Digging for Meaning

Round at the curb towards my home in amboli in andheri, is a little plastic tent on the pavement against a co-operative housing soc.'s wall. (to go ahead to my place, i have to chose to walk either by a huge overflowing dumpster on one side of road, or a roadside orgy of shit. well, usually i time right at the moment to walk in the middle of the road through that distance. ) the place has plastic strewn all over by the tent. the family, it seems, is in the business of sorting out the different kinds of plastics that are dumped. 3 yr olds, 30 yr olds, 60 yr old family members are usually busy separating bottles from plastic bags from plastic objects from... the odd thing is the tenants keep on changing every 2 months while the tent remains the same. i guess. well, i have been here 6 months, and seen 3 families. well, anyways, the object of this post is something else. it concerns the current tenants. it apparently is a family of a couple with more than handful kids and a few elders....

Mumbai. city of dreams. city of refugees. the camp city of private soldiers, who paste dreams made by private soldiers who came before them on their foreheads, and forge ahead. they maime, rape, throw at the city, extract returns in hope of enriching their real home; never knowing that mumbai won't let you leave you this soon having used her. they had removed their humanity like old clothes on the border of the city. they enter naked into the jungle. grimy serpents run on her back incessantly. little pesky soldiers pull up their sleeves, ball up the fists and fight to get inside the serpent. the door, that is always open seems like evanescent port to untold riches, to them. the ever open door, indeed is a port. a port through which the human transforms into a wild hog who just got untethered. once inside, they again transform into guilt ridden, gaze avoiding crabs. walking sideways. its only after getting out of the serpents, do they inhale some air, not fresh, but air nevertheless...