By Shweta Rajput
I have read much about racism in distant lands,
Where skin becomes a language to understand
South Africa—loud, defiant, and raw,
Too sharp to miss, too cruel to thaw.
By people, by nations, even guests from afar,
Have written poems on their left-out scar.
But I have seen racism in much a subtler shade,
In the quiet corners where judgments are made.
In my nation, my home, sometimes within us—
Where in our daily life the skin makes a lot of fuss.
A girl will trade dreams for a fairer face,
Yet never chase growth, or wisdom’s grace.
When a dark child arrives, what do we show?
Sneers on faces of women that quietly glow.
The whitening cream sells like a charm,
As if deeper hues signal harm.
And when illness darkens the skin’s bright glow,
The whispers say, “Her soul’s sunk low.”
“An evil’s come,” a woman would sigh,
As if blackness means the spirit's gone awry.
In the land where Krishna danced in night’s hue,
We can’t paint Him black, so we painted blue—
In a country where divine can descend as humans
But alas! We cannot see divine in commons...
I cannot shout—this isn’t a war with sound,
No banners raised, no battleground.
Still it lingers—in the blood, in the breath and eyes,
In jokes whispered soft, in the gossip in disguise.
In glances exchanged, in silence so deep,
In the things we sow, in what we reap.