रिनिता मजूमदार की कविता

a nice poem
by 

Rinita Mazumdar

After the nationalistic euphoria of July 4, I think some of us, at least, are ready for anti patriarchical voices, here is my feminist poem, which was published in a while ago, and has now been translated into my "native" language (no I am a firm anti nationalist, this is for me a nostalgia perhaps) by another poet, Atanu Singha, thanks Atanu.

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A Love Poem

Tread gently into my being,
For in my pierced naked body,
You will find maze of pyramids,
Curved out of centuries of precious sorrows.

Love me gently with your soul;
Smell my sweet-bitterness
Like the venom of Kalkut.
For in me,
Ahalya is still a stone
Silent suffering.
Bring your ears
Close to my breast,
Do you hear Behula moan?
Can you see in my crimson eyes,
Draupadi in her blood-stained clothes?

Come close to my soul,
Taste in my tears a thousand flickering lights,
Holding silhouettes of nameless Devadasis
Gliding, dancing in Ujjaini,
In Vidisha,
Hollow in their body,
Hollow in their minds.

Love my body that is shamed,
Love my body that descends into the belly of my Mother Earth,
Love my body that is sacrificed
Scorched and burned.
Love my body that is drenched in crimson blood,
Cut into thousand pieces
Strewned in Holy Shrines.

Caress me gently;
Pluck my soul
String by string;
And in your caress my body will open up
Into a thousand Arabian nights;
Nameless dusky harem
Echoing pale ashavaris
Of incessant grief.

If you love me
And tread gently into my being
You will find maze of pyramids
Studded with mystical kohinoors.
Together we shall weave a net
More powerful than Indra’s,
Spun from freedom, Magic, and Myth;
In it we shall gently fly into the land of endless dreams.
And, in the shadows of a thousand graves,
I shall recaste my body;
There in my tribal self
I shall be your Apsara;
And together we shall tear our net,
And strewn the magical freedom
Like petals of white jasmine flowers;
Then, gently we shall flow out into your joy,
And in my tears …….