On the Advancement of the Torture Industry in Kashmir

We have great facilities here.
polished rods, double-coated with grease and oil—
specialized wires for electrocuting;
pliers, easy to handle, precisely sharp.
and burners,
we got rollers made of walnut wood
and nails of varied sizes.

A machine, portable and specially designed,
with valves to insert truth-
attached to a pit, through a pipe,
where it all gets buried.

Rodents, swarms of them,
creeping into sacks
of varied colors,
made of special fabric—resizable
that adjusts according to the
size of the subject’s head.

We’ve got grinders, hundreds of them,
fitted with artificial intelligence-
programmed to deal with multiple
narratives, to mold them
into a shape we want.

Besides, we’ve got spices
imported, sundried for years—
crisp; meant only to be used towards
the last.
and petrol, (enough) to
be injected in every hole
of the subject’s body.

The manufacture
of a confession-making machine
is currently in progress,
it is a landmark in the history of our industry.

The task is onerous
and committed as
we are in the service of our nation—
the future is not bleak.

The posts for psychological torturers
are currently vacant-
we already got a horde of professionals applying.

We’ve got sufficient funds to keep it all going,
as for the shortcomings, we apologize.
We upgrade whenever we can.

(This Poem appeared in the November 2020 print issue of the Mountain Ink.)

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