A Salesman Poem by Rishik DuttaGupta

I start working in a scorching sun, a different Sun
With a drive to earn bread
I see my dreams fade away
Down to the exhausted thread.

The dreams are everchanging though,
From a poet to a salesman,
Only hope drives a man
But sometimes to become insane.

Insanity is a relative term,
For a Sun its cloud, for a cloud storm,
For a child deprived of childhood
Its just a different form
Frustration!

The jostling in a bus, stinking sweat
Exhausted at the day's end
Like the mysery of a pet.

Words are no more than technical terms,
Born from the mind and not the heart.
I am lost everyday
In this claustrophobic citylife.

The room a thousand times smaller than my home,
Oh! I do not wish to return,
The rotten smell of wastage
Shall pay me homage.

Home is where one builds his dream,
What to call that suffocates it?

I sold my soul for other's smile
It pangs me to scream at them.
I smile vaguely entering the narrow lane
Twele hours' battle has ended and I open the room,
Starving!

The rotten smell grasps me,
Well, I should clean the room,
I switched on the light,
But it did not turn on!