ABOUT THE POEM: “Money Drives the World” is a bitter, cynical reflection on economic and spiritual corruption, arguing that money, not morality or prayer, dictates value. The poem details repeated betrayals and transactional encounters, from personal rejection to the commodification of birth and religion. The narrator asserts that his solitary emptiness is the only thing keeping his character intact, contrasting his poverty with the wealthy hypocrisy of those who judge him for desires they themselves profit from.Money drives the world-not me.
Pain twists in my pity; my prayers hold no weight,
yet the world grips power with its evil eye.
Heads-I lose.
Tails-I lose.
Even when the coin spins upright,
that bastard “me” still doesn’t win.
They chant “AI, AI,”
swearing by 2030 it’ll conquer the world,
even wed your sister.
What then for you,
when machines inherit your sins?
She snatched the coins-pocket change-left the man behind.
One queen spurned me,
then circled back for a ten-rupee cold drink.
Another carved friendship from lust and love-
yet stoked flames in her friend,
insisting she was never at fault.
I’ve never seen blood kin
offer a body-to-body massage-
well, it was meant to be just a massage,
wasn’t it?
The baby bursts in screaming,
pain the brutal fee of birth-
or women would’ve charged to bear it.
Godmen hawk purity,
their fat wallets drowning out the prayers.
And this itch-why?
Don’t I need to earn just to buy flesh?
Yet those who peddle themselves
brand my desires corrupt,
wagging fingers from hands long sold.
No need to shout-
I’m poor, with no beggar’s bowl,
but unlike your hollow wants,
my emptiness keeps me intact, alone.
And still they mock:
If my heart were pure,
I wouldn’t stand so solitary.
