All About Women   

THE FEMALE

BIRTH

In the instinct of no-creature-of-Nature
the birth of a female is considered undesirable.
Only humans consider it strange.

CHILDHOOD

Since she has been born,
    let her stay in an obscure corner of her home
    and learn to survive.

ADOLESCENCE

Keep your hair in a tight knot.
Don't let your eyes wander here and there.
Hide carefully your swelling breasts.
Women need to be kept in chains.
At best they can be allowed
to move about in the precincts of the home, that's all.

YOUTH

Men look for unviolated virgins
    so that they can maul and tear them,
    some on the plea of love,
    some of marriage.

OLD AGE

The tight smooth skin is full of wrinkles.
The menstruation pain is gone forever.
The thread of the tale told again has snapped.

DEATH

We are well rid of nuisance.
In the instinct of no-creature-of-Nature
is the death of a female so desirable.

LIBERATION

"Heaven for women lies at the feet of their husband."
        Women, they say, improperly care;
            for husbands, shirk their duties daily.
        But, lured by the promise of Paradise,
        they lick dirt and dust off their husbands' feet.
Those were learnèd men who framed such promises.

The time has come to extinguish such myths,
    to set afire such learnèd laws,
and right the wrongs
that pollute our earthly paradise.

THE UNRUNG RING

 So many things ring,
    the cells of the body,
    the ankle bells as they dance,
    the silver wrist bangles.
As the monsoon rains fall on the window
    the glasspanes musically ring.

As clouds clash with clouds
    lightning rings out.|
Dreams ring, keeping time to their beats,
    and, making a havoc internally,
    loneliness rings.

Only an intimate bell on my door does not ring.

CONDITION

I can't stay content with heart alone.
I want to squeeze you hard,
        get to the core.
I must taste all of it.

Come, fully repay the debt
you owe my body.

LOOK

Steadily I look at beauty.
Who has the arrogance
    to take his eyes away from me?
All the stones are melting away
    before my look.
The seasoned swindler at his gambling table
    is losing all his bets.
If the look hits the target,
    who can withdraw his mind?

I look steadily at you.
All around there is only the look of a barren desert.
You are just a silly boy:
How can you escape surrendering to my eyes!

IN RETURN

You gave me poison.
What shall I give in return?
I'll give you my pitcher of love
    down to its last drop.

How do you look when you are in bed,
    or go to sleep,
    or wake after a dream?
How do you look when, arising from bed,
    you go to the bathroom.
    pour a glass of water from a jug
    and drink it?
I have never seen you in a domestic scene
after you have shaved and bathed.
    How do you look
        as you sing under your breath.
        when you take off your shirt,
        when someone spreads
        her forest of hair
        on your broad chest
        and overwhelms you with caresses?
        when, awaking in the depth of some night
            you drown yourself
            in the wild love of a woman
            like the stormy waves on a river?
I long so much to see, one day,
    how a woman's body
    trembles joyfully at your touch.
For once I want so much to be a woman through and through!

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