September 1, 2021
The Elitist Trail and Other Poems
By S. Rupsha Mitra
The Elitist Trail
It originates somewhere you don’t even recognize. Dungeons buried in the past, all self-proclaiming
stereotypes in aeons — conditioned so well that you consider
it fair and right and why not equal.
It is that high school winter that you learn at your fest — the chasm, the indifference
of not being the bourgeoisie, at the Peak of the scale. That sidelining at the party,
those recurrent arrogant words burbled like silk-smooth mantras,
peppered, in pinches of salt, that invoke in you, the deficiency, of not being
an eloquent English speaker. Those rude identifications of
your faulty grammar. It all happens unconsciously, everything
in the hemisphere that
evokes less
awareness, makes us
believe that this is how things should be, that obnoxious
inclination towards believing in the discrimination as
something sanctimonious, a love for this
weird social bottleneck theory, eliminating
all stimuli other than what is the “desirable,”
“affluent.” It’s just normal how women are
being pushed in the corners, everytime
there is a call out for equality, There is
always an imposing structure of the
imagined falsified meaning, an
excuse why it is just nothing
else but just justice.This elitist
legerdemain that burdens all,
these leading voices that fail to recall
the mesh work of racism in
the workplace, in the crux,
in the roots. In this so-called
level playing field. And
sameness repeats, over
and over The elevated
mounds continue
hiding the realities,
There appears a
Marie, everytime
From history
disregarding starving
people, as the
top–down
model continues.
* * *
Democracy—recreating
In the name of effacing, purifying, all the double standards entrenched–practicing
pure devotion
towards industrialists, anti-environmentalists, beauteously hideous capitalizations.
Christening the land with cleanliness, promising sanctum geographies yet spilling unclean notions.
Scientific discoveries muddled up with communalist emotions—
History perplexed with tainted stereotypical associations.
Freely unfreed media like shackled government possessions—proclaiming myriad forms of same
viewpoints,
Constitutions reconstructed as recurrent ruinations, yet people are denied rights,
All socially proclaimed intoxications.
Selective Freedom, selective aids, selective justice and bamboozling justifications, all protesting voices
labelled
anti-State, restrained, marvelous marginalization.
How grandiose, masquerades of democracy gaudily transmuting
Into elected autocracy.
* * *
Daily Discrimination
Now, this does not bring a sour taste to the tongue
No rancidity, no distaste
Now, this spurs no further agitations
Behold, how it has become normal
to witness such daily discriminations.
Discriminations that come with antecedent instructions
as
Shame the colour of one’s epidermis as if whiteness is the only way
to be, to achieve the pinnacle, self-actualising heights,
construct social pyramids for everything, restore the heavy heritage
Of propagating classism,
the shared responsibilities to engender self-fulfilling
Prophecies,
classify people from low to high,
ensure Majoritarianism, scapegoat,
Undermine young, revolting minds
Preserve age-old treasured lies,
garble spoiled words to label the minority,
ravel equal grounds with opaque sheaths, kill the transparency
Let the economic gorge turn into a canyon,
like an ever-widening distance, incessantly seek to support wage gaps,
loot the common people,
submerge them in poverty as in a drowning ocean,
Enjoy life until the world imbalances completely,
until the justice-seeking knell arrives.
—
S. Rupsha Mitra is a Psychology honors undergraduate based in Kolkata, India. She is a finalist in the Voice of Peace: International Poetry And Short Story Anthology Competition 2021 organized by The League of Poets. Rupsha’s work has appeared in the Mekong Review, Indian Literature, and Muse India.
