Woman At The Traffic Light Poem by satbir bakshi

I remember with a tremor
In my heart
On a cold winter morning with
The fog enveloping everything
Around me

Seeing a young woman at the
Traffic Light
She in tattered and torn apparel
Shivering – teeth chattering
Trying to coax some milk from
From shrunken and shrivelled
Breasts
And feed her skinny child
In the morning winter light.

Today, thirty years hence
When I drive my son
To school
In a centrally heated car
I again see the same women
Standing at another
Traffic Light
Trying to again coax
A dropp of milk
Into those shivering lips

Whither my country
I want to jump out my car
And
Burn this world to cinders

While all this time
Stocks of grain are overflowing
In the warehouses of my land
For the rats to eat at leisure

And the middle-men
Swirl like deverishes
To the strains of
Twinkling anklets
Of the ladies of the night.