Women's Day

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Another Women’s Day is another decorous occasion

To pen down lines… About the women enjoying empowerment (?)

Yes! To pen down lines about women enjoying

Financial Empowerment in the patriarchal society.

And to lend a deaf ear to the shrieks of the housemaid,

Being slapped by her drunken husband until she allows him to unknot her pallu edge and rush to the liquor shop at the end of the street, with a fifty rupee note in his hand.

To pen down lines… About the women enjoying

Self-Worth in the patriarchal society.

And to shut eyes on the body-shaming that a young girl undergoes

At the hands of family, friends, and society alike.

To pen down lines… About the women enjoying

The Best Career Opportunities in the patriarchal society.

And to silence the shameful stories of harassment and exclusion

Of small town girls, pregnant women, and nursing mothers,

Who are trying in vain to break the glass ceiling, at their modern offices which claim to be fair and congenial for everyone.

To pen down lines… About the women enjoying

Comfortable Conjugal Lives in the patriarchal society,

And to swap the TV channels to evade the news

Of those who were killed by fathers and brothers for committing the crime of exercising a choice,

And of those who were deserted by husbands for not getting sufficient dowries.

To pen down lines… About the women enjoying

The Devi Status…

And to ignore the torture 

Of the silent ones who are guilty of not bearing a son...

And of those older ones suffering from mental and emotional wreck, 

Waiting for death in some remote corner of their houses.

 

The useless lines about the women enjoying empowerment…

Are just appended to the anthologies

Which are referred to, to begin and end the fancy speeches

On Seminars and Conventions about

How far Women have come on the road to Emancipation and Empowerment.

Let’s not add useless pages to these volumes

Let’s not pen down lines…

Unless each woman attains the freedom to control her own life,

Unless the social and economic order is just –in the real sense,

Unless empowerment makes it to every single woman…

From a housemaid to a Devi.

 - Parastish


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