Beside Railway Tracks Poem by Sumanta Dhar

Across the railway tracks
There are shabby houses
Mortars peeling off from the walls
Somewhere an unimaginative paint
Adores the window grating
Somewhere from in every morning
Emanates the sound of a noisy radio
Budging ultimately in the
Feeble slapping strokes
Of the octogenarian
The radio, which his in laws
Had presented him
Almost half a century ago
From the gate-less gate
At the ground floor
Where the stairs begin
Out of the bleak darkness
Comes out a mother
Thin, week, gaudily dressed
Along with her kids
One clinging to her shoulder
Barely one year
And a daughter and son
Dressed in school uniform
They disappear at the turn of the street
A few urchins
Clad in dust and shorts
Play with a defunct cycle tyre
Rolling it with a short bamboo stick
They have no obligation with time
Amidst all
The shabby, mortar-less houses
Stood like a nagging geriatric.