Those are not fields of wheat
of our landlords
but the gold of our labour
which brings morsels of food
to the ailing elders and crying children
back in the shanty villages
that no longer provided enough.
These are not the brick and mortar
for the homes we build for our contractor
But the gossamer silks of our dreams
that bring a new tin shed
and proof the leaking dilapidated hut
in our little hamlet by the river side.
These are not mere machines
that produce in surfeit for our factory owners
but the magic wands of a wizard
that conjure up clothes for half naked children
and dowry of our unmarried sisters
as they wait every evening for the postman
to bring by the monthly relief.
At this home away from home,
my husband and I
worked by the day bathed in sweat
and dreamt by the night
of all the succour we provided
to the people back at home in the
wasted villages that were once
replete with self-sufficiency.
In this home away from home,
we were grateful for the benediction
our masters so graciously bestowed.
And then, it happened
when the cities and towns were plagued
with an unspeakable horror.
A disease that alienated them from us
and made them throw us out
Of fields and construction sites,
From factories and even their hearts.
The disease that made us undertake
the long journeys through the ghostlands
where all magic fizzled away
into an infernal reality of human apathy.
- Neha Bansal
