I can't breathe

 

She trashes underwater

Clawing for air

Feet weighed down. 

Sinking.

She can see the surface-

Her children, their dreams.

Nani. She wants to be a Nani.

She doesn’t want to go.

Her husband makes calls.

She needs but a simple molecule-

Two atoms of oxygen in an eternal waltz.

The bottom looms closer.

She sinks.

Gasping

Crying

“I can’t breathe”.

Her husband punches numbers.

The phone rings, unanswered.

Powerless to cut the call, he hopes.

There are no numbers left.

Helpless, he dials again.

He can’t meet her eyes.

He’s failed her- 

She who he promised to protect.

Her eyes seek his out. 

Her wide, terrified eyes.

“Save me”, they plead.

He can’t.

She’s gone.

Guilt.

Rage.

Emptiness.

Grief is a Bloody Moon.

Love Is Love

 

Your child brings home
     His Love.
     Exposing
          Layers of bigotry
Caste
   Language
      Class
         Nationality
      Colour
   Religion
         Gender

Why must it be so?
When Love is Love.

I too will be Free

 

How I long to run
into wind, dewy grass
tickling my soles. My kite

trailing behind me. Unsure
of its place. Flailing
but not giving up.

I don’t care much about
the kite. I want to feel the wind
in my hair. The hill

I must climb. The view
from the summit. My town
lying still at my feet. I run

My kite runs with me. Red
like my menstrual blood.
Powerful. It finds a current

and climbs up. Steadily.
Strongly. Purposefully.
It tugs hard.

It rises high. I struggle
to keep up. One day
I too will be Free

~ Tai ~

 

I was 14 when my husband died

A man I barely knew.

A man who’s life mine was linked to.

I was forced to 

    climb

      on

        his

  funeral pyre.

She rescued me. 

Allowed me to have my child.

She taught me to read

Made me a teacher.

Stood me on my feet.

Helped me marry the man I loved.

I owed everything to her

I would have given my life for her.

But the guilt remained.

One day, it burst forth- 

“Tai, I silently watched

    while my sisters 

       threw stones at you”,

           I confessed.

“I know”, she said.

And smiled.

[Savitribai Phule was born on Jan 3, 1897.

An illiterate girl from a lower caste, married off when still a child, she went on to become one of modern India's first female teachers, and founded a school for girls which rivalled those run by the government by young boys.

A staunch feminist and an anti-caste advocate, she dedicated her life to the upliftment of women and to the abolition of the caste system. Her protests earned her the active animosity of Brahmins, who saw her as a threat to the privileges they took for granted. Yet, most of the battles she fought were against unjust practices that affected Brahmin women the most. She could have chosen to look away, and only work to benefit the women of her caste. But she didn’t, because she realized that women couldn’t be free, unless all women were free.

Long before the term ‘intersectional feminism’ was coined, Savitribai Phule was one.]

I Like You

 It will not end well, they said. You are rich

she is not. She will marry you for your money.

I was besotted. I pursued her. She was not interested.

"Will you paint my front door", I asked. She agreed.

For the next week, she was with me everyday 

I’d pile her with food. She’d paint.

“I like you”, I finally confessed. “I like you too”, she replied.

“But not that way. There is too much I want to do.”

She won a scholarship and went off to study art

I still stand at the threshold, hoping she will return.

Silent

 We are taught to be silent; invisible.

“How does it matter who gets credit”,

we are told, “as long as the job gets done.”

And so, we soldier on. Doing things

while others stand up to make the speeches

and soak up the applause.

But it does matter. 

Credit, validation, acknowledgement.

All of it matters.

Maybe not to us, but to those

who come after us.  We owe it to them

to demonstrate it can be done. By us.

For too long have we shied away

from seeking our due. It is now time

to demand that we be seen.

- natasha

Dreams of my own

 My sister. My clever sister.

The smartest in the school.

Perhaps in the whole mandal.

Everyone’s hopes are on her

She is the one who will study

She will do the family proud.

Nobody even notices me.

The tiny bougainvillea flower

Eclipsed by my magenta sister.

She has to succeed.

I have to make sure she does;

I am expendable.

When the well dries

I drop out of school 

To fetch water. She studies.

She will achieve success

The family will prosper.

They will no longer be poor.

But what of me?

Am I not allowed 

Dreams of my own?

You want papers?

 

You want papers?

What papers?

The aunt who eased me out of my mother’s womb

as the candle spluttered and died in the wind; she

couldn’t read or write. She knows I was born

on the day of the heaviest rains.

That is my birth certificate.

Will that do?

No, I don’t know the day, 

or even the year when I was born.

It may have been fifteen years back, 

Or sixteen

Time has little meaning for us , you know.

What?

Who are my parents, you ask?

That stone you see there? 

That’s not a stone. That is my mother.

My mother who died giving birth to me. 

My father, his father,

his father’s father, 

his father’s father’s father,

our fathers, all the way to the first man-

We were all born here.

We belong here.

Every stone in this valley is us.

You want papers?

Why do I need papers?

This is my legacy. 

These trees, these hills, these streams.

Every plant in the forest, every stone on the hills. 

It is mine.

