The Unforgettable Desire

“I do not want to talk to people, even though a samajik keeda inside my system fills me with guilt for my lack of civility. I am drowned by the forced need to message at times, but then, I do not text simply because I feel that the talk will lead to no productivity. It hasn't in all these years.” Image source: Personal chats for public use. One fine night I sent a message to a couple of my friends asking them, “what is it called when you know you have to do certain things and you cannot make time for it because you are doing other things?” They said, “Life” and “Priorities.” Each word made sense to the situation in its own way. My every day life has changed in last nine months (no, not child birth), in a good way irrespective of what people have to say. I fancy describing my current state of being as “twenty three and 'adult'ing” because I felt some time back that twenty three is the age when you begin to feel like an ‘adult’, by my definition ‘responsible’ (Of c

One day in my M.A. classroom, a professor was teaching Emily Dickinson’s “She Sweeped with Many-Colored Brooms”, and I was scribbling a poem of my own in the last page of my notebook. I stared up, not looking at anything in particular, unaware that my gaze was in direct contact with that of the professor. He asked me, “Do you sweep at home?” “Yes”, I replied. “Girls usually sweep”, was his response. Unable to control the rising adrenaline and noradrenaline within me, I replied without being asked, “I sweep because I live alone, I cannot afford a maid (irrespective of my issues with cheap labour), and I like a clean room. I don’t think it has got anything to do with me being a girl. I am sure, any responsible human would do so.” I do not remember what happened next as my response was ignored. I went back to writing my poem. Do you realise what happened in those few minutes? My developing sense of responsibility was overshadowed by my social sex, my gender, and its role in this societ