Unfashionable Indians

(From my poetry Collection 'Signatures')

Will anyone explain?

Yehudha Amichai’s worry- shipyard was

so big and so clever he was

to leave it at once.

Might be it is Israel,

and they are at liberty

to forsake their shipyard

at their own will.

This is India,

our immovable cargo

gets loaded and loaded on

with many written markers

denoting specific destination;

but goods never move from here.

Please remember this is not

meant to flirt as anti-national

or to sound rebellious for

just to stay above and aloof

for international approval.

Loving your mother with

all your love doesn’t exempt

you from shutting  your eyes

on viewing lice eat her

day by day, lice of centuries.

Neither can I leave my shipyard

nor can she cut off my bonds

Now I am standing

At the air port; waiting

for my dear only son’s

arrival from Barbados;

that much- spirited nationalist

declined India two years before

returns back now to reenter

this stagnant shipyard,

full of centuries old lice.

Call of India, he claimed it!

Will anyone explain

what is there so much

magnetic in this land of

despair and bonds?

May be it is unfashionable

to call you an Indian

without blaming it;

posing a conscntious critic

to collect your laurels

over here.

 Vaiyavan