Peepli Not Live

There that Village,
Her Children call her Peepli,
Tucked somewhere
Anonymously,

Therein Lived
And died,

By some standards,

A man.

Hori Mahato,

His ostensible name,

Dug hard earth -

That's what he did

Every single day

of his last golden years -

Under the stony sun

and village sky.

That's how he sweated

And how he lived by

And how he died,

in an eery Sisyphean way,

His wiry thin body

Worn down by Elements

and Fate

(or Circumstance for us

Who can afford

To quibble).

And,

As our eyes

retreat backwards

and forwards

To the city of dreams,

We find Natha

Again digging

The city's concrete earth,

(leaving morbid fame

and Home behind)

in abject

Anonymity.