Poetry:
Mohit Joshi
Fire Ordeal
Leaves that are intact even in storms
Can fall aground at the touch of a slight breeze
I, smoldered by your allegations,
Have turned ash, a macabre one.
How can ash burn again in a fire ordeal?
The Ramayan is a tale of defeat for a thousand of my sisters.
How did truth and dharma win at women's defeat?
Hey, power-mongering rulers!
If you ask for my self-respect in exchange for the so-called honor
How can I help doubting your dignity?
Tell: can you take the fire ordeal as well?
I have appeared in a new avatar again
And have finished writing Sitayan
In every episode of which
I have taken one fire ordeal each day.
This is not to prove myself worthy of any Ram;
It's for my self-respect; for freedom.
History needs to know:
The wooden-sandals are nothing but burdens
For those born to fly.
I shall teach what purity is
To you and to this society
That has demarcated the Laxman-rekha
And have changed homes into prisons
Where even the female fetuses
Are enduring fire ordeals.
Smoldered in the flames of torture
My body has become a weapon;
With the flames inside my heart
I shall gut your empire.
With the ash from the gutted empire
And all mysteries of the universe
I shall, from inside m vagina,
Engender a golden age ;
I shall feed decency from my breast
And thus raise Lav-Kush .
Not even a trace of your narrow and hollow idealisms
Shall be left behind.
Love shall mean nothing but love;
It shall not entail being captives or disgraced.
After repeated plunging into fire for the ordeal
Even the flames much have noticed
The odor of my body: a gutted civilization!
Even after life has gulped up flames
Fire shall not be able to devour life.
From the ash, I shall rise with a start
And
Fly, as does a phoenix.
Sitayan : Sita's story, imagined with the Ramayan, Ram's story
Laxman-rekha : A demarcation line Laxman had drawn for Sita, asking her stay inside it to prevent being kidnapped by anyone
Lav-Kush : Sons of Ram and Sita, as mentioned in the Ramayan
Translation: Mahesh Paudyal
