Fair and Lovely

Standing in the fields of mustard,

She felt the last few winds of the winter,

It had been long and it had been hard,

And all she wanted was for the sun to kiss her.

Her dupatta wrapped around and covered her face,

The sun tried but it couldn’t reach,

They said the parda protected her modesty and grace,

Or at least that’s what they told her to preach.

To keep away the looks and the strangers gaze,

Her purity and decency depended on this,

But she craved the sun and its glorious rays,

All she wanted was for the sun to give her a kiss.

She wanted to move the dupatta from her way,

But afraid it would cause the men in the field to feel at unease,

And so she wished to be born some other day,

A day 200 years from now where her face could be in the breeze.

The field danced around her and to her surprise,

It twisted and twirled and created new sights,

The future of 200 years from now appeared in front of her eyes,

And what she saw left her with a fright.

The East India Company marched on in,

They took our lands and declared their rule,

The people who ran our country now had white skin,

Anyone darker would be deemed a fool.

Primitive savages was our new name,

Skin that was dark equated to canines,

To put my face in the sun would bring me shame,

And so slipped away my dream for sunshine.

At first it was the men and then it was the whites,

Surely in another 400 years her face could soak the sun,

She’ll be able to bask and survive on the light,

And so the visions of the future again begun.

The field danced around her and to her surprise,

It twisted and twirled and created new sights,

The future of 400 years from now appeared in front of her eyes,

And what she saw left her with a fright.

The colonizers had left and we were apparently free,

We had our independence but our minds were washed,

For everyone believed only fair was lovely,

They bleached and harmed their skin at a big cost.

She saw kids that thought their skin wasn’t clean,

They scrubbed their elbows and knees to get rid of the brown,

They hid their color and didn’t want it to be seen,

As they saw that only white skin wore the crown.

Their movies had stars with light eyes,

Not a hint of dark and features so thin,

Their minds were filled with so many lies,

Of inferiority because of their skin.

Her brothers and sister couldn’t shake away the implicit learnings,

Conditioned to feel less than,

And so she stood in this field still yearning,

For her skin to feel the warmth of a brown tan.

Still hopeful and positive she wishes once again,

For rebirth in another 600 years,

Where she would be ruled by no outsider or no man,

Where no person would be controlled or policed by fears.

The field danced around her and now she wasn’t surprised,

The twists and twirls created new sights,

The future of 600 years from now appeared in front of her eyes,

And what she saw left her with a fright.

The planet was in a state she couldn’t believe,

The lands were barren and oceans dry,

There were no forests left to grieve,

And the scariest discovery was when she looked up at the sky.

The blanket that protected our earth,

Depleted to the point of no return,

There was no more time left for rebirth,

One look at the sun and it would make you burn.

All she had wanted was the freedom to be,

To close her eyes and face the glory,

For her eyelids to turn a fiery red and see,

The melanin in her skin to tell a story.

Instead she saw rays so bright,

That they swallowed everyone whole,

And all that was left was a light,

No gold, no oil, no fuel, nor coal.

The thing about the sun is that it equally treats,

It doesn’t pick and choose whom it devours,

So when the planet was at its peak heat,

It didn’t give preference to men in their tall towers.

The light that came simply took away,

All our order and all of our systems,

With that it washed all the powers at play,

It took away the evil and washed our existence.

But for those that craved the light,

That moment felt pure that they did not care,

So they finally basked and didn’t put up a fight,

For maybe the world would be reborn that was lovely and fair.

And so she found herself back in that field,

Having seen the end she felt oddly serene,

She pulled the dupatta down for it wasn’t going to shield,

She threw her face up and soaked all the beams.