September on Jessore Road
Millions of babies watching the skies
Bellies swollen, with big round eyes
On Jessore Road--long bamboo huts
Noplace to shit but sand channel ruts
Millions of fathers in rain
Millions of mothers in pain
Millions of brothers in woe
Millions of sisters nowhere to go
One Million aunts are dying for bread
One Million uncles lamenting the dead
Grandfather millions homeless and sad
Grandmother millions silently mad
Millions of daughters walk in the mud
Millions of children wash in the flood
A Million girls vomit & groan
Millions of families hopeless alone
Millions of souls nineteenseventyone
homeless on Jessore road under grey sun
A million are dead, the million who can
Walk toward Calcutta from East Pakistan
Taxi September along Jessore Road
Oxcart skeletons drag charcoal load
past watery fields thru rain flood ruts
Dung cakes on treetrunks, plastic-roof huts
Wet processions Families walk
Stunted boys big heads don't talk
Look bony skulls & silent round eyes
Starving black angels in human disguise
Mother squats weeping & points to her sons
Standing thin legged like elderly nuns
small bodied hands to their mouths in prayer
Five months small food since they settled there
on one floor mat with small empty pot
Father lifts up his hands at their lot
Tears come to their mother's eye
Pain makes mother Maya cry
Two children together in palmroof shade
Stare at me no word is said
Rice ration, lentils one time a week
Milk powder for warweary infants meek
No vegetable money or work for the man
Rice lasts four days eat while they can
Then children starve three days in a row
and vomit their next food unless they eat slow.
On Jessore road Mother wept at my knees
Bengali tongue cried mister Please
Identity card torn up on the floor
Husband still waits at the camp office door
Baby at play I was washing the flood
Now they won't give us any more food
The pieces are here in my celluloid purse
Innocent baby play our death curse
Two policemen surrounded by thousands of boys
Crowded waiting their daily bread joys
Carry big whistles & long bamboo sticks
to whack them in line They play hungry tricks
Breaking the line and jumping in front
Into the circle sneaks one skinny runt
Two brothers dance forward on the mud stage
Teh gaurds blow their whistles & chase them in rage
Why are these infants massed in this place
Laughing in play & pushing for space
Why do they wait here so cheerful & dread
Why this is the House where they give children bread
The man in the bread door Cries & comes out
Thousands of boys and girls Take up his shout
Is it joy? is it prayer? "No more bread today"
Thousands of Children at once scream "Hooray!"
Run home to tents where elders await
Messenger children with bread from the state
No bread more today! & and no place to squat
Painful baby, sick shit he has got.
Malnutrition skulls thousands for months
Dysentery drains bowels all at once
Nurse shows disease card Enterostrep
Suspension is wanting or else chlorostrep
Refugee camps in hospital shacks
Newborn lay naked on mother's thin laps
Monkeysized week old Rheumatic babe eye
Gastoenteritis Blood Poison thousands must die
September Jessore Road rickshaw
50,000 souls in one camp I saw
Rows of bamboo huts in the flood
Open drains, & wet families waiting for food
Border trucks flooded, food cant get past,
American Angel machine please come fast!
Where is Ambassador Bunker today?
Are his Helios machinegunning children at play?
Where are the helicopters of U.S. AID?
Smuggling dope in Bangkok's green shade.
Where is America's Air Force of Light?
Bombing North Laos all day and all night?
Where are the President's Armies of Gold?
Billionaire Navies merciful Bold?
Bringing us medicine food and relief?
Napalming North Viet Nam and causing more grief?
Where are our tears? Who weeps for the pain?
Where can these families go in the rain?
Jessore Road's children close their big eyes
Where will we sleep when Our Father dies?
Whom shall we pray to for rice and for care?
Who can bring bread to this shit flood foul'd lair?
Millions of children alone in the rain!
Millions of children weeping in pain!
Ring O ye tongues of the world for their woe
Ring out ye voices for Love we don't know
Ring out ye bells of electrical pain
Ring in the conscious of America brain
How many children are we who are lost
Whose are these daughters we see turn to ghost?
What are our souls that we have lost care?
Ring out ye musics and weep if you dare--
Cries in the mud by the thatch'd house sand drain
Sleeps in huge pipes in the wet shit-field rain
waits by the pump well, Woe to the world!
whose children still starve in their mother's arms curled.
Is this what I did to myself in the past?
What shall I do Sunil Poet I asked?
Move on and leave them without any coins?
What should I care for the love of my loins?
What should we care for our cities and cars?
