Tribal Woman Poem by Chandra Shekhar Dubey

Drooping by the knee,
frail in frame, stick in her hand
She walks uphill grain by grain.
Wrinkles deep on her face
tell her days spent in stiffling trace.
She sings as she snails her pace
A song of mundane chores and trails
In a voice feeble and frail.
She lives by lakes and grassy dunes
near the foothill of the forest deep.
She is a tribal woman, mother of four
waiting for her sons at work in city.
She lits her thatched hovel bright ry every evening by crackling firelight
Illuminating the forest door.
Fed on jamun, mahua and karonda
Living on the edge of life,
She has a heart delight

filled with joy and insight.
She fetches fuels, fodders
for her cattle from the hills high
above her hut which archs the sky
with green turfs hanging by the bay.
She lives by her lone and deserted
self soaked in misery at playful ease,
a living spirit or life bloomed in gloom?
She sings working on her loom
Perhaps song of life or jingles
writ large on her wrinkles.

Chandra Shekhar Dubey