Kenny's Poem// I WISH TO SEE

I WISH TO SEE

The guard whistled and the

Station master waved the flag.

The electric train started moving up,

The people on the hanging platform,

Struggled hard to get in,

As Delhi perspired to buy onion and salt.

And like the dropped beads from the hand,

The crowd rushed at bullet speed,

To occupy the window seats.

May be for an ariel view of

The fort, marina, tv tower…

That reminded me of the musical chair game

In the primary, like a flashback in the silver screen.

The noise was silent.

Some slept and some read.

A blind man entered,

Selling needles, lotteries…

A poor girl, head bent down

Approached everyone and asked

Alms to sustain herself.

Perhaps the old parents also

Staying at the station, waiting for…

She would have felt happy,

If they looked at her at least.

My wandering eyes stopped,

Watching these usual,

And focused on an angel,

Could be of eight years old.

Was squatting like Thiruvalluvar,

Near that middle door.

His water resistant garments

And the projecting ribs,

Documented his warfare

with chill penury

Like the x ray film.

Without looking at him, I noticed.

He looked at everyone’s eyes.

May be to study the society,

Like the poet, mad after nature,

Was taught by brook and stone.

What is the use of pearls,

If kept in the sea bed?

If he were given opportunities,

He’ld have become another Dickens,

My sympathetic mind thought like Gray.

‘Oh man!” I wondered within

As a rustic landed in a city center.

For, hope and joy his eyes glittered,

Though dreams and needs seemed to be shattered.

I wish to have these profoundly to the brim.

Now, he is in me like an archetype.

I wish to see the same eyes again, 
Desire to see with human dignity better,

wish to see many…

G. Robert John Kennedy, II Philosophy.

* This was originally written on 06-10-1994, and reworked on 18-11-1998, and once again recasted in 1999 for the Cosmopolitan 1998 – 1999 Wall Magazine of St. Joseph’s Seminary.

* This poem was published in Cosmopolitan 1998 – 1999, the Wall Magazine of the Philosophy Section of St. Joseph’s Seminary, Mangalore.