Loss of the thumb

How lucky you’re, so young, a Bank Manager:...

Your other activities?... Sir, you are kidding...

I mean your side business... Why pretensions?...

Money lending, commission agency, export...

Of course, not in your name, the other way... No...?

OK, where you then invest your other income?...

I mean the toll you collect from borrowers?...

Dare you to show me the way out?

You cunning, feign as unfit for this world.

The year 1943...

Wartime scarcity, starvation, cholera.

The ration shop manager of my village

Would thrust his thumb into rice

While measuring for sale. He saved

A thumb measure of rice per measure.

Later, a wart blistered on his thumb,

Couldn’t be cured, had to cut off thumb.

Village folk believed It’s god’s punishment.

My fingers grope involuntarily for the thumb.