She carried the electronic voting
Machine herself down the
Corridor of democracy
She stood head held high
And exchanged pleasantries
With the security personnel
She was unarmed, leading a handful
Of men in the red zone
To perpetuate the roulette
She was in sync with the ethos,
Dancing, matching every step
With the anthem sung aloud
The anthem gave a billion right
To share the stage of the
World with pride and honor
Death crossed her path, with
Her car set on fire and
Bullets pumped into her as she
Escaped the smoldering inferno
Her journey was cut short,
But the anthem of democracy
Was sung aloud, drowning
The cacophony of bullets
Bullet riddled she lay motionless
By the side of the charred car!
• Link to story here:
Pranab Ghosh is a journalist, writer, poet, translator and blogger. His
blog is “Existential Problems”. His poems and prose have been published by several on=line publications including Dissident Voice, Spillwords, The Piker Press, Setu Magazine, Pangolin Review, Visual Verse, etc. Pranab has coauthored a book of poems, titled Air & Age; a translation of a book of Bengali short stories, “Bougainvillea and Other Stories” (English translation title). His second book of poems and first solo book, “Soul Searching and Other Poems” (2017), was published by Scarlet Leaf Publishing, Toronto. His second collection of poems, “Vision of the World and Other Poems”, was published by Impspired.com in November 2020.
Read other articles by Pranab.
This article was posted on Sunday, May 12th, 2019 at 8:02am and is filed under Poetry.