God's Own Country? Poem by Ravi Panamanna

The pangs of delivery,
The pain is universal.
For man and man eaters
Life has no different meanings.

It was the month of June,
Wind and rain, monsoon.
A cat, pregnant, in that season,
Ran across a lane at one dawn.

A momentous hour!
She delivered in the plight of hunger.
There – the kitten lay sober
And the pounding skies showered no flowers.

With no medical care around,
Having none to console,
In the wilderness of moments
Two souls solemnly communed.

And in the ruthless weather,
The kitten’s game of life was soon over.
The mother for a moment stood lost,
Left the scene in a figure-less blight.

In the rain and the following night,
The kitten lay on the same pavement.
No one cared to bury the little one,
The din of the world cycled its own style.

The prowling crows had their feast,
They were at work that whole night.
And on the following morn’
The Municipal workers did the rest.

Abandoned in the street,
The kitten calls for our hand and heart.
Where is our empathy and sense of cleanliness?
Deeply buried in the ivory towers of life?