Umpteen times
Have I been food
And at times prey
To a man’s hunger,
Now who is your father.
Once in a month, three days
My womb wept
Tears of blood
Till the day you sprouted
And I graduated from
A private shame to a
Public honour.
Not as easy as a fruit that can be plucked
Not as easy as an egg to lay and hatch
Not as easy as a seed that can be sown
Growing you from inside me
Whom only an ultrasound can see
Sensing the kick and the swell, finally
Ejecting you out in whole
Fulfilled a mother’s role
You smiled and then laughed,
turned, then crawled,
And watching you grow,
As you sat and stood,
then walked and ran-
the folds of my stretched skin
As memoirs remain
And shaping your future,
Oblivious to my shape
Beauty resigned to brown blotches
On face, milkless breasts and
Overgrown bottoms…
These days, there is talk
About human rights and night soil
Those days, when you soiled,
I wiped with a smile.
I wept with you, slept when you slept
My dreams grew as you grew.
You learned the rules of life
And now own a wife
Today, you least care me..
For there’s a love you share
For a girl, a newborn bliss
In size, shape,youth and color…
These aren’t words of woe
Asking for acts you owe
I expect nothing from you..
But Only, a vow,
not to leave her, yearning
For what I yearn.