I see a boy with devil's horns
Sell red balloons
Shaped like hearts, on Valentine's,
For just a few rupees

I see a girl with painted eyes
Bought and forced to
Play her part so many times
For just a few dollars

I see her face a thousand times in that
Daytime dark: dead-eyed, incurious, furious,
In a city of rickshaw wallahs
And roadside squallor
And my hope fades

But in the inky, stinking gloom
Of those living tombs of rooms,
In those maze-like paths, a light has shined
Angels pace like guards, take up the fight
To save the scarred and,
Entertained so unawares,
Bear witness that there’s
One with matchless might who sees, and cares
His wrath, incandescent,
My evanescent hope repairs.
- Gilly Charkham