Shabana's House- Aaryan Raj

Among the crowded streets of the city

I'm a building old and frail,

the neon signs above me

cast a faint light on my tale.

I've got broken glass for windows— my weary blind eyes,

the shards of which have traces many

from an Indian sweat's drop

to a Nepalese tears from cries.

My rooms are painted bright at night,

to hide the gloom that grows

to lure the moths to come and feast

on the lives within me enclosed.

My stairs are stained with cracks and blood

like the fate of lives I keep,

and through these stairs I witness

a rich man's virtue slip.

While the "virtuous" man enters the gate

Shabana gets ready

to be served like meat on plate,

to earn something for living.

Her room's a false beauty

covering the pains and screams

she sits in front of the dusty mirror

working on her charm.

Her pale hands have a red shade nail polish,

and she wears a floral salwar

from earrings to anklet

she wears everything like an ideal woman.

She then locks her daughter in a room

to protect her pure heart

but the little girl is mature enough

to understand the misery about to start.

The "virtuous" man then enters the room,

his mind, filled with the life's woes,

like a storm ready to break

he starts removing her salwar's folds.

She lies still on the blue mattress,

the one her daughter likes,

while the "virtuous" man turns into a beast before her sight.

He rips her soul with sharp teeth,

and the room fills with her shrieks

her daughter bangs and vainly tries

to see if her mother's fine.

The brute uses her like she's a dead thing

breaking all the ornaments she wore

and countless times insults her, calling her a whore.

The irony is the brute himself is not more than a pimp

who every night visits a different me to quench his thirst in dim.

The fiend then leaves and walks out of the room,

Shabana sobs for a while thinking of her fate's doom.

She then unlocks her daughter and hugs her,

and stays silent on her scared questions

in this while Shabana gets another order

breaking her daughter's affection.

The horrors that my moist walls see

can give anyone a trauma,

this was just one Shabana

and sadly there are many like her in my drama.