Mom
You please
Don’t speak
I can’t bear your impatience
Your loud voice
You, being ready to shout at me
on my next minor mistake
As forgiving their children
is not a thing
which parents do
I have no friends
Just like many of the grown-up children
I’m dependent on you
for food
Does your good deeds
Makes me bound to accept your vitriol?
After the demise of you and dad,
I know,
I’d suffer badly
A child who always thinks about
what would happen to him
When his parents are no more
You master your taunt-making skill
Never love your husband
but always feel bad
on his behalf
Make me feel bad
that I’m not a responsible son
The only person you like
is the aunt or grandma
on the other side of the phone
Who you can’t see physically
Whose cheep acts on the daily basis
are not under your scrutiny.
Why did you destroy your goodness
Just to save your two daughters
who got in a relationship
beyond caste,
beyond religion
I want to blame my grandmom
who never encouraged you to study,
who moulded you in a conservative set-up.
Mom
Watching a movie
is not a bad thing
Talking to a girl on the phone
is not something bad
Consensual sex between adults
is a normal thing
Just knowing such thoughts
of your son will send you in deep shock
Mom
it’s necessary to give
moral and psychological support
to your children, in their learning years
Your ‘habitus’ is not like that
The complaint that I’m still studying
A subject which can be studied from home
Your desire
to get daughter-in-law soon
but the barrier of your unemployed son.
You see me
That I’ll turn out same as your
patriarchal husband
and shout at me, based on your premonitions
It was your mismanagement
which spent all the life savings
on the construction of a house
which you knowingly call ‘home’
In a competition, you constructed another floor
Which was an escape for you
From the news of your daughter’s relationships updates
Which you’ll always deny.
The house was always perfect
for our needs
and now you want me
to stay close
to take care of the home
It was easy to recover from your beatings as a kid
Now, I don’t what is the problem between the two of us
Why you and me, are not happy.
You have done many things for me
It’s you only who provided me an
English-education
And today I’m able to write a bit, speak a bit
I might have exaggerated
here and there
Your opinion on the same
Would be something different
Beyond the reach of readers
Maybe there’s some iota of truth
in my complaints.
Rahul Shrivastava is pursuing a Masters in Sociology from Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. You can read his blog here.
Featured image: Hello I’m Nik / Unsplash