Why are your eyes wet Ma?
While mine are dry as desert sand
You brush my hair with the same tenderness
That you had shown years ago
When every night you put me to bed
And now, you tenderly handcuff me with bangles of red and gold
Threads of beads, gold and diamonds
Choke me like a noose around my neck
You sold me to the highest bidder
And now you gift-wrap me as you give me away.
Ma, you doll me up for the slaughter
And I like a docile lamb let you lead the way
The virgin dressed in gold and red
Head lowered, circles around the fires of hell
Tied to a man barely known, my butcher
I can see the knife glistening in the distance Ma
It’s sharpened edges gleam in the blinding light
Red blood sprouts out as it cuts my skin
A red so dark that it looks a menacing black
Blood that melts into the folds of red sari, disappearing
And blood in the parting of my hair,
In a line etched by the man I that I marry