Fr. Stan Swamy- farewell to A Champion of Tribal Rights Poem by Bernedita Rosinha Pinto

O Lord, let peace be upon my spirit
let death be upon my soul
for weary is myself and my age;
long lost were my dreams
long lost were my hopes
as a withering flower has no wishes left
nor blooming;
so helpless was me as my age kept waning
but my duty to humanity was foremost;
and as in a prison cell I passed my last days
I was already so old at eighty four
yet no justice, no mercy came my way
no President, no leaders found me in time
as I breathed my last, sinking in injustice.
How could I, as a dedicated priest
be punished by law in this age
when I had sacrificed my entire life
to serve humanity and God?
How could I pass my last days in a prison cell
when I was a priest and to the church I belonged?
And just because I chose to serve
the poor and the downtrodden,
how could empathy lose its tracks
in those eyes of the law
that an eighty four year old priest like me
had to languish behind the prison bars
when I could hardly walk or sit?
Where was justice hiding its books
of law and jurisprudence
that I myself became an under-trial
when for under-trials who were jailed
for no crimes or for no just reasons
I had raised my voice to get them justice
and now in the court I had to wait for my own bail?
Also when I spoke or expressed my concern
for those unlucky or unfortunate tribes,
and I struggled to make their dreams of equality come true;
more crucified than imprisoned I felt
as I was misunderstood and mis-judged
when I was only a harmless priest doing my duty
to uphold humanity and human rights
as so condemned, so looked down, so foregone
were those whom I stood for and helped;
yet, I was denounced and arrested;
even in the end stage of my life, I silently wept...
was a prison cell my refuge and my final abode, I asked.
And though I had become a sipper with a straw
as I was unable to eat,
no one felt any sympathy for an old priest;
I was confined to jail even though
I was affected by Parkinson's disease;
and though old man with my condition
cannot think nor talk properly
yet they kept me in a prison cell until I was sick;
and as I started gasping for breath,
they took me to a hospital for care.
Even if I wanted to live more,
what could I do more
or whom could I help
or what could I benefit from a bail
when it was already time for me to sail
to the next world
where Christ was waiting to receive me?
And as I will be gone,
this world will feel astonished
at the injustice meted to me;
they will ask - is this the kind of democracy
your country speaks of
where a man of eighty four years,
was still a prisoner on that hospital bed,
on that ventilator
where he kept struggling
to breathe in oxygen to survive
when life within him was just fading away?
Is this the kind of justice a Jesuit priest deserved
for upholding the rights of tribes and undertrials?