India 2010

For India a year of reckonings:
we grew and we sank;
the poor lost their night-shelters,
the rich went laughing to the bank.

More women came far afield,
the rapists had their fun;
the moralists shook their frozen heads,
saying what can be done
if women dare nature’s laws,
and covet spaces meant for men.

The cronies said why capitalism
if not for us and us;
watchdog media screamed for blood
but were cosy with the lobbyists.

The NGOs and idealists put
spanner in the wheel,
wrecking with little love for the land
many a wholesome deal.

But Obama gave us certificate,
and Israel many a gun;
so why speak of such familiar things
as crime and corruption?

But when it came to the onion,
no middle class man could buy it;
the onion, it will bring you grief,
more than pestilence or riot.

So minister spoke to minister
on Blackberry mobile phone;
how is it we roam the sea and sky,
but have no onion?

At which the wag had his say:
“such is the idea of India, dude,
fret not at onion-lack;
that idea is never for everyone,
some starve, some have it good.
Read any text of high religious worth,
and this is always understood.

Thus give your piece of beloved land
so those may fast forward go
who speak on your needless behalf,
and brand India into a show
that shames lesser peoples, lands,
eyeing the high high table;
pray for the prestigious council seat,
and cut out your penurious babble.
take pride in being the fodder
that makes the canon go;
the India story is not so gory
as the whistleblowers show.


*****


Badri Raina
December, 23, 2010