She hears them say,
“Childhood where joy begins”
But hers?
She is not sure it ever knocked.
No paper boats, no mango stained summers
Only silence, and shadows that learned her name
before she learned her own.
Her lullabies were slammed doors,
Spit out curses and scoldings that scraped
and wounds stitched into skin.
While others played with dolls and dreams
her toys were vessels and brooms.
When people spoke of dreams, she thought
they were just stories made up to survive nights.
Once at school, when the teacher said
“Draw your home”
None of her crayons matched
the colours of others
Still, she tried, a roof, a sun, a crooked tree
But how could she sketch a home with warmth,
when her hands have only known cold walls.
She didn’t grow up, She just aged
counting days like unseen bruises
beneath her silence.
Tell me,
What do you call a childhood
that never arrived
but still somehow left her?
***
Madras Courier originally ran as a broadsheet with a poetry section. It was a time when readers felt comfortable sharing glimpses of their lives through verse. If you have a poem you’d like to submit, do email us at [email protected].
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