Poem- An Introduction by Kamala Das

By -
TEXT OF POEMS

I don't know politics but I know the names
Of those in power, and can repeat them like
Days of weeks or names of months, beginning with Nehru.
I am Indian, very brown, born in Malabar,
I speak three languages, write in
Two, dreams in one.
Do not write in English, they said, English is
Not your mother tongue.
Why not leave me alone critics, friends, visiting cousins,
every one of you?
Why not let me speak in any language I like?
The language I speak becomes mine its distortions its queerness
All mine, mine alone.
It is half English, half Indian, funny perhaps, but it is honest
It is as human as I am human, do not you see
it voices my joys, my longings, my hopes and it
Is useful to be as cawing as to crow or roaring to the lions.
It is human a speech, the speech of mind that is here and not there,
A mind that sees and hears and is aware
not the deaf-blind speech
Of trees in storm or of monsoon clouds or of rain or the
Incoherent mutterings of blessing funeral pyre.
I was a child, and later
They told me I grew, for I become tall, my limbs
Swelled and one or two sprouted hair.
When I ask for love, not knowing what else to ask for
He drew or youth of sixteen into the
Bedroom and closed the door, He did not beat me
But my sad woman-body felt so beaten.
The weight of my breasts and womb crushed me.
I shrank pitifully.
Then... I wore a shirt and my
Brother's trousers cut my hair shorts and
Ignored my womanliness.
Dress in sarees, be girl, be wife they said.
Be embroiderer, be cook,
Be a quarreller with servants.
Fit in, Oh, Belong, cried the categorizers.
Don't sit on walls or peep in through our laced-draped windows.
Be Amy, or be Kamla. Or, better still
 be Madhavikutty.
It is time to choose a name, a role.
Don't play pretending games. Don't play at schizophrenia
Or be a nympho.
Do not cry embarrassingly loud when jilted in love...
I meet a man, loved him, call him not by any name
He is every man who wants a woman, just as
I am every woman who seeks love.
In him.. the hungry haste of rivers,
In me the ocean's tireless
Waiting, Who are you, I ask each and every one
The answer is, it is I.
Anywhere and everywhere, I see the one who calls,
Himself I in this world, he is tightly packed like
The sword in its sheath. It is I who drink lonely,
Drinks at twelve midnight, it is I who make love
And then, feel shame, it is I who lie dying
With a rattle in my throat. I am sinner,
I am saint. I am beloved and I the betrayed.
I have no joys that are not yours, no
Aches which are not yours. I too call myself I.

Critical analysis of "An Introduction"