In the lights of passing shops,
we could see tattered clothing on a
frail humanity,
pumping water into an old bucket,
carrying a gunny sack of
dirty papers and rags,
and hammering on a
greasy bicycle frame.
My wife was crying tears and sobbing sobs,
"Take me back home!"
“I want to go back home!”
My heart was thinking,
"Is this a ride through hell?"
"Is this a night in Paradise Lost?"
"Is this what happens when no one cares?"
"And is this the ultimate end of
a lost humanity?"
CROWS CAUCUSING
Beneath my window
On this Calcutta morning,
What are they discussing
with endless vitality?
When will I see the sun today,
And will be it be a red blob
in a brown sky again?
CALCUTTA
Broken old woman
Hobbling on a dirty
crutch.
Transformed
You will be a lovely lady
who cares for her
children
And takes flowers to
a broken world.
SISTER JEBEMALA
Had spent two years in
Colombia and Bolivia and
had then gone to
New York City's Harlem,
as one of Mother Teresa's
Missionaries of Charity.
At the Mother House
on Lower Circular Road,
I asked her, "What is the
biggest difference between Harlem and
Calcutta?"
"In Calcutta," she said,
"It's safe to go out.
I can come and go
Anytime.
"In Harlem, it's not even safe
to go out at four in the afternoon."
HOW WAS THAT AGAIN?
I asked Hindus in Calcutta,
"Why it is that America,
a Christian nation,
has streets and parks that
aren't safe to walk in,
where violent crime is rampant,
And in a city like Calcutta,
deeply, wretchedly, freakishly poor,
you can walk almost anywhere,
day or night
with never a thought of being mugged,
raped, knifed, or shot?
Why?"
Their answer may surprise you.
"It is simple," they said,
"It's because we are
spiritually more advanced."
THE MONSOON
The monsoon arrived two days ago,
on my birthday,
at seven in the morning.
We had survived the
infamous Indian summer heat,
and now
Calcutta has become the
Venice of the East.
The streets become canals,
water washing up the
steps of buildings, and
taxis become yellow gondolas,
making waves as they
plough their way along with
water up to their floorboards.
In streets with water hip-high,
only the rickshaws can ply.
The heavens just open up and
it pours and pours and pours
for hours and hours on end.
For those who live on the pavements,
their abodes are now under a foot
or more of water.
The temperature drops
down to the mid-90's
and gives relief from the
heat of summer now passed.
THIRD WORLD FLOWERS
Calcuttayou are an ugly flower.
An old ugly flower in ruins,
And there are a hundred other cities, or
a thousand others like you.
Weeds and neglect have
choked you until now you are
no flower garden.
You are a garbage dumpthe
refuse of a world that cares not.
What do we say to you, Calcutta?
What do we say to our beautiful flower,
beautiful on the inside,
ugly as all hell on the outside?
THE THIRD WORLD
Is a mirror
In which all of us
See ourselves
As we really are.

CITY OF TEARS
In Calcutta, you walk through human
stench and bone-grinding
degradation and watch a heroic
struggle against all the odds to
survive in a squalor that leaves the mind
gasping for air.
You walk through a no-man's land of
lepers begging
with no noses and
with stumps for fingers
(the flesh long since eaten away).
You see humanity with no limbs, partial
limbs, and horribly twisted limbs
vying for alms with mothers
clutching new-born babies to their
shriveled breasts.
You see children scavenging garbage bins
for bits of broken glass or metal
for 14 cents a day.
Then, before you can get accustomed to
the depths of someone else's misery,
the survival dance takes a different turn.
Out of the corner of your eye, you see an
enchantingly beautiful nine- or ten-year
old girl picking through a pile of
ashes to find some bits of
charcoal to sell.
Her beauty could appear on the cover of
any number of American fashion
magazines were it not for her filth, and
you ask yourself,
"What future does she have?"
“How long before she begins to sell herself for
some man’s quick joyride
at 30 or 40 cents a shot?”
And deeper questions jettison into your
conscience,
"What is my responsibility here?"
"Am I my brother's keeper?"
"Who is my neighbor?"