the black sun

Heera, the colour of the dried barks of aval shrubs

has turned deep red

and the hides are ripened fully maroon.

how long will you fondle them

from morn to eve

as you indulge in giving warm-bath to your children ?

how long will you blow your lungs

with the odour of the salty waters

of the tanning-pit,

as if they are sweet-smelling Kesar mangoes ?

Heera, you are in love with these stinking pits—

as if they are the holy tanks of Tulsi shyam temple.

these pits are the deity of your clan

and your kamdhenu.

but you are a simpleton !

a beau named Bata dressed your deity

with a scarf of fancy leather

in the factories of Kanpur.

but with the close cajoling,

your life has turned into dirt and dust.

even your very skin has become worthless—

not worthy to be tanned in your pit.

see, the hides are cleansed

in the acidic milk of akda flowers,

but it blackened and burned your hands ruthlessly.

your hody is stinking badly

like the breaking wind from uncleared bowels.

You have turned into a leper,

an untouchable !

o man, for a few grains of bajra and maize,

you drown your dead head in this hell,

and  make yoke-straps, leather-strings for the oxen of the Patels,

leather-bags to fetch water from the well for the Thakor farmers

you neither have a field nor a buffalo,

then what is the purpose of this partnership?

have you ever seen in your life

the thighs of a kanbi or koli woman ?

nor your forefathers could ever dare.

Heera, there rots the black sun in your pit since ages.

if you raise the head

it will be released from the eclipse.

don’t be so happy by the changing rainbows

in the milky waters of the cacti in the pit.

Heera, it is time to raise your head to the sky eastward —

the sun is rising bright red.