The Breastgiver (after Mahesveta Devi)
I give my breasts
for them to foul
for you to fondle
for the young to feed –
Be the divinity you pose as mother.
Caring, caressing, squeezing, suckling –
All that matters is
hunger in different forms.
And when there’s none to reap
I’m sent alone
Uncared for, uncaressed –
Like a mortal God
Or quite less –
A mortal goddess
No roots attached
No seeds withheld
No legacy, none
To follow me after.
*Be it not me tonight
Another day, Another place
Another incident, Another victim -
I wonder what she thought
Or how she felt…
My shift ends late
One hour to commute
Then a walk fifteen minutes straight
There’ll be lights for sure
Still, it’s the night…
And these noises of horror
Occasional vehicles passing by
Those approaching steps
Loud chatters from behind
The roughness, the careless frolic
In those male voices
I walk fast already shaking
And I’m reduced to a prayer
To Gods unknown where
And I keep mumbling
Be it not me tonight.
(Written 17th August 2024, in solidarity with Moumita and those protesting. While this may not be exactly the incident, the immediate reaction to hearing it looked something like this - before the sadness, before the anger, it was fear. Maybe you can’t help it when you are a woman?)
A Strange Thing
Inside my room,
Doors closed,
I love him.
He’s the man.
I, the woman.
I see nothing more.
I step outside and see things appear –
Tags and trophies I never paid for.
This dot I’d never worn even once in my life
Becomes a scar I cannot erase at all.
He’s one.
I’m ‘the other.’
There is nothing more.
This is a strange thing.
One you can’t spell out,
One you can’t care about,
Until they shove you down an alley
And carve it in your bones,
“This is you!” – “This is you!”
And you, helpless, kneel back,
And scream in submission,
“I am, I am, and nothing more!”
*Pottu (Bindhi) generally worn by the Tamil minority in Sri Lanka.
Wrapped in paper
Papers, daily ones,
On a coffee morn to be read –
A bomb blast, thirteen killed,
Right next to port.
One village at border, ten hacked
To Death!
Papers, daily ones,
Carrying stories, and
The scent of death.
Inside them,
A bunch of flowers
Neatly wrapped.
Million Me
They don’t deserve me in the ruled.
Me, and the million me.
Not the smile and shake hands –
That they perfectly do.
It is this that went missing:
I, struggling, lend a hand.
Someone wounded picks me up.
While those on the rule
Simply slip us by.
Yes, they don’t deserve me in the ruled.
I know it just well.
But I don’t dare go in there.
Nor do the million me.
We’ll stand outside.
Imagine we put them there.
Clinging to this thread of hope
That we can switch
Every five years or so.
About the Poet:
M.C.Kanula is currently a student at the Open University of Sri Lanka. An avid reader and writer with a keen eye for beauty, she has always loved the idea of expression through art in all its forms (with of course, a soft corner for tinkering with words). She loves to explore themes of identity and conflict in her work.