Forced indoors, the mirror is your god.It’s time for personal grooming — manicures, Pedicures and finicky facials Though no one else is looking. It’s time to go on a diet and fitness regime Though there’s stuff, tinned and frozen,Stowed away in your basement.But in time you’ll get heavier in body and mind. For the recluse and jailbird it’s nothing new.The contagion, most democratic,Knows no cure and can spread with justOne breath from patient to physician. In slums and open roadsTheir lungs are dustbins, the masks porous. The cops rain down with their truncheons, Enforcing penance with frog-jumps. Now the peacock, leopard and gazelleStrut, prowl and leap across pavements.They’ve reclaimed their spaceAs you stare down from your cage. Now the long knives, edgy sickles, And those native pistols hidden behindPrayer books and idols of unforgiving godsAre cocked and loaded. Soon, from a mob they’ll line upIn disciplined rank and file.They’ll defy the daylong curfew.They have you, you and you in their sights. Manohar Shetty’s Full Disclosure: New and Collected Poems was published by Speaking Tiger. His forthcoming book is ‘Borderlines’.
