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Here’s a poem on a pertinent socioeconomic issue, suicides by farmers. A protest poem by Kabir, in Different Truths.
Peeling off the roots they cry
Tears roll and feed the last thread of it
Adjoined hands pray to leave them to die
Cultivators howl and say, “We don’t have any option”
Roots surrender and dissolve their strength
To make the cultivators’ job easy
A yard ahead a rope is waiting for their neck
Like a hungry lizard, it is waiting for her prey
A surrendering prey makes her smirk
While the God is busy in flying kites of money
From up above, the kites witness the hanging rope
It sees a man approaching the rope with torn flora
One of the kite tries to approach the man
But the thread woven with God’s hand pulls it harder
Making her journey tough like an armadillo in water
Now the kite is helpless just like an old elephant
As the man approaches he tightly holds the flora
He wants the flora to take his hand as he approaches death
He wants both of them to set a mark even when they are scared
Death came early for both of them like a big pit
Saliva dropping from the palpitating rope
Makes him bound to jump in that pit
From miles above the kite sees the jump
Even when he can stop death, he is bound to feel the fingers of oppressors
Feeling death is less painful than witnessing it
As he climbs and his body drops, for him everything ends
The roots start dying as he dies
The end just initiated a start towards the kite handler
To make the handler jump in the same pit
Where the man jumped, to make him alive.
©Kabir Deb
Photos from the internet.
#Poem #SocioEconomic #SuicideOfFarmers #DifferentTruths
