When I Brought Her Home by Rinzu Rajan

They called me a domineering dame
only because I refused to respect
the rule made for a woman
a cook, cleaner and baby machine
I couldn't have been
as Napoleon once wrongly said.
Never could I see men
as masters or a marriage
as mandatory
and I didn't mind if that made me
rude, arrogant or a vagabond.

And in a bid to stand straight
in my spine, for unsolicited advice
about matrimony was commonplace
etched on every inch of the wall
around my debris.
One May morning she came home
that cherub of a creature with
a glittering glaze and a sparkling smile
they protested at my decision
which they say is a folly of an error
I chose to change diapers
and sing lullabies to a parent-less progeny
rather than for the work of my womb
why still remains a question
perhaps it was my own way
of thanking the Almighty
for not rejecting me in refusal like her.