Nobody

India might have entered its 70^th year of independence, but the sacrifices of all those who fought hard to attain it are fresh in the collective memory, as are the memories of the horrors of the partition of India that followed soon after.

The poem ‘Nobody’ aims to capture one sentiment from that time. It has been written by Reena Kapoor, both of whose parents were from the Pakistan side of undivided India. She grew up listening to her family’s ordeal of the time of partition of India. She believes that women of partition were subjected to gruesome horrors not just by the others but by their own communities, in the name of ‘honour’ as well.

She is particularly moved by her own grandmother’s experience, who found her way from Peshawar to Haridwar during the time, as a recently widowed woman. But her ordeal had hardly ended – she made her way back once more to get the family valuables so she could bring her children up. This poem is, thus, dedicated to her grandmother, and countless other ladies like her, who were forced to flee and for others who did not even get the opportunity.

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Nobody

my story so familiar, so utterly common place
the cries, the weeping, the wailing for my dead
all the homes i know reek with echoes of such pain
for those mutilated, raped, and dishonored and bled

rude history swept in and flooded my home
chased my dreams away while i stood small and dumb
i ran for my children, left all that i knew
a home, vain comforts, a lifetime rendered numb

wise ones exhorted us women "choose honor over life!"
heavy familial burdens bestowed on us to take
rooms of charred bodies, honorable heaps in the well
they never thought to ask whose choice was it to make

told us a dear new freedom was headed our way
but forgot in those slogans my name and my face
as i was being banished, being compelled to 'choose'
festivities marked the tryst with destiny's famed day

they said it was 'azaadi' for a 'svatantara' new land
demands just sacrifice from all, it was claimed
yet apparently when they came gouging for that rent
our heads were bartered for lines in political sands

a foreign lawyer who'd never set foot on my soil
inked new lines, lit them up and it was declared
clean cartographies created, summarily announced
ancestral homes, generations, lives? simply exchange!

books decoded new lines that severed all old ties
without asking me once how my own life was hacked
this "partition" was explained in historians' thesis
my truth came up trivial compared to those tracts

yet do you see those ties still shackle me today
the nightmares stay close, like wearying next of kin
every year you celebrate freedom -- yet i still burn
the wounds seethe and breathe just under my skin

i rebirthed you countless times, fenced every fear at bay
now will you ease my torment from this vicious history?
will you free my tale from mere domestic rants and tears?
do save your pity but not for me; acknowledge my story

don't let me leave here yet, unheard and unsung
expose unto sunlight my darkness, scars and guilt
don't choose to walk on by unmoved, unchanged
or history she'll come knocking, reigniting every sin!

Reena Kapoor lives in San Francisco Bay Area with her husband, daughter and dog. She works in the tech industry. Her passions include gardening, poetry and photography. Reena is also a founding donor to the 1947 Partition Archive, whose stories are also published in Contemporary Indian Woman.