Poverty Is Here To Stay Poem by Syed Anwar Yarkhan Jilani

Children picking food at the dump site
Scratching overgrown hair full of lice
Unclad youngsters playing in the muck
No program or drives to keep them tuck,
Thoughts torture their souls constantly
One difficulty that ensues incessantly:
Poverty is here to stay.

Begging at crossroads is not allowed
Police enjoy caning them avowed
They run, falling, exposing their parts.
Strive for survival an intense freaking.
Take to robbing and house breaking,
Land in jails and are called terrorists:
Poverty is here to stay.

Have no education for want of school cost
No defense for want of a solicitor provost
No identity card for want of official braids
No homes as shanties are on illegal lands,
Round up and evict them in massive raids
While Ministers aptly preach human rights:
Poverty is here to stay.

Teen boys and girls enter drug culture
As carriers they eye police as vultures.
Coke, cannabis, cocaine, Acne and Nice,
Deliver them cleverly to become an ace.
A living sex toy is next to virtuous vice
Rich use them as lifeless abject objects:
Poverty is here to stay.

A ten year old says Maoist do not wait
Five officers disarmed and tied as bait.
Ask a five hundred thousand payment.
Government agrees, says for 'upliftment'
In three hours it's money or bereavement.
Little one says: What will be, will be!
Poverty is here to stay.