Bhopal by Varavara Rao

Oxygen a danger
Sight darkness
Breast milk a mortal kiss
Colonialism feeds
Crops of feudalism

Green revolution
Gurgles life force
On the ground it drained
The village blood

Cities are hugger muggered
By the long arms of multinationals
Exploiters funnel chimney fumes
Right in the heart of cities

A time bomb explodes, heart quakes
In the centre of every home hearth
Leaving dry salvage of ashes blue
Sights devoid of heat or fire
The `hand’ passes on ballot paper

To fingers that fumble in the dark.
Human habitations become crematoria
A corpse encounters the enemy as a nightmare
With the peace of rich house
With irate eyes
With breathless hearts, heaving chests
Tens and thousands rise in revolt
They are neither alive nor dead
Yet, burning top to toe
They spout fire and brimstone
Declare `death is none but capitalism’
The group genocide
Reveal the conspiracy of exploiters
Unless you fell the tree of poison

People will kill
In a civil war
Capitalism on its deathbed
Inhaling war and exhaling poison gas
People will kill.

***
January 1985 
Translated by V Mohana Prasad
http://www.varavararao.org/en/en_index.html