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, poet, author and translator. He has three published books to his credit. Air and Age (co-author; published from Kolkata), Soul Searching and Other Poems (first solo book of poems, published from Toronto) and Bougainvillea And Other Stories, a book of short stories in English, translated from the Bengali original. His poems have been published in Tuck Magazine, Dissident Voice, Literature Studio Review, Scarlet Leaf Review, Leaves of Ink, Weasel Press, Ochebooks.com, Harbinger Asylum, Spillwords, The Piker Press, Visual Verse, Hans India and Setu Magazine, among others. He is married and lives in Kolkata, West Bengal, India.
Read other articles by Pranab.
This article was posted on Sunday, May 12th, 2019 at 8:02am and is filed under Poetry.
