Arts & Entertainment

The Friday Poem: a bundle of bones

Each Friday Benicia Patch will publish an original poem. If you would like to submit your own poem please send it to benicia@patch.com.

In recognition of Mother’s Day 2012, Benicia Patch will publish a poem each day for the next three days.  Each poem will in some way tie in to the theme of mothers. 

 Here is what Benicia Patch poetry maestro Jeff Burkhart has to say about today’s selection: This  is a compassionate piece about sacrifice. The poem is by a woman who introduced herself to me at the last First Tuesday meeting. Here name is Kavi Kaur and she is a soft spoken woman of Indian descent. Her reading of her piece, "a bundle of bones" was somber and powerful. Somewhere between the most serious parts of "Slum dog Millionaire" and a Gandhi speech about the oppressive poverty of India. It speaks to what lengths a mother will go to to provide for her family against all odds and circumstances. Truly moving.

 

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a bundle of bones by Kavi Kaur

She sits on the pavement
With her hands spread
For a passerby to notice
And thrust a coin

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A withered leaf from a tree
She lies on the ground in a torn sheet

Those eyes are hollows
Her eyes have betrayed here
The light shines no more

Cold like a slab, she lay on the road
Thousands passed by, coins filled her bowl

She did not move to pick them tonight
She did not pick them the following night

Will no one remove the torn sheet
Will no one pick up that withered leaf

She sits on the pavement, a bundle of bones
The coins come no more
Today, people stare at each other
Will no one pick her, she is someone’s mother

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