P O E T R Y
Niha Zahan
As I keep moving on ahead,
I take a deep breath;
I was an innocent little girl
I was absolutely unknown about the people in this world;
Who think it’s a curse that I was born.
It had nothing to do with me but with my gender
I realised then, I have to suffer because I’m her.
And I keep moving on ahead,
One day my brother goes off to school;
While I stayed at home
Tending to the boiling pot,
On the stove, scrubbing the
Floor to a fine shine,
Cleaning the streaks off the windows,
I dreamed of being in a classroom;
Travelling to colourful new worlds;
But I kept moving on ahead
And I keep moving on ahead.
Sometimes I see my mom and I try;
How she lifts her head and looks up,
the skies light up entirely;
the clouds float in her eyes.
She struggled all the while;
How when her eyes are shut,
the skies grow all dark,
clouds break, and all over,
the spate of sadness.
My heart breaks
And I keep moving on ahead.
I saw my sister getting married at 8
My sister stayed depressed;
She had no second for deep rest
After marriage, she was always oppressed,
Her property lived in her chest,
Financially, she was pressed;
No matter how she tried her best
Her efforts were all compressed;
She was restricted from searching her light to the west,
That’s how she was denied of her life’s zest.
Like my grandmother and my mother, I stayed silent
And I kept moving on ahead.
But my heart was burning hot,
And it’s still burning hot
Aren’t they human?
As society tells them, she is a woman, and that is her role.
Where she wishes to stomp, she stands on her tiptoes.
Where she wishes to thrash, she glides across the floor.
A puppet bound by the hands of society, pushing, pushing;
To free herself, to change what being a woman means,
This is what the selfish rulers think,
Just strip us down, wash away our skin, we are bare, we are the same, INSIDE
What makes us us?
Is it our gender?
Is it society?
No, what makes us, what makes you, is ultimately your decision,
and that’s something, not even society, can take away from you.
And this is what is in my head
And I’ll keep moving on ahead.
Woah,amazing