Sunil Sharma, 1/25/2016

Current Occupation: College Principal
Former Occupation: Vice-principal
Contact Information: Mumbai-based, Sunil Sharma, a college principal, is also widely-published Indian critic, poet, literary interviewer, editor, translator, essayist and fiction writer. He has already published three collections of poetry, one collection of short fiction, one novel and co-edited five books so far. His six short stories and the novel Minotaur were recently prescribed for the undergraduate classes under the Post-colonial Studies, Clayton University, Georgia, USA. He is a recipient of the UK-based Destiny Poets’ inaugural Poet of the Year award—2012.
He edits online journal Episteme: http://www.episteme.net.in/

 

 

#
The manual worker

A man

I see

On the Old Delhi street,

Hauling alone

The huge

Iron sheets

On a hand-drawn cart;

The bare-chested

Guy

Strapped

To the two-wheeled cart

Like a

Rickety

 Donkey;

His bearded

Black face

Gaunt

And

Hollow

Dripping with

Salty sweat,

A figure

Unseen

To the

Crowds

On that

Day

Of May 1

And  its

Terrible

Heat.

 

 

#

Rickshaw puller

A man skeletal

head tied with a hanky

waits for a fare outside a mall

scrubbing chest bare

with bony hands

in the August heat of Delhi

when no leaf stirs/turns in greeting;

his bony feet stretched on the

seat of his rickshaw in a city

bursting with cars and bikes

and indifferent to a manual worker

sweating it off in an unforgiving

and brutal landscape

where no man counts in crowds

lusting after brands and gadgets.

The bored rickshaw puller waits for long

And then moves on, sweat dripping on his back

In a gleaming rivulet!

(The Lake, UK,  September, 2015)