Afternoon tea

Sea of green,
Hard work unseen
Dripping sweat
Effort great
What is grown
What is sown
Never drunk
Never sunk
To those dry lips
Tired, nearly broken hips
Arrival of thousand ships
For places afar, to sail away
With million bags of tea
On the mighty sea
In few days, weeks be
Adorned in a beautiful pack
Delicacy sack, expensive rack
Newest fad, buyers glad
Stamp says, ‘fair trade’
from all that, money made
who benefits, who is screwed
whose children sleep without food
While you admire
the crockery, with utmost glee
along with your afternoon tea

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53 thoughts on “Afternoon tea”

      1. It rains every single day or at least when we were there, BUT it is not called the Emerald Isle for no reason.
        There are shades of green there that I had never seen before or imaged possible!

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  1. Ah, the leaf from Ceylon ! – meant to be the best there is (well, according to Sri Lankans, anyway).
    I used to drink tea in bucketfuls. Not any more. Sighh …

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  2. When I went out to Srl Lanka I saw some of the tea plantations and was fortunate to go to the tea buying and selling place, I forget now what it was called…. But it reminded me of parliament inside with wooden benches in a tier …

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    1. Their tea factories are amazing places to visit and understand the process and factory shops definitely very interesting places 🙂

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  3. What a heartfelt poem, reminding us of the great inequities of the world. Such a tragic global problem…….

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