John P. Matthew

These days, gunfire and cameras make the same sound: rat-a-tat, rat-a-tat. One kills; the other immortalises, what comes first? I don’t know.

In these extreme days, when guns crackle in snow and heat, the cameras pan, debris and dead bodies. Those that didn’t face the cold steel metal, say: “It was me,” “It was me,”

“that the bullet missed.” Why? I don’t know.

Those days before Kalashnikovs, and Berettas were invented killing a man was called murder “Lock ‘im up,” “Lock ‘im up.” Nowadays the military-industrialists, kill millions, yet, we hail them as keepers of democracy.

These days gunfire and cameras make the same sound: rat-a-tat, rat-a-tat. One kills; the other immortalises, what comes first? I don’t know.

Late John P. Matthew: Writer, poet, singer-songwriter, and blogger John P Matthew was born in the state of Kerala, India. His first success as a writer was Penguin’s world-wide short story contest “India Smiles” in which his short story “Flirting in Short Messages” was selected for publication in an anthology. His poem “Call of the Cuckoo” has been published by Poetry Rivals. He was working on his first novel and writing a book-length travelogue about his native state of Kerala. He died in 2017.