rape – My Spirals

Something I can touch.

Something I can touch.

Assume all TRIGGER WARNINGs. I’ve been trying to write about such issues more often and I hope I do them justice. (secret: you might enjoy the poem more if you google the meaning of some of the names) Let me know if you liked it in the comments.

When my father told me we were the gold pots
at the end of the rainbow,
I was only ten.
He loved rainbows.
Every year on his birthday,
our house would become a castle made of
blue, yellow, and red
and my sister and I would draw him a red carpet
made out of every color in the 62 rupees color pencil pack.
It would start at the door and only last four steps
but it made abba smile the widest every year.

Sevenfold

Sevenfold

Till the day the world is a safe place to live in, I’ll write about the reasons why it’s not. While I do sugar-coat things very often to give people reasons to smile, I know that being raw is the only option to spread awareness. This post is about marital rape and justice. I hope you like it. 🙂 Let’s talk about it in the comments?

What I know of this is: if someone did something to harm Cain, the damage would come back sevenfold. The same goes for anyone with the mark of Cain. I’ve used that as a prop to give seven hells to the villain of this poem.

(TW: abuse, rape)

When you touched me that night with
one hand around my neck
and the other on parts of me that still scream,
I tried my best to stop you.
I hit you across the face and dug my nails deep into
your empty skin
but nothing seemed to wake you up
from the monster that you’d become.
Sometimes I wonder if people found out that I’d hit my husband
because he was raping me,
which part would they be more concerned about?
Your hand choked my cries inside my throat,
and your lips curled into a smile
that still makes mine quiver.
My tears were the mark of Cain
and for every piece of me you broke,
life was going to fuck you up seven times.

A letter to you for a word/sentence.

A letter to you for a word/sentence.

Comment down below and let me know what you think. It’ll mean a lot.

To you,
For every time a woman said no.

I need you to listen.

When I was ten, my mom thought it was important for me to learn two things – one, that tomatoes weren’t vegetables and two, that ‘no’ is a sentence. The former because it was the only mistake I had made in my science exam sheet. The latter because every child should know the chaos not knowing what ‘no’ means has caused. My mother spoke to me about her experiences and told me about things that would make me human, or in her words – ‘ would make me happy’. This conversation became my bed-time story that night and I am really glad it did.

Last night, I read about what you, a thirty-year-old, had done to that eight-year-old girl. You will be punished for that and so, this letter is for you to read in one of these two situations – one, if you ever get a second chance to be better in this lifetime (which I know is unlikely) or two, if this letter finds its way to you in your next life when you’re ten. I really want you to become better – so much so, that I am willing to believe in re-births.

When you heard the word ‘no’ for the first time, what did it mean to you? For me, it was when I asked Baba if I could have two ice creams back to back. I was three. When he said no, I didn’t even think about questioning it. I just bought a chocolate instead. I like to think of myself as a writer when I am alone and so, I am going to give my memory a metaphorical reference for you to become a better human. When a woman says no, do not question it or try to persuade her. If that doesn’t make you happy, then get the chocolate – be genuine, ask her out on a date and see if you connect. If that doesn’t work out either, then just read a good book and fall asleep. This isn’t a metaphor.

Being human is really easy. Trust me.

With hope,
The man assigned to hang you to death.

Previous posts: I fell in love with my best friend.
Instagram: @myspirals

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To all the #METOOs

To all the #METOOs,

In autumn 2017, the world shuddered as a hashtag (me too) spread across hundreds of walls burning thousands of ignorant beliefs in its wake. The world realized that things were not okay. Whispers became loud stories and you accepted openly the things you have had to go through because of humans that went rogue. For most men, it is next to impossible to understand the pain you go through every time you have to talk about that one or many times you felt an unwanted hand on your skin.

The first girl I fell in love with shared her story with me once. It was a winter night and we had just started getting to know each other when I noticed some stories etched onto her wrist in red ink with pens that looked like knives. She was really young when it happened and I remember I was silent for quite some time when she told me everything.

A few years before that, my sister told me about the time she had to go through it. I had to sit while my mom shared her story too. And another close friend of mine told the story of how she was six when it happened. My phone lit up like a Christmas tree with a string of ‘me too’ staring me in the face. All these wonderful women I have been with in my life still stand tall, straight and with battle scars that look a lot like tattoos.

I can’t do much except promise you to never be that man you loathe. Also maybe, I can make a character out of him and kill him in my book for you. You let me know, okay?

Consent has become a foreign language and I am so sorry that you are suffering because of it. I am sorry some men didn’t let you become the Khaleesi that you were meant to be. I wish you didn’t have to stop talking just because you were in the presence of an important ‘influence’. Honestly, fuck them.

Stand tall, stand real and stand the way you want. I am with you. Always.

Yours,
Utsav Raj

Instagram handle: @myspirals
Previous post: The story of the trees.
Related post: A tale of the five senses.

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A tale of the five senses.

Sight:
She was walking down one of the oldest and most crowded streets of the town. Men in turbans, or vests, or filthy t-shirts sat on stalls. Women sat on the ground beside the stalls and spoke sweet nothings to their sons in shorts or daughters in t-shirts too big for them. The men tried desperately to sell things to the people who walked past the stalls with indifference. The kids giggled and ran along the sides of the roads, and she saw all of this right before he blindfolded her.

Sound:
The bustle of the town slowly faded and became a distant buzz. Every step she was made to take now made a sound against something hard, probably wood. The man who had blind-folded her yelled directions now and then groaned as he walked behind her. He sounded like he dreaded his job, and he most probably did because he whined with every step. She could hear twigs breaking beneath her legs and birds chirping around her. The crows cawed loudly because they could sense her danger.

Taste:
For a long time, her mouth tasted like strawberries because that was the last thing she had eaten before the man had forcefully taken her into his car. After driving for an hour since then, they had parked somewhere near the outskirts of the city, on a very crowded road. When he blind-folded her, everything went dark and she could taste the strawberries again as her mouth dried up. Now as she was walked with the man, her tongue was dried up and she could barely speak. But she kept trying and started screaming after a long time. The man used a piece of cloth to gag her, and she could taste the cloth in her mouth.

Smell:
The first time she entered into what probably was a house (as she had heard the door shut), her nose tried to block the awful smell in the air. The man nudged her forward as she tripped with every step she took on the stairs. The smell seemed to be a mixture of dead rats and rotten wood. There was also a nauseating smell of paint that, she guessed, had been used for hiding the wood. The smell of the paint on the wood reminded her of how humans wear masks and play pretend even when they’re old.

Touch:
The man pushed her onto a bed and she hit her head onto the edge. She lost consciousness for a while, and when she came back to her senses, there were two distinct voices in the room. One was coming from very close, so she guessed he was sitting by her side. Suddenly, she felt a hand on her inner thigh and she tried to scream but the cloth just hurt her skin as the man removed her blindfold. Both of the men have evil smiles on their faces and the one sitting closest to her moved his hand higher up her thigh. Every time his fingers touched a new part of her body, she cried and died a little inside.

Instagram handle: myspirals
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Related post: Earth.

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