The Gallows

Old buildings move me and draw me to draw them.

The gallows in the cellular jail moved me - not its form or colour or texture or architecture - but the story behind it, the story of India's struggle for independence in particular and the struggle against colonialism and imperialism in general, the story of heroic young men whose life was cut short by disease, hard labour and a hangman's noose.

Some of what I felt when I saw the gallows is below and an image of the hateful building drawn in pencils and digitally altered.























Did the architect seek beauty and balance?
Or only purpose and efficiency?
Did it touch him that a man climbing up those steps
Would KNOW that he would never climb down?

Did the mason, who builds for the living,
Feel that this was for death?
Did the rain blacken the roof or
Was it death that painted it black?

Did the burning desire for freedom
Burn the fear of death too?
Did the hangman see his brethren
Or did he sell his soul and his eyes?

Did the criminal who called a hero
A criminal and ordered his death
Snuff his conscience 'cos he knew
He was killing a nobler being?

Did the first man that this structure took
Break his back to break the rock
To lay the base for the scaffold
That would one day blow the candle of his life?