My Mother Is Evolving

By Divya Bharti

My mother- is 'the other woman’, ladies in the colony gossip of.

but my father has another woman, no one talks about.

My mom and dad are lovers under night sky,

loving every other man and woman,

but not just each other.

Every morning they both come out of their dingy bedroom smelling different.

Dad smells of extra sweet cheap perfume.

And my mom smells of expensive woody, Smokey,spicy scent.

(My mother is 'the other woman' and 'a gold digger' too, ladies in the colony gossip of.)

My mom and dad they both are at 180 degrees from the point that completes the circle called family.

(And length of tangents drawn from an external point to a circle are equal and so their suffering different and same.)

My dad says he is tired of these walls and this blue ceiling.

My mom says she is tired of boundaries and keeps repeating it letter by letter until it stops howling.

My parents argue, who between them is the bigger victim?

My mom is tired of stories inside the hollowness of her voice,

and she talked till her teeth wore out from friction blurting her emotions.

My dad made no point but just had to say

Lipstick smudges and fades over time, it melts with a kiss.

(As a child; I looked up to their love and

as an adult their love stares at me.)

'The other man' my mother has, no one knows about.

'The other woman' my father has, no one talks about.

But,

My mother is 'the other woman'- ladies in the colony gossip of.

My father looks at me, comes closer and spoke

"I love your mother, but I don't like how my wife makes me feel."

Mom and I argue, she says your father left,

and I deny, saying your husband left.

(none of us willing to call him; ours, anymore.)

Now my mom put sindoor from that same lipstick hoping it fades with time.

Since then, my mother is evolving and

today she waits on the door for 'the other man.'

By Divya Bharti