The Incredible Victoria Walay

Prologue: this poetry is about my overwhelming experience and encounter with the Victoria owners at Soldier Bazaar. It is poetry written as them, from their perspective and about them.

The world wonders where our secret lies,

We don’t walk by flowers but horse manure’s slice.

But when we start to tell them,

They think our magnificent horses, our magnificent carts are nice!

We say,

In the reach of our arms,

The wheel of the cart,

The box seat with truck art,

The riddle and blinkers on his eyes,

The old leather whip,

We are the Victoria-walas,

Incredible Victoria walas!

It is not a story of yesterday or a year on nine,

But something from the Victorian era here,

From my father’s father’s father’s father’s time.

Bestowed with horses and pride of a peacock,

The Nadir brothers took their horses to walk,

For rulers and kings and mango people who mock,

We say,

In the times to go and the times to come,

This pride is ours,

This tradition of carts,

This heritage of lifetime,

This glory is our dime

We are the Victoria walas,

The incredible Victoria walas!

As we move forward we frown a little more,

Times have changed and money is sore.

And jets is all people want, not us anymore,

For shaadi season was not the only time to earn before.

The horses are weak and cannot speak

And will disappear from Karachi, it is the peak.

We say,

I’m the lost memory now,

I don’t know to survive how

We are family burdened and our esteems are low,

We now want a bit of this city’s glow.

We are the Victoria walas,

The incredible Victoria walas

This city we live in that has to offer everyone so much

All we live for, pray for, hope for is a little of good luck’s touch.

But the beauty Karachi has and the people Karachi has,

It holds a wondrous world, a magic, a spark, a sass

In God we trust and try very hard to smile

Because crying, whining, complaining isn’t Karachi walas style

We say,

In the rush of the city,

We don’t loathe for the pity,

And horse saddle we wind

Leaving worries behind

We pat the horse’s hind

With one thing on our mind,

We are the Victoria walas,

The incredible Victoria walas!