I jump on an incoming evening seven thirteen train
to secure a window seat.
As I open ‘Leaves of Grass’ the first line noticed,
declares, ‘Sing on there in the swamp’ in
the ‘Memoirs of President Lincoln’.

An urchin occupies the seat next to me
With harmonium on her lap;
Her fingers wide apart, search for a pitch across
on the bars, high low, high low,
from maintain picks to deep seas.

She settles on a pitch appropriate to the crowded train
in motion, plays a pop movie song.
On the threshold of sprouting youth, her dark face
And full eyes glowed divine grace;
She is sound personified.

Her wards, two little sisters, one recites the songlines;
The other with tiny folded hands;
They appeal to the softer edges of weary home-going crowd;
They, not belonging to the mundane, remain
Untouched by hostilities or sympathies.

The Time atomized; there is no yesterday, tomorrow neither.
The concert moves to the next compartment.
They have not lost either their fragrance of innocence
Or dignity of untimely adulthood,
In the energies creative to sustain.

The last straw of hope, yet for the Post-historic
Civilization of exploitation
These offspring of Kali, until they open their
Third Eye imminent
To make way for regeneration.

(Kali: Hindu Goddess, one of the three aspects –
Kali, Lakshmi and Sarswati -of Prakriti or Shakti or Energy.)