Past dusty streets and dusty streetlamps
Where bored shopkeepers stare at passersby lustily,
shoving capitalism down their innocent throats
Wrapped in neon lights and shiny tags;
While outside under a red sun
Kids draw eights on little bicycles
Between speeding cars and
An occasional handcart.
I wish I could go back there
Playing like I did as a kid
Chasing rubber balls across graveled pavements
Hiding behind paan stained walls
And cursing people for no reason
But I have grown up now;
That’s what they tell me.
And I do what they tell me to do.
The market has not yet begun
The shops pause with a hum on their lips,
That would soon turn to cracked cries;
Of prices and haggling customers
Till the darkness overcomes their desires,
And leads them home to troubled sleep.
Chocolate éclairs stare at me
From within round jars of plain glass.
Juicy apples in forbidden jars,
I remember the counting and waiting,
Turning over 5o paise coins again and again
Till there were no more chocolates;
And no more coins.
Young men wait on railway bridges
In search of that utopian feeling – love:
Something I’ll never know,
Till death itself brings me a peace of that feeling
Where, to attain it is to overcome its desire
But till then smoke rings fill the empty void
That surrounds a heavy air around the bridge.
Feet carry on their tiresome job of treading dust
That rise in small puffs and swirl away
Behind the exhausts of big cars
Driven by shoeless vagabonds with puffy red eyes
Till the petrol runs out in the air cooled tanks.
Something is bothering me
If I knew what it was it wouldn’t anymore
But the liquid keeps simmering in that deep place
Where feelings are hid like inside a dingy cupboard
Till they burst out like old clothes stinking of sweat
But till then I wait endlessly.
Then the sun goes down in a dirty red sky
The vultures come out of the hiding
And men hunt for prey
Behind dark alleys and brightly lit corridors
Where flesh is sold by butchers,
Hung up on hooks, while the wolves
Surround it and howl.
Sometimes I wonder if this is all there is..
This poem has not been translated into any other language yet.
I would like to translate this poem