Elections Poem by Praveen Kumar in Celestial Glow

(This poem considers movements like AAP and Arab Spring as rebellion against general political trends rather than as part of that activity)

Elections, celebrations
To political professionals
To prove their might
To fool en masse
Rich and poor and
Beyond class and creed,
And especially fool
Self-claimed intellects.

Voting right,
They say sacred right
To elect them
To loot the country;
Come out, and elect
One of us rogues
And choose from us
Whom you prefer
To rob you this time
They call aloud,
Quote Constitution,
Invoke laws and rules
They themselves laid
As spider’s webs,
And await preys
To fall upon, and suck.

Once you yield
And elect one,
It is the end
For that term;
Your lock in grip,
They play the king
And bend you to knee
To recoup what
They spent for vote,
Thousands folds more
In political trade,
They chose for them
And inherit down.

Political trade
Like any other trade?
Certainly not;
They engineer class,
Economics, caste,
Land and faith
And divide citizens
To grab more votes
In election next,
And join hands,
Be they ruling or not,
To cook their broth
And sprout their seeds
In name of rules
They themselves wrought
In rogue parliaments
In contempt of
Fairness and justice
And common sense
And human respect.

Court of law or
Human right works
Or myriad commissions
Their selections
By the laws they spawn;
They let not powers
Outside their groups,
Lest they lose tools
Of robbing the land
Never again to regain,
And claim their crimes
Constitutional right.

They pit one another
Against each
And divide the land
On class and creed
To garner votes
To win elections;
They indulge in crimes
And harbour violence,
And rent out power
For money and muscle
In self interest.

Have unearned money,
Power to bend rules
And commit crimes,
Muster muscle power,
Hard ruthlessness
To shed others’ blood
To corner the power
And loot the country
Left and right
To fill coffers
At public cost,
Lo, then you are cut-out
To win election
And rule the country
And squeeze its blood
And foster your kin.

Is the country safe
In such hands
Of political blood-hounds?
Democracy as vision
Sacred and right,
Constitution as measure
Rightly conceived;
Like gold bestowed on
Thieves to protect,
Constitution and laws
In wrong hands,
Full of rat-holes,
Help plunder and store,
And bleed the country,
Its innocent citizens.

What is truth
Everybody knows;
Commoner, hapless
And helplessly yield;
Those in any power
In sync with the whole
Hail Constitution
And hail democracy
To partake in the loots
And fill their belly;
Self-claimed intellect
And media on job
Though know whole truth
Beneath aberrations
Of political claims
Or for minor gains
Hail the process
Of bleeding the land,
And prompt citizens
As democratic process
In Constitution’s name
To partake to vote
One among the rogues
To bleed themselves pale.

A few may be there
True to souls
As exceptions
Even in politics
Who serve the land
And citizens alike;
In the hustle and bustle
And the sound and fury
Of millions in cash,
Muscle power to boot
Of rogue’s rat race,
They rarely win votes,
Thus venture not there;
Exceptions a few
Of winning the race
Like milk in ocean
Make no impact;
Exceptions apart
As rarest of the rare,
Politicians as band
Deserve no vote,
And whoever wins
Makes no difference
To the hapless land.