The Lonely Tea Picker Poem by J T Jayasingh

The same red sun
Spreads his light
Through the tall pine trees,
The same silver clouds
Glitter and move towards the mounts,
The cool armies of ghost like mist
Come out of the greenish tea plants.
Now I hear a mild sweet voice
Reverberating in the
Green clothed valleys,
That cannot soothe
The bleeding hearts!

What makes this
Lonely Dravidian tea picker
To pour out her heart,
As the odor of pesticides
Cut through the lungs,
As the hard labored leaves
Are made high-tech currencies
In the global markets?
What brings this divine voice
Through the cropped tea plants?
Is it the tragic stories
Of long done wars?
Is it the pain of
Drought or flood or famine?
Or is it the tragedy of burning stomachs
And dying hopes everyday?

The bending estate woman
With a tea basket on her back,
And her divine warbling,
That couldn’t soothe tired laborers
Made an eternal impression
In my heart.
I gently passed, not to meditate,
But to burst out.