What shall we buy with our Food Stamps on Mars?
How many millions sit down in New York
& sup this night's table on bone & roast pork?
How many millions of beer cans are tossed
in Oceans of Mother? How much does She cost?
Cigar gasolines and asphalt car dreams
Stinking the world and dimming star beams--
Finish the war in your breast with a sigh
Come tast the tears in your own Human eye
Pity us millions of phantoms you see
Starved in Samsara on planet TV
How many millions of children die more
before our Good Mothers perceive the Great Lord?
How many good fathers pay tax to rebuild
Armed forces that boast the children they've killed?
How many souls walk through Maya in pain
How many babes in illusory pain?
How many families hollow eyed lost?
How many grandmothers turning to ghost?
How many loves who never get bread?
How many Aunts with holes in their head?
How many sisters skulls on the ground?
How many grandfathers make no more sound?
How many fathers in woe
How many sons nowhere to go?
How many daughters nothing to eat?
How many uncles with swollen sick feet?
Millions of babies in pain
Millions of mothers in rain
Millions of brothers in woe
Millions of children nowhere to go
poem by Allen Ginsberg
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Related quotes
In Every Way!
how many people are blind?
how many people are deaf?
how many by choice?
perhaps you still have jobs,
homes, food to eat, medical care.
perhaps you have investments,
a way to retire....
perhaps your family is happy,
and well taken care of...
i hope so for you!
millions of people hurting,
millions in need...
millions of children hungry,
millions who cant get an education.
millions enslaved by poverty,
millions left alone....
people with faces and names.
all of these are normal people.
whatever their language, their religion,
their sexual orientation.
all of these are people just like you.
and many of these have families,
just like you!
is it their fault they're victims?
perhaps they've worked their whole lives.
male, female, young, old.....
all people,
with mothers and fathers....
all people....
and no, America is not free.
the news we watch is tainted.
the truth is hidden from us.
killing people around the world
does not make us free....
books are being banned and burned,
prejudice and discrimination are rampant.
we have forgotten we are responsible for each other,
we have forgotten we are all immigrants here.
there are no illegal people,
all people are just people.
freedom demands equality,
in every way!
poem by Eric Cockrell
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There Have Been Millions And Millions Of Years
THERE HAVE BEEN MILLIONS AND MILLIONS OF YEARS
There have been millions and millions of years
And there will be millions and millions more
And I have had only less than seventy-
There is so much to see and be and know
I could understand far more than I do now
I have so much beauty and hope and love in me
Why do I have to die?
It does not seem fair or wise
So much waste and loss in my dying
Worlds in me that will never be known.
poem by Shalom Freedman
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That Millions Do Live In Poverty
That millions do live in poverty should never be seen as okay
The gap between the haves and the have nots keeps getting bigger by the day
Everyone should have the chance to live happy a home to live in and enough for to eat
There never should be slums and ghettos and never a poverty street,
That millions are born to live in poverty and to end their hard lives in despair
Only tells us if there's a god that god favours the wealthy and that god is not very fair
To leave millions homeless and dying of malnutrition the people condemned to die poor and young
In the refugee camps of the World live the displaced, the poor and unsung,
In the age of celebrity worship the poor in millions multiply
Why millions are destined to be poor don't ask me I wouldn't know why
Even in the World's wealthiest Countries poor people are no longer rare
And millions and millions of have nots in the bigger World out there
And millions are dying of hunger and millions are doing it tough
And millions are displaced and homeless and as refugees living it rough.
poem by Francis Duggan
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Where Spring, the lord of the seasons
Where Spring, the lord of the seasons, reigneth,
there the Unstruck Music sounds of itself,
There the streams of light flow in all directions;
Few are the men who can cross to that shore!
There, where millions of Krishnas stand with hands folded,
Where millions of Vishnus bow their heads,
Where millions of Brahmas are reading the Vedas,
Where millions of Shivas are lost in contemplation,
Where millions of Indras dwell in the sky,
Where the demi-gods and the munis are unnumbered,
Where millions of Saraswatis, Goddess of Music, play on the veena
There is my Lord self-revealed:
and the scent of sandal and flowers dwells in those deeps.
Do Something!
Buddu Ramdas sings
The only holy book that can take
one to safe end is his own life
book!
Keep it always Holy
God is the greatest liar,
Uses millions tongues to lie in
million ways, He thinks in million ways using
millions of brains, God advises in millions of ways
using millions of mouths! God plays millions of games in
millions of ways using millions of
toy players, Buddu Ramdas, stop thinking, you are just that
puppet on chain,
Chained by destiny and made to
play by unknown hands!
