The French Protests: May 26

May is the season of protests
in France.

Remember the flaming 1960s?
its repercussions?
the ferment?
the turmoil?

May 26, 2016, no different
the protesting streets exploded
anger was in the stratosphere
palpable, visible

workers brought down the barricades
faced the batons and the tear gas of the police
but refused to be cowed down by this state terror

the workers erupt in fury, only there
in Paris
something to do with the French soil?

The nation—heir to the French Revolution of 1789
has been a cradle
a crucible
of radical change
crucial transformation.

A mosaic of nationalities
Paris toasts the love and romances life

along the banks of the River Seine
walk the beggars and philosophers and tourists
a level playing-field for all the sections

and it implodes with rage—at any lingering injustice.

More power to the French!
Show the way to the others
as it did earlier with ideas and praxis.

The passive world needs
such a massive protest
such a fierce rage
against an unjust social order
that exploits the remaining 99 per cent.

Sunil Sharma is Toronto-based senior academic, critic, literary editor and author with 23 published books: Seven collections of poetry; four of short fiction; one novel; a critical study of the novel, and, nine joint anthologies on prose, poetry and criticism, and, one joint poetry collection. He is a recipient of the UK-based Destiny Poets’ inaugural Poet of the Year award---2012. His poems were published in the prestigious UN project: Happiness: The Delight-Tree: An Anthology of Contemporary International Poetry, in the year 2015. Sunil edits the English section of the monthly bilingual journal Setu published from Pittsburgh, USA. For more details, please visit here Read other articles by Sunil, or visit Sunil's website.