Father in a Crowd
The interchange is confounding and loud,
Autorickshaws scuttle the rotary,
Crowd in a father, father in a crowd;
Sun-blinding towers stand pompous and proud,
Paan Shops on footways roar with janglery,
The interchange is confounding and loud;
No pother was under the village cloud,
Or straphangers uncalm and ornery,
Crowd in a father, father in a crowd;
His chest, ribbed and short-winded made him cowed
To find and rest inside an eatery,
The interchange is confounding and loud;
For this frail elder, ease is unallowed,
To his helplessness, youths throw mockery,
Crowd in a father, father in a crowd;
Unminded jaywalkers, no aid endowed,
Snarled are his feet amid this bobbery,
The interchange is confounding and loud,
Crowd in a father, father in a crowd.
by Shamik Banerjee
Instagram: @where_tales_end
Editor’s Note: This villanelle’s repetition is as well-suited to the chaotic mess of a busy intersection as it is to the relationship between father and child.
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