Poetry 2015, Shortlist Haimanti Dutta Ray

I Am She

The music of falling rain catches
The lightning speed of sunlight as it lashes on my windowpanes,
In an effective fusion of love, light and harmony

I have been sitting here, watching
The slow dripping of water, drop by drop
Drip-drip
From leaves unto my face,

My face which reveals a thousand distortions when looked
At, in front of a mirror,
Suddenly assumes the beauty of a
Pristine, teenage girl, a girl who had walked a thousand miles on a
Rain-soaked day, to catch a glimpse of the rising morning sun,
To catch the rainbow after an onslaught of rain,
It was the dream of that girl.

She had held lives, now turned into ashes, on the palms of her hand.
Lives that were spent fostering her,
Hers is the voice of tomorrow –
A tomorrow where sectarian conflicts come to a final resolution,
She stands as a pillar of trust among disbelievers of humankind.

Yes I am she.
I am that voice that had meandered
Through lanes and by-lanes,
Only to reverberate around that blind alley,
I had vibrated through the lilting tunes of Bob Dylan
Only to come to a thunderous halt when the forces of Communism
Had fallen crashing all over the globe

I am she, who had fought for women’s rights for centuries,
Whose voice had had been stifled under your patriarchy
 I have withstood the onslaught of violence of the most heinous order,
Yet none could defeat the cadence and candour of my voice –

I am she – the voice of femininity, throttled as I was, for eons of years,
Today I have resurfaced, effectively, in the firmament of male domination.