The Prayer Of A Denied Girl-child!

Parvati sees them daily-

Young girls of the village

Walk down the dirt road

To the municipal school,

Near the bend of the yellow river,

Far-off.

From her perch on the piles of the

Baked bricks

Under a wild tree, the thin girl

Of nine years, matted hair,

Holds the youngest

Baby of the family working in the

Brick kiln;

She dreams, twice, daily,

Persistently:

Walking to the school and

Back-

With a new satchel of books

In clean uniform and shoes,

Chattering, singing, dancing,

Like the rest of her more lucky sisters.

She prays every night, morning

Before gods of stone

In that gloomy patch,

Hoping for a miracle,

Because Ma told her once:

Keep on requesting,

Because a kind

God listens to an honest 

Girl-child helping out her

Impoverished family

Survive in a free country.

#Freedom #freeindia