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This poem asks men why red is a bad colour, why the ordinary act of being a woman is such a crime.
Dear men,
I was told that, as women bleeding every month, we were supposed
to stay locked away, in cold, dark rooms, because you opposed
our impure existence.
Asking you to buy us sanitary napkins or even tampons was considered
to be something not to be spoken about,
Our voices silenced,shadows diminished,in the crowd.
“Is it a crime to bleed out womanhood?”, my grandmother asked,
And her grandfather said no more,
Asked his grand daughter to leave home, showed her the door.
Just because she bled, her things were left untouched,
her presence ‘unsacred’, burning a part of her soul,
Red, is not a bad colour.
A thinly disguised line between misogyny and empowerment,
The stereotypical predicament.
I grew up listening to code words, phrases I didn’t understand,
Banning even uttering the term menstruation, and yet, empowerment was on demand.
That red, that they considered unsacred, unholy,
a contributor, to this bitter melancholy,
Nobody made any sense to me,
Not even the wise.
For they thought, women bleeding were sluts in disguise;
that red, is what they throw around, during holi,
that red, constitutes their Rangoli,
back home.
He held my hand, looked me in the eyes,
and asked me, ”Are you okay?”
A world,
where they don’t question our presence, but our virginity,
They worship the Holy Bible and his brothers, but not the divinity,
where women are objectified, personified,
to the extent of qualifying as ‘non-living’, in this dictionary.
They burned down Sati, in the yellowed pages of that ancient book,
But today, when a husband kills himself, women(us), are held by the hook,
And asked to destroy themselves (ourselves),
for things they, (we) didn’t do.
Just because that working executive steps out at two,
You ban her the privileges,
impose the curfew.
Who said anything about equality?
Was it me, because it was definitely not you,
Your hands that reached out,
and drew red lines across her face,
what’s funny, is that despite all of that,
we promote marital rape.
And yet, red is not a bad colour?
Criss cross,
the straps of her feet that bind her to not just the ground,
but the dampness of your narrowmindedness.
Hands on her mouth, muffling the screams,
sending across shivers down her spine,
Your timely resurgence, as she moans,
the moans that are mistaken,
for groans of solid pain.
Permission, you don’t ask,
because asking her if she is okay, is an uphill task.
You shatter her, with every breath,
that you exhale, onto her bare neck,
that lies bound to a noose,
the noose of sexism. Dear men,
I ask, she asks,
of nothing more than that,
her safety, your fidelity,
she doesn’t want you to be that man,
penetrating her without consent,
because she’s entitled to what she has,
and you are, with permission.
do not treat our title, as your stereotype,
and shut us down.
Do not unman yourself, just to satisfy,
your privilege, and destroy our hymen.
Our rights matter too, embrace our presence
First published at author’s blog
Image via Unsplash
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Rrashima Swaarup Verma's new bestselling book The Royal Scandal is a celebration of the spirit of womanhood set in the 18th Century.
Rrashima Swaarup Verma’s new bestselling book The Royal Scandal is a celebration of the spirit of womanhood.
A true love story. A tale of politics, treachery and war. A piece from India’s rich history. A vivid description of 18th century life in the Deccan. Yes, The Royal Scandal is all that and more. But it is also an aide-mémoire of the tremendous fortitude, the unbeatable spirit that women are, and have always been, capable of.
18th century, Hyderabad, India. A time and place when societal laws and rules came down heavy on the female gender, when zenanas separated and shielded the women from the world outside, when it was understood and accepted that the men in their lives would govern and dictate every big and small decision.
Women aren’t a place to dump a man’s anger no matter what the issue could be. And calling her names is again not the husband’s right just because they are married.
Trigger Warning: This speaks of domestic violence, emotional abuse, and may be triggering to survivors.
“Visualize it. Just visualize it!”
Five-year-old Niranjana was finding it difficult to connect the colours, shapes, and alphabet together. She knew each of them separately, but connecting them together seemed huge and impossible. Tears overflowed her cute eyes when the teacher instructed her to learn at home and answer questions in class.
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