Athula's Demise Poem by Vihanga Perera

Athula's Demise



Forty years later, Nimalasiri died
After being summoned to the party head's room
In the middle of the night.
He had collapsed and passed out.
Upon admission he was already gone without a doubt.
Nimalasiri -the last scene of your last act:
Poignant. Pathetic. Speculation on fact.

I think of 69,70, April 1971.
You -one of the fab, marching to and fro,
Instilling in chosen youth sentiment and will
And the El Dorado of the coming revolution
Which, when it came, came as a bitter-sweet pill.
In the party annals, you were now a traitor, a turncoat
Who to wear the coat had a body but a soulless back.

A pre-revolution hero who turned meek at the firing line.
In that way and many others - a modern day Frankenstein.

And forty years on,
One dark night you were forced to embrace
And kiss certain death you once cheated
-In an unlikely colossal palatial room
In the plush seaside suburb of a man whose rule
Was now beginning to dissolve like an inevitable mountain -
Perhaps, you provoked him some way,
Hinting at some later day rebellion

-Something you had in you the world
Had robbed from you in how they wrote your name -

That that leader's gaze struck you like a bolt
And brought you, Nimalasiri -Athula -
And your pulses to a final halt.

- March 2019

Thursday, March 28, 2019
Topic(s) of this poem: death,irony,politics,rebel
POET'S NOTES ABOUT THE POEM
Nimalasiri Jayasinghe -known as 'Loku Athula' in the 1971 political discourse -died in December 2014, while visiting his party leader's home in the middle of the night. The death was caused by cardiac arrest.

In 1971, Athula was a front leader of the JVP who attempted to seize state power through a sudden uprising. After the rebellion failed and its cadre were brought to book, Athula testified against his party by being a witness of the Crown.

He later joined politics and was better known as a politician for the SLFP -the very party whose government short-circuited the 1971 rise.

His party leader in December 2014 lost his powers a month later when he lost a national election. The writer speculates that on the night of Athula's death he was summoned by his leader to discuss politics.
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