Poetry

Reuters photo

By

Amitabh Vikram Dwivedi

Discrimination

I too want to walk-

Not naked, but topless.

Like males,

I too like to walk around

On a hot summer day.

Why my breasts have always been caged?

I wonder.

No serious crime actually they commit;

Except feeding the infant

Since the dawn of civilization.

Like me, they too have experienced

Little or no freedom, I suppose.

Law[1] says, ‘women are free to go topless.’

But at what cost-

I am afraid.

Regressive men may break progressive law anytime-

They may assault or harass me.

Why only my nipples violate

Instagram or Facebook policies-

I fail to understand.

Why woman should be ashamed of breastfeeding?

Instead, you need to be ashamed of sexualizing my boobs.

I am comfortable in my body,

But not comfortable in your culture-

Where being topless means ‘I am horny or a slut’.

Sorry, your culture is sexualized and

Not my body.

[1] New York State Court of Appeals ruling in favour of the women’s assertion that the state law governing public nudity was discriminatory.

Amitabh Vikram Dwivedi

Amitabh Vikram Dwivedi is assistant professor of linguistics at Shri Mata Vaishno Devi University, India. His research interests include language documentation, writing descriptive grammars, and the preservation of rare and endangered languages in South Asia. He has contributed articles to many Science Citation Index journals.

His most recent books are A Grammar of Hadoti (Lincom: Munich, 2012), A Grammar of Bhadarwahi (Lincom: Munich, 2013), and a poetry collection titled Chinaar kaa Sukhaa Pattaa (2015) in Hindi.

As a poet, he has published more than 100 poems in different anthologies, journals and magazines worldwide. Until recently, his poem “Mother” has been published as a prologue to Motherhood and War: International Perspectives (Eds.), Palgrave Macmillan Press. 2014.