Fair and Lovely face
Clinic Plus hair
skin like silk washed in Lux
Eyetex eyes
Emami lips
Lakmé nails
jewels from Lalitha
clothes from Nalli
a dowry from Saravana –
although she has no acquaintance
with these, nor chooses
a different form each day
a different colour each hour,
yet princes appear before her
in the dead of night
bringing their packets of biryani.
She sits at the street’s verge
scratching her head full of lice
and singing all day
with the tunefulness of pebbles
rattling in a cup.