We are Hanging on Wires

Babu Ram Shrestha ‘Yatri’

We are neither on the ground
Nor in the sky
Or at work
We are busy
Just hanging on wires
Like eyes rolling in the morning
Every day,
Blinking at night
Blessed is the applause
Without knowing it
We breathe
Hanging on the wire

My two and a half year old son says:
Father, mobile!
Opens Facebook
And uploads photos
Acting on tick-tock
Surprise!
Mother!
The product of technology
Is spoiling the eyes;
We are looking at the world
with artificial looks
We are hanging on useless wires
We are spoiling the children

The letters are installed on the computer
What a pain in the arm!
Why did you have to understand the language?
Apps that can translate
Its great taste of life.
Why grow vegetables?
Why go to the market?
There are facilities of home delivery
Why need to think?
Copy and paste has happened enough
Corona pandemic
Requests to stay at home;
Even now we are hanging on wires

By gathering cheap relationships
forgetting animated pictures
like a flower of life
Spreading deceptive sticks
one after another
From time and time
We are running;
Who care about the world?
We are meaningless
We laugh alone
We cry alone
We live alone
We spend life alone
unmindful;
We are hanging on wires.

[Babu Ram Shrestha ‘Yatri’ (b. 1986) is a Nepali poet from Marin, Sindhuli. An MEd in English, he has a collection of poems, Deshswapna to his credit, besides several other isolated pieces and articles. He teaches at Marin Multiple Campus and Kapilakot Secondary School as an English teacher.]