Issue: Vol. IV, No. 1, May-July, 2025
The Grey Earth
The green earth has turned grey
The earth looks tired today
Climate, humanity and environment
Are all infected!
Some men have turned into monsters
Putting into shame
Civilization of centuries.
Those fallen have been
For ever degrading
Since when man has given up
Love, faith and trust
Is uncertain!
But the earth became dry and bare
Ever since.
Life lost its charm
Language lost power to express
And we look back to the glorious past!
Our hopes and dreams
Take shape
The thoughts and feelings
Would be poured into poems
And the poems
Will be songs of humanity.
The earth will
Overflow with melody.
Woman is peerless
You are a woman
You do not have an exclusive
name for yourself!
You are a daughter, a sister,
A wife or a mother of someone!!
You are a guest to your parents
Your duty is to serve
Endurance is expected of you
Humility is your virtue, an ornament
You are the preserver of the
family' fame
The keeper of prestige
Society discusses you the most.
But I have too busy a schedule
To mind those matters
I am a bit emotional, capricious
and conceited
I commit small mistakes very often
Make myself ridiculous pulling
At a push door
I cannot do a small sum in my head
Other people 's sufferings break my heart
Even acting of sufferings sheds my tears
Norms of behavior imposed confuse me
Can frontiers of the mind be measured thus?
My resilient mind has power infinite
Worldly worries do not tire me.
I do my duty in earnest
I have competence and identify
Outside home, have education and
I write to keep people aware
I may be a teacher, a scientist,
an astronaut;
I can assume the highest post of my land
I can build happy homes
Minus me the home is wilderness
It is my pride
I am a woman!!
Translated by Ananda Bormudoi
Dr. Farida Ahmed is a poet and former Professor of Anthropology in Dibrugarh University. She has two collections of poems to her credit.