The poem is about a photographer who takes a picture of a beggar asleep on the pavement in Bombay. He originally thought it was a good composition and called it "The Man in the Street," but now realizes his presumption in attempting to portray the man's suffering as art. The beggar's head, appearing as if weeping into a pillow, chides the photographer for his insensitive treatment of the man's plight of hunger and solitude as a subject for art composition. The poem highlights the irony of attempting to capture poverty and suffering in art, and suggests multiple meanings of the word "decomposition" in reference to the composition, the beggar's condition, and the poem itself.

1. Decomposition*
By Zulfikar Ghose
*state of rotting or decay, especially of organic matter

2. I have a picture I took in Bombay
of a beggar asleep on the pavement:
grey-haired, wearing shorts and a dirty
shirt,
his shadow thrown aside like a blanket.
His arms and legs could be cracks in the
stone,
routes for the ants' journeys, the flies'
descents,
Brain-washed by the sun into exhaustion,
he lies veined into stone, a fossil man.
Behind him there is a crowd passingly
bemused by a pavement trickster and quite
indifferent to this very common sight
of an old man asleep on the pavement.
I thought it then a good composition
and glibly called it "The Man in the Street,"
remarking how typical it was of
India that the man in the street lived there.
His head in the posture of one weeping
into a pillow chides me now for my
presumption at attempting to compose
art of his hunger and solitude.

3. Another day in
paradise
 http://www.youtube.com/watch
?v=Qt2mbGP6vFI

4. I have a picture I took in Bombay
of a beggar asleep on the pavement:
grey-haired, wearing shorts and a dirty shirt,
his shadow thrown aside like a blanket.
His arms and legs could be cracks in the stone,
routes for the ants' journeys, the flies' descents,
Brain-washed by the sun into exhaustion,
he lies veined into stone, a fossil man.
Behind him there is a crowd passingly
bemused by a pavement trickster and quite
indifferent to this very common sight
of an old man asleep on the pavement.
 first person – personal experience
 beggar – poverty
 dirty – negative/unclean
 shadow – lacks reality/substance
 thrown aside – discarded - insignificant
 simile: like a blanket
 cracks in stone – metaphor – he is part of
pavement, arms and legs thin lines of paving
 insignificant – ants/flies walk on him
 brainwashed – sunstroke/mental languor
 veined – metaphor – arms and legs
 fossil is dead – mere impression of stone
 enjambment suggests tourist walking on/lack of
interest
 bemused – interest in street performer/or interest
in the beggar’s ‘trick’ by blending into the
pavement?
 indifferent – paying no attention – numb/over-
exposed to this sight
 literally what the poem is about

5. I thought it then a good composition
and glibly called it "The Man in the Street,"
remarking how typical it was of
India that the man in the street lived there.
His head in the posture of one weeping
into a pillow chides me now for my
presumption at attempting to compose
art of his hunger and solitude.
 composition – produce art work
 decomposition – decay / idea decays /
the man’s life is in decay
 glibly – uncaring – fluent but
insincere/shallow
 which man? ambiguous –
tourist/beggar/man
 typical – stereotype – quite callous and
insensitive
 childlike – adds to tragic element
 chides – rebukes
 presumption – should respect fellow
human being
 insensitive to man’s actual plight –
tourist is concerned with artistic nature of
his photograph
 hunger and solitude - can this be art?

6. Irony
• An outcome of events contrary to what
was, or might have been, expected.
• Why is the whole poem ironic?
• He tried to fix his mistake of turning suffering into art with a
photo by writing a poem about it. Now he has done it twice
because the poem is also a work of art.

7. Decomposition: pun
• This poem suggests a few meanings of the word
‘decomposition’ because:
• the photo of a beggar is artistically not good anymore
because poverty is not art, and the composition has thus
decomposed in a sense; and
• the beggar’s life/body/soul is literally decomposing on the
pavement; and
• the composition in the form of the poem has figuratively
decayed or rotted, or decomposed, because the tragedy of
the beggar’s life is not art.

8. Poverty in India
 Poverty in India is widespread, with the nation estimated to
have a third of the world's poor. In 2010, the World Bank
reported that 32.7% of the total Indian people fall below the
international poverty line of US$ 1.25 per day (PPP) while
68.7% live on less than US$ 2 per day.
Percentage population living on less than $1.25 per
day 2009.svg

9. Poverty in
Africa
small-scale farmers
nomads and herders
artisanal fishers
wage labourers
displaced people
households headed by woman
unemployed youth
landless people
Source: IFAD