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Abandoned…: A poem by Jayashree Pillai


I see her clinging to the railings
That  trap her within  towering walls :
Walls that  now seem alien to her.
I watch  her stare blankly at a road
That rushes past noisily –
A haze of moving bodies racing from
One  end to another.
I know she waits, 
As  she did aeons ago,
For  the sound of tiny feet
Racing home from school.
She waits till the shadows  curl around her,
Like the creases on her face
That have curled around her heart.
Slowly  she moves away.
Another day of waiting goes by.
She hums a lullaby.
Perhaps her son, somewhere, is awake.