Escape Poem by Ajit Das

It was a much sought-after departure
from the barnacles of squatting boredom.
I packed up, took a taxi and squeezed
into the evening traffic crawling on the route,
stifled at the bent with iron and concrete:
skeletons of a future fly-over slinging
from a tangle of red tape, design and greed.

The cab drove past snapshots slowly unwinding:
a victory march in election loosening anarchy,
communal frenzy fomented in a religious rally,
close to half-lit mud huts a marriage reception
rapping vulgar display of wealth, an ambulance
bleeping with someone's evening on oxygen.

I reached the station where, time suspended,
a motley crowd in shades of waiting mood
made a noisy, blurred, indifferent scenario:
lying on snatches of sleep, running to and fro,
making endless queries, gazing at outer signals -
all engrossed in arrivals and departures.

My train arrived; I stepped into the confine
of an insular coach, looking through tinted glass
at the world outside I was trying to escape.
My heart returned to the scenes on the platform.
Life is never fully lived; waiting for something
makes it desirable, intense. Why think of escape?