A train journey in summer

Beyond the window vacant fields stretched out

spotted with greenery for eyes’ so journ

unto the foot of the barren hills far.

When tired of the sight from the running train

I took the newspaper and glanced through

headlines, advertisements, crossword puzzles.

A lengthy write up in one inside page;

Now television can show miracles

in bringing to nought tural backwardness

The writer vehemently argues for

installing publicitv receivers

in all villages by 2000 A.D.

Much on affective mass media

for audio visual education

of the illiterate rural poor.

They can be taught about the value of

nutrition, need to use public comforts,

birth control, child-care, cricket and karate.

Train halted in an upcountry station;

women from teens to tottering sixties

carrying large pots trooped into the train

Within two minutes they milched and drained dry

all the water –taps in all the bogies

and got down noisily, their pots spilled over.

The train whistled, wheels rattled, moved onward.

Tracts of land on either side seen parched dry

tanks and ponds drained and wells seen deserted.

Plants, shrubs and grass dry and cattle skinny

a lone tree in the field whose branches were

seen leafless spreadwide and silvery gray.

Weird as the fossil of a monstrous beast

of pre-historic ages raised to sky

like giant antenna of a T.V. set.