Requiem for a Stint

I

Am sitting in the brimming train beside my backpack

The misfitted blue backpack with camera and Ipad...

It's raining outside, painting the window panes with fog

As the locomotive begins, an image flickers beyond the fog...

I blink and squint and through the haze, seem to understand

An outline at the platform, of a shaky attempt of a man 

Shaky attempt of a man,

Dressed uptight so as to justify the three letters tag 

Moving consciously, Careful not to displease or to lag...

Greeting and taking salutes on the heel

Covert nervousness, well concealed...

His first government office, he used to patrol

The office that's in the business of exerting control...

He harboured the desire to touch the setup's very life,

Not knowing how, corporeally aware of little time that lies...

He follows his mentor, shadows his life's enduring

Overzealous to learn from his doings and undoings..

Keeps beside him through the day's toiling

Sharply watchful, cautious and smiling... 

II

Ah! the train stops with another backbreaking jerk

It's K, a trading town of migrants midst people of tribal birth...

It was here that our bud had sprouted to learn the world's ways

Calculative people and corrupt staff tried to make his lofty ideas sway...

It was here they happened,

Events when he shunned politeness and sought collars to grab

Times when he smiled overtly while wanting to stab...

Times when injustices made his heart bleed

Nights when he cried himself to sleep...

He slogged himself, seeking to make things good

Like a drowning man, clutching and clasping everything he could...

He met all the targets given to self,

Still felt a deep urge to stay and do something else...

III

With a jerk it began and caught speed again...

This rugged piece of metal, moving like a disjointed tube

Like a reluctant horse, struggling under a noob...

But soon I slept, thinking of the same man who had now turned sanguine; 

Having felt his capacity to effect transitions

He humbly peeped in his heart for divine revelations...

The role of messiah he had played too well

Wherever he had been, he could feel the love swell...

Yet, he knew his challenge was to keep his feet on the ground;

To feel the humanly pulse despite all the ego boost around...

The train moved like a serpentine goddess, 

Cutting across fields of potential fodders...

Far away one can see the smoke chambers,

Beside meandering queues of monstrous earth diggers...

I had closed my eyes from the mines, 

That's when the elections came to one's mind...

When he saw how government achieves the works most grand

Read, planned and coordinated with more time and space in hand...

Went to depths of processes and wrote his mind on the files

The days with unceasing hours of peering through the piles...

An exercise involving thousands of people and the things they say

Numerous stories enacted throughout the day, 

Yet no time to visit those memories and stay...

IV

I must have slept again, for when the brakes screeched 

A forested tribal hinterland's peace was breached...

It's D, a town 50 miles from where the collector functions,

With their mines and the mafia, 

Catching the tribals unawares at the malicious junctions...

It was here that our budding man had spent his month,

Toured the remotest villages, 

Met with people of all ages...

It was here he saw the naked demented child
Unattended, tied to a tree like something wild...

With a steel plate held firmly by his teeth

Compulsively scratching the ground beneath...

It was here he met people unbelievably bereaved

The people who feared everything concrete...

Our protagonist got surer in days to come

He metamorphosed gradually as he felt overcome...

There were days when he questioned everything in sight

Days when he captured hearts and minds...

Days when he felt let down,

When his face carried a perpetual frown

But then, there were days when he reached his place

In a tired body with a smiling face.. 

Harbouring no desire or will to seek

The sight of grateful eyes was for him to keep...

How abrupt, the ending befitted the stint

He packed his bags while fire-fighting for peace...

While people were dancing, he slipped away from the city

Gently and Quietly, never to return in the same capacity..

Took nothing more than what he originally had, 

His misfit backpack with the camera and Ipad...

V

And so it stopped, our train with a blast,

We had reached the capital at last...

I shrugged myself out of the daydream...

Man? metamorphosis? What feelings?

There's nothing to gain from  pointless musings...

I picked up my bags and stepped down at platform four,

While the window, still hazy, was shining through the glass door...



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PS: As a fresh entrant into the Indian Administrative Service, one has to undergo an year long "field training" under the mentor-ship of a District Collector. During this time, one is exposed to the area and the people first hand and is given temporary assignments in various parts of the jurisdiction. This period is the "larvae" stage of development for these officers, when they can learn as a participant observer. 
They will in a few months, be left to fend for themselves and be given important responsibilities in the government.