Benevolence

On and on the clustered paths
Of  ragged villages and slums
Through poverty, stench and harsh reality

Plods the rumbling bus .

Children; boys and girls,
Blank, white, bloodless,
Stare with popping pupils.

Protruding bellies.
Dirty, stained knickers.
Brown, unoiled,matted hair.
Faces unwashed, 

Marked  from last night's  dried  saliva .

With rheumy eyes they stare 

at the man in the bus.
He smiles at them.

Suddenly an act of benevolence.
Something colourful falls.

They run, they gasp,
They bend, they pick up.
They look up 
At the smiling  man in the bus.

Six hands pull the packet apart.
They don't know what .
Everything falls on the dusty path.
So What!

They bend,they pick up.
They dust off the dust.
They eat the chips that was thrown to them
From the man in the bus.

I Don't Want What?

I don't want the wind to stop blowing.
I don't want the birds to stop singing.
I don't want the rivers to stop flowing
and
I don't want to cry for the days gone by.

I don't want the blue sky to become grey.
I don't want the flowers to wilt.
I don't want the colours to fade
and
I don't want life to always remain the same.

I love it when the autumn leaves fall.
I look forward for every year to end.
I love the warm pleasentness of spring
and
I feel a rush of life when for the first time it rains.

But
I don't want memories to fade.
I don't want my parents to age.
I want my child to grow 
but
I don't want her innocence to wane.

MARRIAGE MYSTERY 1

I look at you fast asleep beside me...
You in one world, me in another ,
and wonder how --
YOU and ME
Together__
Have made a family!

Forefathers--
Grandfathers and grandmothers,
Their forefathers and families--
All have been left behind.
Most we don't know.
Ahead we've moved ,
Together we've stayed
and
Created a new family!
With each year we move further and further away.

Each marriage is a creation
planned by God.
Perfected or imperfected by Man.

Love distributes.
Responsibilities distribute.
Time, space, duties, values and ethics
Connect and reconnect.
Relationships metamorphosise.
Pain, anger, love and all feelings_
Change and rechange.
What is it then that still bind us
Together?

There is no blood or umbical cord to bind us.
Why is it that we feel we have to remain together?
Children break away from parents:
There is no hesitation then!
Parents, who with love have created us ,
Become different when we marry.
Why?

It is indeed strange
That when
Parents and later even children
Become different--
We will remain--
Man and Wife
With nothing to bind us
But feelings and social norms
and perhaps
A thought.

You and Me ,
Together,
Will become
Someone's grandfather and grandmother.
To future generations,
We will be forefathers
Together as
Man and Wife'
We will remain one