MATCHBOX

Birth of Isa

Sometimes I wonder
If Marium breastfed Isa,
If she cried out when he bit her,
Or if she sobbed when he would not latch
And sometimes I wonder if this is all too vulgar
To ask during a khutbah in a mosque full of men
Without milk stains on their shirts
Or coconut oil on their breasts
Preaching from minbar,
Which is off limits to the mother of prophet.
But then I think of feeding Isa, birthing Isa,
The expulsion of blood and smell of sweat,
The salt of a mother’s tear
Onto the soft head of the salt of the earth,
And I think if the vulgarity of birth is not
honestly preached
By men who carry power but not burden,
By men who carry privilege but not labour,
By men who carry authority but not submission,
Then miraculous birth of Isa without a father should not be preached at all
’cause the real scandal of the birth of prophet
Lies not in non-existence of father
But in the cracked nipples of Marium,
And not in the sermons of men,
Who say women are too delicate to lead.

Lost Poem

 I can’t help but panic
There’s a lost poem
Inside caresses of hands
Of women who never learned to read or write
As her hands scrubbed her wits away
And I never found it in textbooks or bookstores
‘cause privilege bought privilege
And art suffered at the cost of patriarchy,  reality, inhumanity.

Dinner

Who made dinner while Rumi whirled?
Who mopped the floors while Rabindranath sat in quiet contemplation
And did he lift his legs off the ground obligingly
For a faceless hand, who fed and bathed the children,
Brushed down their hair, mended a torn sleeve
While the great men of learning
Peered deeply into the unknown chasm,
Clutching at threads to weave tales
That other men would read.

And womxn- well womxn-
To be a woman is to imagine
A history of the world retold from her eyes,
A stone, that would, if it could be flint to kindle a fire,
Medusa,
The witches of Salem,
Soorpanaka,
Lilith,
Draupadi,
And the satis offered upon a dead husband’s pyre,
As little more than the timber they sat on.

The womxn traded as spoils of war
Seeded as fertile soil,
Or those, left behind, a wailing baby at her breast,
And three more to feed,
What of them, of us?
So we too bow to the Devis of stone in our temples,
While we slave away in smoky kitchens,
Our soot-stained lives wiped clean
Before a meal is served on gleaming plates,
For the men, who eat first, always first,
And don’t know when the women will eat,
Or if they any longer let the food travel their systems.

The Goddess is just a vessel of chants
That used to hold faith but now not much
Men were looking for hope
She wanted words to hold her anger hostage
But those screams never made it to prayers
Today, a man fell upon goddess’ feet
She said, “what do you want?
What do you want? It’s always about what you want,
What he wants, what the cocks want,
What about what we want?”

Yet we will kneel, won’t we, to Marium,
And lower our heads to celebrate people
From Khadija to Aisha to Mariah as mothers of Muslims
Sing paeans to Lakshmi, Saraswati, Durga,
Asking, seeking, blessings
Meanwhile Hera, Artemis, Athena put their legs
On a table and pity our contentment,
To be as small in our voices, our bodies, our thoughts,
As allowed and offer up our sacred wombs,
To men who will decide their fate on our behalf,
But we busy ourselves with more pressing things,
Such as dinner.

Savarna Feminism Plays Pin the Blame

Savarna feminism plays pin the blame
Why feminism calls me aggressive,
Says I’m too loud,
Too much attitude, too much sucking teeth?
Why feminism swings have privilege wrapped around?
Savarna girl is always right
And she gets to decide parameters of politically correct culture
She’s the queen of call out
With flick of a wrist, she gets to be the bouncer of all things feminist
She’s armed with The Print and OpIndia articles
My feminism is going to write a think piece
On why your feminism needs modification
Savarna feminism asks me a question
And then turns to the nearest Brahmin woman for validation
It’s almost as if my opinion is three-fifths of hers
Or if I should be used to having ideas shot down by Savarna people
It’s well known that I can’t stand Amish Tripathi 
But why my feminism asks me to cry it down
Savarna feminism says, I’ve to support every woman having a platform
Even if it’s built off my back!
Savarna feminism only works for her own ego
Only to lift herself higher than the identities
That she profits off or writes poems about their pain
Citing solidarity as a source
Savarna feminism would protest in the tweets
Rather than the streets
She will lead class discussions on caste system
As she can put me down as a reference
She plays the ventriloquist if she can play in my skin
But I refuse to play games.
Why feminism swears she can’t be racist
When feminism goes to parlours for bleaching
And holds her arm next to mine for comparison
Sometimes for laughs, she wears a hijab
And colours herself with religious unity
Savarna feminism asks if I want to sit down and discuss my issues
As if anything has ever been given to a Muslim woman
As a result of sitting down and discussing
I know I’ve to bleed in order to show this world
That I’m a human too
Savarna feminism says, she wants to fight side by side
But what she wants is for my browner than brown behind to carry her uphill
So she can make a shield out of me for her subtle bigotry
Make me her token queer friend
Make me a target ready for her to pin the blame on me at any moment.