Either let this Egoless hollow
shell,
Sail on the sea at Gods will
'I am on this shore,
My friend is on the other,
Wind favourably blows cool and
gentle,
Open the sail and reach the
friend!
Or find the way out,
The root of all
Is based in you. Explore the base To reach the
essence There is that short tunnel,
Light the torch of knowledge,
Drink the wine of love,
Eat the bread of concentration,
Blast that stony door of
ignorance, Move on to reach the other
shore, Be not busy in picking stones and
pebbles,
Or that shells, World is that biggest lie of the
greatest liar,
Go out of lies of MAYA, Let all see
how zero can cross the infinite
ocean to shine,
shining one,
one with infinite,
poem by Ramdas Bhandarkar
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Millions of water drops
drops of water
millions of drops
Falling down the rocks
Millions of water drops
Glittering in the sun
Shining like pearls
Millions of water drops
Ending as a river
Finding way to ocean
Millions of water drops
Creating childrens happiness
Laughter and joyfullness
Millions of water drops
Soon will tide reach
White long shores
Millions of water drops
Animating Waves
into forming caves
Millions of water drops
splittering from above
till reaching top of the hill
Millions of water drops
Without them no sound
No whispers of the living
Millions of water drops
Watch the clearness
From crest to earth
Millions of water drops
For tribe’s best
Beware of waste
Millions of water drops
Treasured should they be
As belonging to all humanity
(march 2008, Switzerland)
poem by Morhardt Carmen Mencita Monoi Angel
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Many Must Grow Poorer
Millions will go to bed hungry tonight that does seem sad to say
And many of them will not wake again for to see another day
The sad fact that many die of malnutrition is sad cause for lament
Whilst billions in war by Governments are spent
Even in the World's wealthiest Nations people live in abject poverty
And the unequal distribution of wealth does seem all wrong to me
The wealthy getting wealthier whilst the homeless of poverty street
Are searching in the rubbish for thrown out food to eat
To have enough of food and shelter should be a basic human right
But millions must try to sleep hungry without shelter tonight
And many cannot feed their families on their meagre take home pay
In an egalatarian World things would never be this way
And many must grow poorer for every new millionaire
And for the hungry millions doesn't life seem so unfair.
poem by Francis Duggan
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Don't waste the food..
Dusty roads are many, where gutsy people walk,
Muddy paths are countless, where trusting lives live,
On the embankments of river, ravine and monsoon canals,
Millions of babies formed, born, grown and give birth,
We are the tough species to conquer any other species,
We have come a long way not to make it a short exit,
Let us celebrate our victory with the mother earth,
Where her treasure are being stolen for our mirth,
Diamond cuts a diamond; a heart wounds a heart,
We, human, hurt our fellow human for our greed,
Millions roam on the urban jungle for the food,
Millions throw the food into the bin as a fad.
poem by Veeraiyah Subbulakshmi
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Inasmuch As Ye Did It Not . . .
If Jesus came to London,
Came to London to-day,
He would not go to the West End,
He would come down our way;
He'd talk with the children dancing
To the organ out in the street,
And say he was their big Brother,
And give them something to eat.
He wouldn't go to the mansions
Where the charitable live;
He'd come to the tenement houses
Where we ain't got nothing to give.
He'd come so kind and so homely,
And treat us to beer and bread,
And tell us how we ought to behave;
And we'd try to mind what He said.
In the warm bright West End churches
They sing and preach and pray,
They call us 'Beloved brethren,'
But they do not act that way.
And when He came to the church door
He'd call out loud and free,
You stop that preaching and praying
And show what you've done for Me.'
Then they'd say, 'O Lord, we have given
To the poor both blankets and tracts,
And we've tried to make them sober,
And we've tried to teach them facts.
But they will sneak round to the drink-shop,
And pawn the blankets for beer,
And we find them very ungrateful,
But still we persevere.'
Then He would say, 'I told you
The time I was here before,
That you were all of you brothers,
All you that I suffered for.
I won't go into your churches,
I'll stop in the sun outside.
You bring out the men your brothers,
The men for whom I died!'
Out of our beastly lodgings,
From arches and doorways about,
They'd have to do as He told them,
They'd have to call us out.
Millions and millions and millions,
Thick and crawling like flies,
We should creep out to the sunshine
And not be afraid of His eyes.
He'd see what God's image looks like
When men have dealt with the same,
Wrinkled with work that is never done,
Swollen and dirty with shame.
