Life Of A Street Dog Poem by M. Asim Nehal

Born on one of the streets of an urban city
Grown under the protection of my mothers’ care
Learned the tricks to survive on the busy roads

Under the watchful eyes of my mother I learned
That life is not easy
To live and survive
A struggle of everyday
For food is routine

Thought barking is reward
I barked hard
And harder to impress
Yet no rewards
Just a hush hush by the dwellers
To push me away
Mother came to rescue

I realized my learning is half
I watched my mother
Not barking on those who reside
On streets or in house on those street

Also learned how to identify suspects
How to scare them and how to remain safe
Although learning is a never ending process
My mother left me to learn by self

I was all alone fighting my battle of life
One day I saw a suit-boot man
With a briefcase in hand
Walking happily and fast
Trying to hide what he embezzled from office
My sixth sense alerted and I barked
He got scared and ran past my street

After few hours I saw a car
Five men descended and
one being suit-boot man
they chased me to beat
one being successful
he hit me on leg
since then limping
I learned a bitter lesson
if you bark at a decent man
even though he may be a thief
it will costs you a leg

Same day a poor thief came running trying to hide
he was injured but his body language
showed me that he need help tonight
I saw him giving me biscuits and bones
Every day as reward
one day I saw this man stealing
But distributing goods to poor people
He was my robin hood in true sense

I saw the suit-boot men stealing from poor people
And distributing it to rich men by throwing parties
What a contract in human society I found
Poor man stealing from rich and distributing to poor peoples
Rich man stealing from poor people and distributing to rich

I saw many changing colors of the street
And many different shades of humans
Some were society animals, intelligent animals and what not
I feel pity, the way they think, and the way they behave
My street life is far better than their pompous life.