A Midway Petrol Pump Poem by Akhtar Jawad

I don't remember when I started my journey.
I don't know where the starting point of my travelling was.
Perhaps I was sleeping somewhere when someone
put me on the rear seat of a taxi cab
but one loved me
as I was wrapped in an woolen blanket
with nipple of a feeder in my mouth.
The taxi cab is running on a lonely highway.
I can't see who is driving the vehicle,
but someone is on the front seat.
I am sure the driver stops the vehicle when I sleep.
I don't see my excretions anywhere
I notice my dress is changed every night,
the feeder has been replaced with the packs of solid foods.
How long is the journey!
I am growing,
now I can sit,
I can see the shadow like back of the driver.
The television was there watching it listening to it
I learned how to speak.
I can smile and I can cry and I can talk now.
I have further grown.
I try to open the gates of the vehicle
but it's locked.
I try to move to the front seat
and I find there is a glass partition that I cannot break.
The highway is dark but I see lights at a distance.
The taxi cab reached there and stopped for refueling.
It's a petrol pump.
The driver forgets to lock the gates.
Perhaps willfully!
I slip from the vehicle.
There are billions of vehicles in the queue for refueling.
I am lost in the crowd.
What a beautiful place is this!
There are so many shops of delicious things to eat,
and many other things.
Neon signs are attractive and enchanting.
I am hungry and have no money to purchase some food for me.
I go to a shopkeeper, 'Sir, do you have a job for me?
I am hungry. I want money to purchase some food.'
'All right boy, lift the broom and the brushes, clean the shop,
if you can work as a sweeper? '
I work hard.
Years pass.
I am now a youth.
Behind the petrol pump there is a garden.
I go there and see a girl
roaming among the flowers like a butterfly.
She has a polybag in her hands.
'Hello! ', I say and she replies,
'Can you help me?
There are seeds of beautiful flowers in the polybag,
despite my repeated efforts I failed to open its knots.'
I helped her and seeds of flowers were sown in the garden.
Behind the gardens there is a forest
We make a hut there and start living together.
The seeds sown are now green plants
springing colorful flowers of love.
I am Manager of the shop.
I am now too old and tired.
Suddenly one day a stranger comes in the shop.
'I have a warrant of arrest for you,
you have unlawfully escaped from the taxi cab,
without paying the due taxes.
Come on gentleman,
your journey is not yet over,
the petrol pump may be a beautiful place
but it's not your destination.
Today, I show you my face,
I am the same taxi driver who took care of you
when you were an infant.
I don't know how you are called here
but I know your name is Man.'