Near the Butcher’s Shop in Sector 62 Mandi

Faiz Ahmad

shuts the van door
with the hammer of his hands
the metal of daily habit

moves a measured fraction
of a latitude towards the cosmic
fate of broiler chickens

grabs them by the wings
fingers clawing into the pale skin,
two in each hand like weighing scales
his upper torso the beam of gallows

as was perhaps not too unexpected
one of them birds violently extricates
itself out of that death grip,
and suddenly you have a commotion -

of young men armed with cheap badminton
racquets, closing in on the errant bird
who is now perched preacherly like a prophet
upon the tin shed roof

and more and more young men trickle
to join the congregation, loosening their hands
letting their weapons fall to the ground

young men who migrated to Delhi
at the promise of eight thousand a month.

---

Faiz Ahmad is a recent graduate in Biological Sciences from IIT Madras. His work has been published or is forthcoming in Poetry Daily, Denver Quarterly, Salamander, Storm Cellar and others.

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