Journey of the Heart

Skin whitening is the use of cosmetic products or services to reduce the amount of melanin, or pigment, in the skin to make it appear lighter. It’s a huge market around the world that exploits women’s insecurities about their appearance,  estimated to be worth about $4 billion in India alone! India’s younger generations, however, are starting to fight back with body-positive messages, such as the one delivered in this poem by emerging poet Navratra from Jaipur, India.    Beauty-fool by  Navratra   Rosy lips, dimpled cheeks your long black hair. Celestial nose, pretty eyes, your color is also fair.   Such attributes of beauty: I am amazed to see such grace! But more amazed to realize something missing on your face.   Alas! These features of yours are not attracting me towards you. I see beauty in a brown-cheeked lady sitting just beside you.   What power could this be? I wonder for a while. Then discover the miracle is her alluring smile.   St...

Woman You want me to shrink to ease your pain To bow my head in shame? Because your shame is buried deep beneath your ancestral ash Let Ganga take your piety and wash it well. I will stride as my mother does and speak my words In strange tongues. I have held my belly and bawled When karmic leela bludgeoned The fragile heart within me. My arrhythmic soul Can only dream but Faith is my lineage. Rubescent rivers flow from my story and I fly proudly my red jandhi. You may cremate your shame Let your Maya choke it, smother it, hide it for now. My weighted flight ponders your casket of belief But the sun is in my eye And my bindi whispers Fly.       *   *   * A Jandhi is the flag flown from a bamboo rod to signify the victorious completion of a holy ceremony or puja. Lila (Hinduism) or Leela can be loosely translated as the "divine play. Maya is the Hindi word for illusion. A Bindi is a decorative mark worn in the middle of the forehead by Indian women, especially Hin...