Sweatshop

Brightly coloured garments hanging limply on rails –
glowing colours –
painstakingly embellished –
bargain priced

Sari-clad ladies
in beautiful glowing cloths
hanging limply in rows
sapped by heat and tiredness –
painfully exploited –
cut-price wages

Buying and selling exhaustion –
lifeless clothes -
lifeless lives -
days too long -
life too short –
eyes strained –
fingers sore

I can’t wear this pain
any more