During Partition, 75,000 to 100,000 women were abducted and raped. Many of these women were forced to marry, or chose to stay with their abductors because they knew they would not be accepted back into the communities from which they had been stolen.
we’ve had our worth told to us since always:
two goats & maybe a nose ring or bracelet.
we’ve tried to re-learn
worth outside our bodies one day
may our names come before our sex
one day may we be more than a body
may we forget the threats of our uncles
selling us off to some man some round
belly & house already brimming with wives
may our names come before you
come before butameez come before whore
may our silhouettes not be followed
not be the last fed & the first to wake
one day may the men in our beds not be strange