What’s Wrong With Us Kali Women

There’s nothing wrong. Nothing wrong. That’s your fear labelling us. We are the Kali women. And all other female, male, androgynous gods We don’t distinguish. We seek. We learn. Comprehend. Embrace. We are the Kali women. In the forefront, striding and, yes strutting our stuff too. Some men gulp and gawk. The Ji, sir ones. And those men that make a tight knot of their patriarchy right in front of their balls. They are the same who have been bowing before Kali’s statues, images for centuries. Marking their foreheads with the mitti from her robes. And then they call her Ma Kali and walk away brash, brazen, evil. Don’t think she’s not watching.

There’s nothing wrong. Nothing wrong. That’s your fear labelling us. We are the Kali women. And all other female, male, androgynous gods. Always in front, straddling between pathways, poles, blocks, and behaviour. Between screams and footsteps pinning for justice denied. Justice Abused. Justice Flagged. Lynched. Burned. Their dark skin, their different religion, their torn clothes, their sandals bloodstained, their handkerchief drenched and smelling of your foul breath, with your hands, striking, your feet jutting and hitting. And then in your sinister voice, you sing well into the murky night, Ma Kali. Ma Kali, Ma Kali. Ma Kali. Don’t think she’s not watching.

There’s nothing wrong. Nothing wrong. That’s your fear labelling us. We are the Kali women. My skin is Kali, my heart is gold, my soul is a child…cries, laughs, jumps… feelings flow like fresh churned cream from cow’s milk. My skin disgusts you. Yet you try to tan yours. My skin disturbs you, yet you find it exotic. My skin you call gandi. But I am clean. I bathe. In winters when my skin lightens a bit, you proclaim I am looking saaf, fair. I was always clean. It’s your mind that is dirty. Even mock bathing in the river Ganges might skim above your falseness.

Glossary:

*Mitti: Dirt/Earth *Kali: Of Black color and also Goddess of destroyer of evil *Ma: Mother *Gandi: Dirty *Saaf: Clean. Also, a colloquial word to imply fair skinned *Ganga: Considered to be one of the holiest rivers in India