By Nabajit Das
We are cognizant of you, Hunger!
Had you not pointed your tongue
To thwart our plans of living in peace
We would have not been aberrant and
Unscrupulous under fleece!
Where don't you live!
We know your whereabouts,
You are the native of
Each chunk, city and outskirts!
We see while wandering across the street
The ribs of the starving children,
The extended hands of the vagrants,
Neither a handful meager nor a little water
In their hands and lips!
Your influence garlands the poets
When they read you in the audience,
Your existence instincts the painters
To decorate the cocottes in canvas!
Hunger, how strong you are!
Those whom the sick and destitute
Thought to be the affluent,
Too have an unceasing desire!
We are being grabbed,
The planet is dying at your clutch,
We are living with the lumps in our throats!
Sapience has changed behaviors
At your toxic bites,
They are now penchant
For lands, stones, forests, trees
And sands of the rivers
Than rice, chapatti and water!
We know thy name is Hunger!
You have entangled
Every nook and corner
From Guwahati to Haiti
Sri Lanka to Bangladesh
Sudan to Burundi
Foiling all summits
Charters and treaties
One after another!
Never had we imagined
That you would jeer at us
Saying our huts as forbidden;
But, if so, keep in mind the assertion
The whole World would be plundered
For your unabashed gesture!