I am the Woman who Breaks Families

I am the woman who breaks families.

Sita, Draupadi, Helen of Troy and the likes of them,

the ones who are known to have triggered wars

so tragic and glorious that poets, singers, storytellers

Couldn’t help themselves but keep those women alive

ages after their lifetime.

No war was their fault.

If something has to be blamed,

how about the fragile male ego?

Those wars,

- they were the wars of testosterone.

- they were to prove the right over wrong.

- they were to show the prince charming from ugly frog.

- they were to let men drown in their ego.

- they were to pump up the unquestioned pride.

- they were to limit women into boundaries.

- they had nothing to do with women.

- they were about men and their conquests.

I am no Sita, no Draupadi, no Helen

I am a woman who breaks families, for real.

I make married women from generations before feel useless.

I ask them, how could they tolerate what was done to them?

I ask them, why did they not voice themselves in their times?

They tell me, it was a different society that they grew up in.

They tell me, it was a different time that they grew up in.

I understand, and yet I tell them, speak now.

Women are not stupid, they know, they understand.

These women I talk to, they tell me to live my life.

- they tell me not to get married.

- they tell me, do something for yourself.

- they tell me, get a job, follow your passion.

- they tell me a lot of things,

But all I hear is a sad undertone in the words that try to encourage me.

I tell them, it’s not too late.

I tell them, women are doing wonders in old age.

I tell them, transgress, it’s not too late.

But I see, had I not told them anything at all.

They would have gone by doing their chores.

They wouldn’t have thought about what could have been

because their minds were already conditioned.

I wanted to help, I wanted to make them aware.

I forgot, in attempting to make meaning for my life,

I ended up making their lives meaningless.

I am the woman who breaks families.

I tell men, that they should take up some domestic chores.

I tell men, to share the unpaid labour.

Every woman needs her space, a room of her requirements.

I tell men, that they might not be active upholders of patriarchy

I tell men, that it’s the ideologies of society that need change.

Those men tell me, we haven’t tortured our women.

- how are we supposed to help?

- it’s not our fault.

- we don’t understand why you blame us.

I try to tell them that I don't.

I try to help them out of their social conditioning.

I try, I try, I try, I try to tell them they aren’t wrong,

That, they have to get together to do the right thing.

They look at me with desperate eyes,

They look at me as if I have accused them of crime.

And then I realise, I have broken their spirits.

I am the woman who breaks families.

Family is sacred. 

I have heard. I had believed.

But, individual became more important to me.

What was I to do in a family, without knowing myself?

What was I to do as a daughter, sister, or what-so-ever

if I did not know who I was as a woman?

All my relationships are named, with respect to the men in life.

I tell those men, you need to step out of the responsibility.

I tell those men, you need to find your individual self.

I tell those women, you need to find your individual self.

Because, when you do, you will speak for yourself.

You will make your voice heard.

Because you will be more important than everything else.

And that’s exactly what our society doesn’t want you to believe.

Society, as we know it, will crumble.

But another will replace it,

The one where humans find themselves,

and then choose to form personal, social and political bonds.

The one where every human is equal

And isn’t assigned roles to play before birth.

But till then, I am the woman who breaks families

because I make the men and women of a family think.

And thinking, it can be a boon and a bane.

A boon, for an individual; a bane, for a family.

I am the woman who breaks families,

And

I won’t be changing that anytime soon.

- Unashamed and without guilt.

Source: beatricebaiu.deviantart.com