He'd see on the children's forehead
The branded gutter-sign
That marks the girls to be harlots,
That dooms the boys to be swine.
Then He'd say, 'What's the good of churches
When these have nowhere to sleep?
And how can I hear you praying
When they are cursing so deep?
I gave My Blood and My Body
That they might have bread and wine,
And you have taken your share and theirs
Of these good gifts of mine!'
Then some of the rich would be sorry,
And all would be very scared,
And they'd say, 'But we never knew, Lord!'
And He'd say, 'You never cared!'
And some would be sick and shameful
Because they'd know that they knew,
And the best would say, 'We were wrong, Lord.
Now tell us what to do!'
I think He'd be sitting, likely,
For someone 'ud bring Him a chair,
With a common kid cuddled up on His knee
And the common sun on His hair;
And they'd be standing before Him,
And He'd say, 'You know that you knew.
Why haven't you worked for your brothers
The same as I worked for you?
'For since you're all of you brothers
It's clear as God's blessed sun
That each must work for the others,
Not thousands work for one.
And the ones that have lived bone-idle
If they want Me to hear them pray,
Let them go and work for their livings
The only honest way!
'I've got nothing new to tell you,
You know what I always said -
But you've built their bones into churches
And stolen their wine and bread;
You with My Name on your foreheads,
Liar, and traitor, and knave,
You have lived by the death of your brothers,
These whom I died to save!'
I wish He would come and say it;
Perhaps they'd believe it then,
And work like men for their livings
And let us work like men.
Brothers? They don't believe it,
The lie on their lips is red.
They'll never believe till He comes again,
Or till we rise from the dead!
poem by Edith Nesbit
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Stunted Growth, ,
Millions of our children naked and hungry,
Rolling on the streets to scratch the itch,
Stuffed noses and coughing throats,
Inflamed lungs, worm filled guts,
Bloated stomachs and teary eyes,
Thin hands and legs with thinner fingers and toes,
Millions of them all around the world,
Scavenging on the waste and left outs,
If children were the blooms,
What fruits can be expected,
Of these suffering silkworms?
Voiceless children of the world,
Suffer in silence in multi fold,
in The hands of abusive human,
The legs of run over ideologies,
The merciless hearts of economy,
Stunt not only their physical growth,
But also their innocent childhood.
poem by Veeraiyah Subbulakshmi
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When Children Pray
Children only kneel when some incident causes great fear
Children only cry when they feel alone and threatened
Children live by a strong faith that is scare these days
Children will bare any type of pain if they feel it will ease the hate
And those times when children pray those times are when god can do nothing but, obey
Children the ask for happiness and they are the light of day
Yet we let millions of these treasures starve for attention
Children look at war but, look away
Its times like these when children prayers save the day
In this world of lost souls what more could one wish for than just pure hope
They are bright as stars that glitter
And all they shed is grace
With sticky fingers from exploring the juices mother earth bares
And their innocence laying bare
And simple truths spew from their rosy lips
Children pray but only when they can feel the end is near
And their love is a sudden rush that only causes forgiveness
Perfect smiles they wear upon their face
And children never hold any disgrace
Light shallow dreams of making the world a better place
When children kneel that is for which they will pray
Children only pray when in doubt
And their voices portray light fears
All a child wants to see is the new day break
And when that thought is threatened children kneel and pray
poem by Victoria Martinez
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Weekend Fatherhood
Out of all of life's raw deals
Weekend fatherhood is the rawest
48 hours to undo 5 days of propaganda
'I do love you, no matter what your mother says'
Try to do the impossible, squeeze 7 days of love, caring and fatherhood into 2 measly days
Days that fly by faster than the speed of light
No sooner do you pick them up, it's time to take them home
Weekend fathers, you see them everywhere
They're easy to spot by the attention they pay to their children
Their smiles and laughter, tears they so bravely try to hide
After bringing their children back to their mothers
The malls are full of this special breed of man
Buying their children anything and everything
Especially if they say 'Mom won't let us have this' 'Keep it at my house, and don't tell your mom'
From Monday 9AM to Friday 5PM
You're just a man, one of millions, nothing special
But 6PM Friday you become a father again, picking up your children and taking them for the weekend
And if you're one of the lucky ones
Their Mother, your ex-wife
Won't take your children and move away
Halfway across the country
And your weekends along with them
poem by Harry J. Couchon Jr
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Compared To Most I Feel So Lucky
Compared to most I feel so lucky I never have known hunger pain
I've always had a warm bed to sleep in and I've never slept out in the rain
In a World where millions are homeless and millions live in poverty
I am one of the lucky people one of the privileged minority.
