Forgive Me, My Child

Sweating screaming shuddering

l wake up in the middle of night

How could you kill a part of your being

Deafening shrieks seize me tight

My mind pounding my soul cursing

Haunting cries of my murdered baby

Leave me dumb and distraught

Why did you turn your womb into tomb

What was my crime, she asks

How can you sleep with your hands

Soaked with my innocent blood

How could you commit the horrendous crime

How could your tears not shed

How could I explain to her?

Shaken to core my spirit flogged

My motherly instinct bitterly wept

My soul shrieked my heart bled

When I smeared my hands red

But weren't you the seed of lust?

How could I explain to her?

Girls have shattered glass ceiling

But they are still chained in fetters

Perverts are still on the prowl

Scourge of dowry still batters

Mindsets still stuck in quagmire

Brides are still burnt alive

Three months olds are ripped apart

End to Nirbhayas' nightmare not in sight

Forgive me, my child

Your traumatized mother could not let you live

A life of stigma and ostrasization

Forgive me, my child

Your life would have been a living hell

With pervert society's barbs and bursts

Heaped on progeny of rape, of lust