My tongue is my sword.
I slash the men of my country
with reason and knowledge,
While they rebuttal with
their phallus and acid.
Consent?
What consent? Opputal?
Enna opputal?
The price of my reasoning,
is my right to say no.
.
My body is my temple.
I stand for myself in my
shorts, my tank tops,
My two
pieces, my bodycon dresses,
While the male gaze strips
me of my kalacharam,
my sanskar,
My manam, my valarppu.
.
Speaking wisdom and truth,
Each syllable,
stress, and sibilant,
Well thought out,
never leaving it to intonation,
But my tongue is lost
when thousands sightsee
this temple,
Transcending space and time,
thousands more comment
about its inferiority.
.
A temple
is a place of divine;
welcome to all.
Men see and touch
divinity,
While tasting it
in the curves of
the structure, in the texture
of the shape,
Women hear and
smell divinity,
For its true being,
the temple, a place to exist.
.
Misogyny only grasps physically.
Penniyam sees
into the soul spiritually,
Demanding a
temple unscathed,
My fleshly existence
means I am undeserving,
Hence, belittled,
assaulted,
mutilated, manipulated.
.
The macho creed
of the colored society,
Only put their palms together,
Finger to finger,
bending their elbows and wrists
in place,
In salutations
of respect to Goddesses
Praying for strength
and protection.
.
Goddesses depicted vividly
through bright colors, and tactile imagery,
An exaggeration
of the goddesses leading
real lives,
Fighting the real villains
that are these men,
Transmitting genuine
ethereal superpowers,
Sometimes even losing themselves in the battle.
.