Ingrid Pharris '04

Global Semester

India

 

 The Streetsweeper

A broom he carried

Brushing lightly

On the ground

 

On the streets

The sounds of

Beeps of shouts of songs

Of throngs of people moving tightly

Through tiny boiling spaces

All the faces in their places

The shames, the disappointments, the disgraces

The smiles, the attractions, the flashes

The injuries, scars, and gashes

Of the leashed monkey who gnashes

His teeth as the crumbs drop

From banana leaves

To the floor

 

I rolled up my sleeves

 

Right to left he swayed

Never tarried

Right to left

On his tiny, crooked feet

Sweeping, sweeping slowly

And the sewage underneath

 

The liquid day surrounding

Lost in curries and echoes

Silks and chants

Left to right

I trudge through waves to see

Past beggars who hex

The sex, the jasmine, the teas

The skipping girls who holler, No hurry, Auntie!

 

The tiny emperor and his scepter

Crouching before me

As the rats feast beneath

The sun beat cruelly

As I stared

Sunburned and scared

Puttering anxiously in my slipping skin

I, five-foot-three

He, to my knee

Paused

And met gazes

Something swelled

And tipped

Let fall the ghee of butter lamps

Like blood

Into newer deeper chambers

Giving glow to the embers

As my skin dripped behind

This jester remembers 

Unimpressed, he kept on and on

Muttering phrases

As he swept away the traces

Of the lives we leave behind