Trigger Warning: It’s that time again for another poem to end rape. This is a prayer to beat the odds of a perpetuating rape culture.
At 8, I was unaware that
Sex without consent is rape
At 9, The Nirbhaya gang rape case
At 10, The Shakthi mills gang rape occurred.
At 11, the 2014 Birbhum gang rape
At 12, another rape case
At 13, another one
At 14, the Unnao rape case.
At 15, Asifa, an 8-year-old girl was raped and murdered
On hearing this, I felt as if I was stabbed forcefully
on my throat to the sound of jazz music
with a blunt knife 12 times.
At 16, the Hyderabad rape-murder case
There was a mutiny of rage
wreaking havoc within my mind
clotting horror in my veins
at the thought of these incidents.
24,212 child abuse cases
4,000 cases every month
130 in a day and one in every 5 minutes
From the 1 Jan to 30 June 2019.
These statistics petrify and perplex me
There are still many such incidents that stir my conscience
And there are still many more out there
that go unreported and undiscovered.
Now, instead of gawking at the
incivility, chaos and melee of a place
Here I am, restricting myself
to not set foot outside alone
as I deeply fear of being pried open by the hungry vultures.
Rape incidents might get
repetitive and monotonous for you
but the survivors continue to relive the moments
as long as they shall live.
This impure pandemic
doesn’t care about age
or skin pigmentation
It’s a contagious disease.
Educate your sons, your brother, your father
and all the other men to respect women and act civilised
These poems will continue until there is no damn material left.
17 and 18 are years
I haven’t experienced yet
but I hope it to be an ode to myself
rather than a eulogy.