Today they have gathered round yet again,
And another poor soul must bear it all.
Today it’s a child, merely of age seven,
Who chose to steal from some stall.
They all came rushing,
Adding voices to the brawl.
He simply lowered his head
For there was nowhere to go... nowhere to crawl.
He braced for what was to come:
Profanities he did not understand,
People screaming all at once,
He’d lived up to his ‘lowlife’ brand.
He kept mum, silent as stone,
And gave into their demand.
He guessed it was better, to confess and repent
Than from the stall be forever banned.
A few feet away his sister was lying,
Still a babe, hungry for days.
He’d stolen the milk and biscuits for her to have,
She’d been in and out of a daze.
But the people did not condemned
Those who had left him with a child to raise
They had, however, sworn to keep
Things hidden from his “beady gaze.”
“I apologize, Sire, but I had to steal-”
“So you do plead guilty then.”
“Yes, milk and biscuits for the empty stomach. I swear I will never do so again.”
“You’ve confessed, so onto the punishments now. I say about ten hits with the stick.”
As the boy was bruised and screaming in pain, victory swelled in the hearts of the men.
And as he sat there, cradling his sister and himself
The crowd simply walked away.
He’d confessed, he’d repented
But the righteous would not sway.
The righteous woman who not with her husband does lay
The righteous man who
For land did betray…
Authors: Charu Sabharwal and Leyna Dardomur
Editor: Vedant Vaswani