Poems are often cussed things,

So they do not sell.

What market affords a bankruptcy

With poems that truths may tell.

 

And, poets are an afflicted lot

That carry contagion

Of laser-sharp impertinence

To those that hug the nation.

 

Not for nothing did a Plato too

Leave them out of Republic;

What publisher then may undertake  

A Plato to contradict.

 

Besides, the Pharoas of the day

Propagate scripture;

And poems quiz the gods the most

Who prop a dictator.

 

 

So, what bookmaker may his fingers burn,

And his pockets turn inside out

By venturing a book of  poems

That do not the time’s praises shout.


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Badri Raina is a well-known commentator on politics, culture and society. His columns on the Znet have a global following. Raina taught English literature at the University of Delhi for over four decades and is the author of the much acclaimed Dickens and the Dialectic of Growth. He has several collections of poems and translations. His writings have appeared in nearly all major English dailies and journals in India.

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