In a World where the poor are forgotten and where millions for success compete
Millions are slowly dying of malnutrition their dream is enough food to eat
The suburb of the wealthy and famous the breeding ground of self conceit
By motor car only a short drive from the squalor of Poverty Street.
Compared to most I am so lucky though I'll never be a millionaire
Lady Luck she has always been with me and by life I've been treated fair
The distribution of wealth is disgraceful the reason for inequality
Compared to most I am so lucky I do feel life's been good to me.
I may not have an abundance of money but I have enough of it for to get by
I do feel the tag of Mr Lucky to one like me has to apply
Compared to most I feel quite privileged I do not have any cause to complain
Lady Luck has always been with me and with me I hope she remain.
poem by Francis Duggan
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If There's A God In Heaven (What's He Waiting For?)
Torn from their families
Mothers go hungry
To feed their children
But children go hungry
There's so many big men
They're out making millions
When poverty's profits
Just blame the childrenIf there's a God in heaven
What's he waiting for
If He can't hear the children
Then he must see the war
But it seems to me
That he leads his lambs
To the slaughter house
And not the promised landDying for causes
They don't understand
We've been taking their futures
Right out of their hands
They need the handouts
To hold back the tears
There's so many crying
But so few that hearIf there's a God in heaven
Well, what's he waiting forIf there's a God in heaven
What's he waiting for
poem by Mthokozisi Ntokozo Maphumulo
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It Begins Right Now!
we live in the most intense time
that the modern world has seen...
governments and economies are
caving from within... the very
air we breathe is polluted, the
water we drink has been defiled.
sea life is being destroyed, and
the world food situation worsens
at an alarming rate... millions
live and die in poverty, millions
are homeless, without medical care...
masses of workers are unemployed,
children grow up on the streets
without hope, and end up in prison.
human rights are being violated,
or just plain taken. and people
are absolutely afraid of each other!
we have closed our eyes, and numbed
our souls for too long. now we stand
on the brink of disaster, and we're
forced to wake up!
so what can one person do? one person
can live in a way that stands for truth...
one person can demand freedom, and equality.
one person can reach out a helping hand...
and when one person daring to live becomes
millions, we can move the stone from the
mouth of the cave!
but it all begins with one person... and
it begins right now, or its too damned late!
poem by Eric Cockrell
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Crazy Wars
War is a stage of which many
never take a bow
their bodies lay in shallow graves
where flowers now grow.
How many millions
have mothers wept for,
and how many millions more
will be buried where they fall?
The answer lies with the ones
who send these brave men, women and boys
away from their families
to fight their crazy wars.
poem by David Harris
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That Tomorrow Is Another Day
There always is tomorrow you hear some people say
But for many tomorrow will me much like today
In the refugee camps of the World thirty million refugees
From war ravaged and drought stricken Countries waiting for placements overseas
In living conditions poor and overcrowded they are obliged to stay
No Country seems to want them that does seem sad to say
Even the wealthy Nations have their own homeless poverty is Worldwide
Due to their circumstance of birth to millions success has been denied
That there always is tomorrow so happens to be true
Though the millions of homeless and displaced better Karma are surely due
Than what life is giving them millions dare not to look ahead
And many far too many only wishing they were dead
That tomorrow is another day with that most would agree
But tomorrow will be like today for those in poverty.
poem by Francis Duggan
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Allen Ginsberg
Allen Ginsberg, I love you
You have inspired me to be a poet
Your creation “Howl” and other writings have stimulated me to write
You are a real poet
A poet of your own
Your life, your philosophy all
Mandate you to be the ONE
As I go learning you
I find something new in you
You have moved the west and the east together
And have stirred all new things
Specially when you write “September on Jessore Road”
And utter “Millions of babies watching the skies
Bellies swollen, with big round eyes”
I, as a Bengali feel proud
poem by Kazi Ahmed
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They offered me millions and millions and millions of dollars to write books about Cary. That was between us. That was private. I'll always love him.
quote by Dyan Cannon
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Caring
Millions and millions of faces
Of people we don’t know
They live around the world
All colours and creeds
But with an outstretched hand
We can care for them all
Caring is something
That comes naturally
We care for our loved ones
As they grow old
We care for our children
The new seeds we’ve sowed
Caring is a natural thing
We do it all the time
We never really realize
But we do it all the same
It is only when someone thanks us
That we realize we care
(11 April 2007)
poem by David Harris
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