When Will We Learn? Poem by Daniel Trevelyn Joseph

Two women crossing the last part
Of a wide road off BKC Main:
It is then where I hear two-segmented
Sound of the impatient horn
From the free-left turn
By a tourist taxi, issuing irritated
Warning notes making the women
Stop with a shock, hold back
Laughing awkwardly,
Till his Highness passes.

Twenty years ago in Beijing I’ve seen
Heavier vehicles wait for cyclists to pass,
And cyclists for pedestrians.
Likewise in the developed West,
Have I seen the cars stops for pedestrians
Regardless who is right, and who wrong.

Time is important for everyone, man or woman,
But not more for the rich and car-drivers alone;
Courtesies make life rich and livable.

When will we learn these small things
In our cities in the India
Of Buddha, Gandhi and of nonviolence
That Might is not Right
And being polite is not weakness?