the rag picker


Today while I was walking my way back from the institute, I saw a child. Someone whose resemblance matched that of the rag picker of my thoughts. I don’t know how old she was. Anyways she is starved enough to look half of her age.


Dark. She had hair that hadn’t been oiled for years. Stunted and small. She wore a green skirt which was too long for her. She walked with a gait that told me that she had never held anyone’s hands. Her tiny feet had no chappals. The road I knew was burning with the afternoon heat. May be that is why they were hurrying away. They- my rag picker and her mentor. She had a man who walked beside her. He hurried her along the way a shepherd leads his sheep.


I tried to keep pace with them. And then they halted. She wanted to see the children of the well-off do karate. That amused her.


Those kids had everything she had always wanted-clothes, food, comfort, love, a future. She didn’t even have a present. She lived on the streets—like an animal.


I waited for her to turn her face. I wanted to see her eyes, pale and small…I wanted to read her mind.


But as I walked away other thoughts meandered into my mind…

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

nice. really nice. touching.
at first i thought "well.. cant we all live happily. then i thought heck "nature ITSELF is cruel" and then ... what the fuck am i blabbering???.. well anyway good post

Anonymous said...

@ dirtydoggy
thanx for stoppin by,
but the tragedy is dat der are lacks of child laborors in our country like my rag-picker. people live lives, devoid of everythin. the disparity here is horrendos. we should be ashamed of ourselves
wildflower

Anonymous said...

very touching

wildflower said...

@pankaj
well...thanx!

Anonymous said...

nice :)
each post of yours has a rather unique flavor .. this one is quite touching

wildflower said...

@utkarsh
err...
well da difference you spot amongst all my posts is not deliberate, it's da way i feel...
n thanx... :)

Adithya said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Adithya said...

People who are born blind never crave for sight. They just don't know what that is. It is us with vision who look at the blind and fall into despair. A predicament arising out of our fear of loosing something we have taken for granted.

I am sure the young girl deserves all that you have mentioned but I am not sure you are right at reading her mind.