Thursday, June 4, 2020

Poetry in the Times of COVID-19-VI



Friends

Here is another poem on the subject that is exercising everyone in the world: COV1D-19


It might interest you to  notice that the poem consists of  nine 3-line stanzas with the number of words progressively decreasing from the first to the last.  The first stanza consists of nine-word lines and the last of one word lines. The attempt is to show the progressive diminution of the migrants' identity to nothingness.



                                                  Migrants?

Who is a migrant? Let the Dictionary speak first:   
A person who moves from one place to another,
especially, to find work; or an animal for food.

Do these locked-out beings truly fit this sketch?                                          
Uprooted from work; driven out of their hovels;
herded into pens; let loose like stray cattle.

Scattered like dry leaves by a whirlwind    
Crowding the bus stops and rail stations
 Q-ing for charity food like street bums

 Hungry thirsty; desperate to go home    
 where they await hardly any welcome
 even if they reached there unharmed

 Bundled off by their employers   
 Disowned by the uncaring state
 can they be called migrants?

 What are they now?   
 Are they war refugees?
 Are they stateless now?
     
Having no rights!  
Citizens no more!
Bereft of dignity!
    
 Just non-entities                
 None’s concern
 Just abandoned

Unwanted    
Forsaken
Nothings
             ----





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