solidarity

Marginalised? Who said we are marginalised?

We are humans walking side by side.

 

Women, Men and Children

Dalits, Tribals and the Abused —

 

Who said we are different?

 

Who said that Woman is born of Man’s rib?

Who said caste is by God writ?

 

Who said women cannot enter temples or mosques?

Who said Menstruation and Widowhood are both to be abhorred?

 

Who made these rules?

 

Did Durga menstruate? Did Kali?

Did Mary have a husband before she conceived Christ?

 

Who created religions and rites?

Who made castes and border lines?

 

Who created these and why?

 

Radcliffe for Manchester Mills drew a line

that split homes, created the Great Divide

 

Corpses without heads rolling on trains of death

Burnt, decapitated.

 

Zombies looking for blood

Zombies rising out of the death of love

Zombies that cannot tolerate

Zombies that hate—

They no longer think

But Kill—

Kill for Cows,

Kill for Country,

Kill for Dowry,

Kill for Concealing Rape,

Kill in the name of Different Gods.

 

Who made these different Gods?

Who? Who? Who?

 

Was it me or you?

 

Marginalised? Who said we are Marginalised?

 

We are humans walking side by side

singing a song of Love —

Love that will smile our differences aside

Love that will claim we are all the same:

born to live and die

guided by an Unknown Light,

an Energy pulsating through our veins called

Life.

Mitali Chakravarty’s bylines appeared in The Statesman, The Times of India, The Hindustan Times and The Pioneer in the 1980s upto 1992 and more recently online on Kitaab.orgCountercurrentModern Literature, Words and Worlds (Austria) and The Daily Star, Bangladesh, Harbinger Asylum Quarterly(USA). Her poetry has been published online and as part of anthologies. Some of her poetry has recently been translated to German and read in a PEN symposium. Mitali also translates from Bengali and Hindi. She has published a humorous book of essays on living in China where she spent eight years, In the Land of Dragons (2014). 


Countercurrents is answerable only to our readers. Support honest journalism because we have no PLANET B. Become a Patron at Patreon Subscribe to our Telegram channel


GET COUNTERCURRENTS DAILY NEWSLETTER STRAIGHT TO YOUR INBOX


Tags:

Comments are closed.

Translate »