The State Highway Poem by Pallab Chaudhury

The highway diverged in the outskirt of town
And in the same town there was a mass meeting.
As having some work there on the further end
I thought why I should land-up in traffic-jams.
So, expecting a crowd I took the diversion;
As was clear, I thought, perhaps I'd reach
The destination, in a shorter duration of time.
The journey went on smooth and I finished
The entire works of the day as I planned.

While returning, I took the arterial road;
That was the time when the crowd just broke
And there was none of those who assembled.
The vehicle was running ahead of the time
But, I felt the travel time was much longer
Than that during journey in the morning.

I shall be telling this story with a deep sigh
To some fellow travelers of the same route
In the ages and ages hence regretting that
People assembles to have a timely solution
To their problems; if someone joins the mass,
He'd be surely the people's friend or else
If he searches even, for the same mass later
He'd unfortunately, be treated as an enemy!


Dated: 5th March 2019.