s reborn as a bat —
insomniac, alert, fretful. 

Countless spin-offs spawn
across pale patriarchies,
in which only the strain
of his masochism varies.
A scholarly version surfaces,
in which his brooding begets
rumination so intense that
he will major in phenomenology,
devour What It’s Like To Be a Bat,
question his assumed identity.
Rejecting conceit, and bad faith,
he dispenses with kevlar, and
the hand-stitched amnesia
of the enveloping cape. 

There’s a Zen parable in which
he relives his parents’ demise
through their eyes, first numbness,
then release — until he steadily
unshackles from the suffering.
Adopting bat as a symbol of
reincarnation, he ordains in
monastic life. Nurtures unhurried
compassion over decades of
devotion. Uncouples pain from
torment. Called home to bury
his butler, he’s unfazed by the loss,
anchored in its rituals. Vigilant. 

After the wake, subsumed by the city,
he stumbles too soon upon a felony.
Nearing the scene, he eyes
the aggressor with a mirror’s
limpid clarity. And in slo-mo
montage, reflects all ill intent
back on the youth, who weeps,
repents, beseeches clemency.
Onlookers are disarmed by
such nonchalant non-violence.  

And the dharma hero
in his coffee coloured cowl
vows henceforth to levy
such transformation in
as many souls as his
remaining days will allow.
Redemption without bloodshed.
In which I see a helluva story,
but accept its lack of
box office appeal.

Neetha Kunaratnam has been published in the UK magazines, Acumen, Agenda Broadsheets Online, Magma, Poetry Review, Stand, The Interpreter's House, Poetry Wales, Orbis, The North, The Rialto, Poetry London and Rabbit (Australia). He was awarded the Geoffrey Dearmer Prize for 2007 (adjudicated by Alan Brownjohn) and gained an MA in Creative Writing in 2008 from Royal Holloway University of London and studied under Andrew Motion and Jo Shapcott. He appears in Off the Shelf (2016) published by Picador UK and edited by Carol Ann Duffy. His first collection Just Because was published by Smokestack Books in 2018, and highly commended in the Forward Prizes 2019.