false solace

(to an inconsolable dalit couple)

I.

Uka, you must become large-hearted like Rama.

so stop matching time and again

Magla’s face with yours

or your forefathers’ faces.

and stop beating her black and blue.

even the dead cow’s udders taste sweet, Uka,

let her live for the suckling child.

and the children she will bear to you.

and how come an Uuntouchable believes

that one gets defiled by the contact of a stranger’s skin ?

was it her fault

that the helpless woman was stopped by that savarna scorpion

when she was half-way to the fields all alone ?

the pestering whispers will die down as the time passes.

and Uka, have you seen children of the sun sun-like?

this Earth,  his child --

how ugly and rugged and dark is she ?

Uka, it’s true there is not much difference

in the face of that Kanabi snake and Magala’s muddy face.

then what about those tar black Kanabi and Koli children,

were they fathered by you or me or any of our castemen?  

that black puppy you carry on your shoulder 

and kitten you play with in your lap –

are they your kids ?

Uka, the one who gives birth is called mother

but he who brings up is called father in Gokul.

Uka, do we cast out a  pea from peanuts

while sowing the seeds in the fields ?

Uka, you must become large-hearted like Rama.

or will have shoot the arrow aiming sharp,

or stab in with your flaying-knife

and cut off this crooked cock’s terrifying crest.

II.

Methi, you will have to be large-hearted like Sita.

so stop crying

pounds of tears and blood

in the woods and fields

before  trees and cacti hedges

helpless against the vagaries of time,

he is doing bone-breaking drudgery

in the Kanbi’s farm

all day and night,

to fill the bellies of these  piggy children.

looking you suckling Kanbi’s little snake-

this hedgehog pricking her while in her womb,

his endurance may give way

and slap you in a husbandly anger !

don’t you know the saying,

that weak husband is valiant only on his wife ?

but with this Kanbi’s farm,

this Kalubha’s well,

and that Koli’s hut –

you raise your little ones with the largesse of these lords;

you will have to swallow all :

their evil eye

and their dirty desire too.

dusty and earthy

clod of clay he may be, Methi

but Dhuliyo is your husband after all,

and strong enough to rein in Kanbi’s untamed ox all alone;

his manhood is not stigmatised ?

husband of a cuckold that he will be called !

but Methi, our forefathers called each child a child-king.

that Christian bavo says

the one who was born in the manger to the virgin mother

is known as god

and the one that was found deserted in the floating basket

became a king.

he will grow up tomorrow

and be your care taker in your old age.

don’t you know

devima Kalka’s sari was snatched by the king Patai

and sati Jasma’s bosom-scarf was not dragged by the king Sidhraj ?

were they stained by these  stigma?

they are revered as chaste deities, you know.

Methi, you have to be large hearted like Sita.

or will have to become a tigress of the forest

or become Ma Jogini of our cremating ghat        

and kill all these poisonous KanbanKolanKalotaran.