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#Poetry. She had suffered the domestic violence quietly for too long. She would be a victim no more, and show the world what happened when #WomenSpeakUp!
She walked in hurried steps, furtively
After having lied, out of habit, glibly
About the bruise visible on her forearm –
No one could know about the bodily harm
Inflicted on her most days by her spouse –
This shameful secret belonged inside the house
They were educated, liberal and well to do
It was universally accepted as true
That such things did not happen in the society
That she inhabited, everyone behaved with propriety..
Beneath skilful make-up, tasteful scarves and long sleeves
Her secret was safely ensconced, or so she believed
Besides, she was clumsy at times, this could not be tolerated
By an important person like her husband, who berated
Her for falling short of his expectations every day
It was her fault after all, she had nothing in her defence to say
**
This time things had gone too far
The abuse had left more than just a scar
Her facial bones were fractured; with a deformed face
To hide her injuries, she had no place
Seeing the ER nurse’s expression she realized
Her shameful secret was revealed to public eyes
Within minutes she was seeing a counselor who specialized
In domestic abuse- even this professional was surprised
That she had escaped attention for so long-
What she had been tolerating was far too wrong..
It was not easy to stand up to her abuser
At times courage threatened to leave her
With help from a strong group of women
She fought for her rights, and made a decision
To leave the abusive relationship before it was late
She learnt to believe in a better fate
Today she works for victims of domestic abuse
Her experience she has put to good use
Abuse hides in plain sight, she knows
She strives to release women from its throes.
Published here earlier.
Image source: pxhere
I am a woman, a physician, a mother and an aspiring writer rolled into one. I write about various aspects of my life, and my preferred form of writing is poetry (or rhyming verses). read more...
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UP Boards Topper Prachi Nigam was trolled on social media for her facial hair; our obsession with appearance is harsh on young minds.
Prachi Nigam’s photo has been doing the rounds on social media for the right reasons. Well, scratch that- I wish the above statement were true. This 15-year-old girl should ideally be revelling in her spectacular achievement of scoring a whopping 98.05% and topping her tenth-grade boards. But oddly enough, along with her marks, it’s something else that garners more attention – her facial hair.
While the trolls are driving themselves giddy by mocking this girl who hasn’t even completed her school yet, the ones who are taking her side are going one step ahead – they are sharing her photoshopped pictures, sans the facial hair, looking nothing less than a celebrity with captions saying – “Prachi Nigam, ten years later”.
Doctors have already diagnosed her with PCOD in their comments, based on photographic evidence. While we have names for people shamed for their weight – body shaming, for their skin colour- racism, for their age- age shaming, for being a female- sexism, this category of shaming where one faces criticism for their appearance has no name. With that, it also has zero shame attached to it.
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