I don’t need no papers

This is my land.

The land of my forefathers.

The land where we’ve always lived.

The land where my children,

and grandchildren and great grandchildren will be born

Everything you see around me is mine.

These are my papers.

You cannot displace me from my land.

Not even if you find bauxite under the ground

- natasha ramarathnam

[This poem was written during the protests against CAA+NRC. Indigenous tribals will be most affected by NRC.]

Shopping for Vegetables

Returning from her evening walk,

She catches a whiff of dinner being prepared.

Palak paneer! Yes, she would like that.

She takes a detour through the market.

Her shoppu vendor is there. Pink saree. Big smile. 

“Amma, I haven’t seen you for long.”

They talk about the daughter

Of how she’s doing in school.

She sifts through the greens.

There is no spinach. But the methi looks fresh.

There is curd at home.

She could have methi paratha tonight.

She now makes weekly trips to the supermarket.

Where cold vegetables choke in plastic bags.

And masks hide even the smiles.

Of What use Dharma?, Janaki asks

Magnolia champaca

You talk of Dharma, Ramchandar.

Rajyasi Dharma. Is that the only Dharma 

There is?

Are you not required, as a husband,

To protect your woman? Your wife. Well,

You failed.

Even if I had been violated, 

It would still not have been my fault.

Would it?

I did not ask to be abducted, did I?

Why must I be asked to prove

My chastity?

Do you not have the courage

To stand by me. Is it not your Dharma to 

Defend me?

You can keep your Dharma, 

It is of no use, if when I most need you, 

You fail.

The Biggest Mask she Wore

 

Orchidaceae

She went through the old photographs.

Swiping though most. Pausing at some.

Moments of joy; captured, frozen for Eternity-

Chucking her graduating cap into the air

Striking a seductive pose at her cousin’s wedding

Running on the beach, racing a dog

Making the okay sign on her scuba dive

Grinning from behind the masquerade mask

Rejoicing after climbing the walls of a fort

She. The girl with the gorgeous smile.

The girl who hung herself one night.

No photographs were taken at her funeral

Had they been, might she have smiled there too?

That smile. The biggest mask she wore.

The Babies never came

Jasminum sambac

“When are you giving the good news?”

her nosey relatives would ask.

Did they not realize she was 

in no hurry to start a family?

The curiosity soon turned stringent,

“Don’t delay or it will be too late.”

They gave her names of IVF specialists,

told her which temples to visit.

They didn’t hesitate before throwing 

barbs of ‘carrier woman’ at her.

Choice or not, they never knew,

but  the babies never came.

“We told you not to delay,

now look at you”, they said cruelly.

Shouldn’t there be more for a woman 

than to be reduced to her ovaries?

The Elections

[This is a work of fiction. A drabble in poetry form].

He was the dreaded school bully,

She the topper of her class.

She despised school politics, but since 

Nobody wanted to challenge him,

She ran against him for School Captain.

They all certainly hated him, 

But were not sure of her either.

She generously shared her notes, 

But could she bark orders?

All the teachers loved her, 

But maybe a bit too much?

She won honours for the school, 

But somehow just didn’t look the part.

She was brilliant, but didn’t she lack

The commanding presence to lead?

But

But

But 

More than half the school despised him-

He won.

Was this how it was meant to be?

[On the Day of the Girl Child, a few girls share moments from their life.] 

The cold steel blades advance towards her.

Merciless. “I don’t want to die”, she screams.

Her shrieks echo off the walls of the womb.

 

Firm hands grip her head, and ease her out.

Gently. The touch changes. “It’s a girl”,

A voice snarls, dropping her in disgust.

 

She wakes up from the dark. Something soft

Pressed against her. “I can’t breathe”,

She thinks before slipping back into the black.

 

Dizzy with hunger, her eyes are fixed on the bread.

One piece. She wants just one piece.

Her brother grabs it. She will sleep hungry again tonight.

 

Chocolate. She hats chocolate. Chocolates are secret.

‘Uncle shouldn’t tell mother what she did.’

She takes the chocolate. Good girls always smile.

 

She smiles. Her clothes are itchy. She smiles.

Yesterday, she was going to school. Today she is married.

“It is for your own good”, she’s been told.

 

She married him in a temple; one he can enter.

They ran away. Started life together.

Her brother found them. Raised his sword. She shut her eyes.

 

Pain. Excruciating pain. Flashes of faces.

Men entering. Leaving. Laughter. Kerosene. Pain.

Through the flames, her last thought-

 

“Was this how it was meant to be?”

Home

 Home-

Where the crocuses bloom

Fields of mauve with a heart of saffron.

This realm of mine

Caressed me, smothered me, didn’t let me breathe.

Home-

Where the sunset paints

Distant mountaintops in fiery shades.

My life was on fire too

Warm and seductive; reducing me to embers.

Home-

Where the chinar leaves

Twirl gracefully after letting go the brough.

Did I dance

When I had to flee; dangers I could not face.

Home-

Were icy waters

Skip gleefully over well rounded rocks.

I live my life

Haunted by the life I should have led.

Home-

Where the Jhelum flows

Red with all the blood we have spilled.

I long to return

To the paradise my heart never left.