A Voice in the Dark | Shubhodeep Pal

Why we, as a society, must take some blame for such crimes and their effects You. Yes, you. You blabbering all over Facebook and Twitter and elsewhere on the internet. I want you to stop with your sermons and tirades and humbug tears. I want you to stop thinking of yourselves as experts on crime. I want you to stop thinking that violent retribution - hanging, physical castrations - will stop these crimes. Instead, listen. Shed your hypocrisy please. Look within. Shed this deep-seated, generations-strong, mixed-with-your-blood hypocrisy. Stop baying for blood when your own might not be so clean. Stop screaming for heads when you yourselves award impunity to many rapists. How are you responsible, you ask? Allow me to hammer some sense into your over-charged social-network-fried brains.Violent sexual assault - indeed, sexual assault of any nature - is gut-shattering. But do you know what is worse than being a victim of such a crime? That feeling of helplessness when you don't k

She waits for her lover's return.  Her bated breath brushes the darkness away. Her eyes flicker and sigh With each whisper of time. Minutes arrive, Days depart.  The grave remains  ensconced in her unmoving heart. Where there was emptiness,  there is emptiness still.  Follow @diaporesis

I am just words. The ones that used to drift in through the windows of your dreams on starless nights. The ones you once danced with in the mango-stained monsoons. The ones in which you first saw my face. Destined to be loved. And hated. I am the same words. The music for which is lost in a maze that's lost in memories of pain. The taste for which you lost because they wanted to fill your hours forever. The ink for which you spilt because the colour never changed. I am still just words. Replaceable, and replaced by the dictionaries whose covers promised more. Beaten and battered by the pens and matches you used to erase me. Hollow and unfeeling. Ever yours. Never yours. Yet feeling hollow and unfeeling. I am the words you erased Before you read me. Follow @diaporesis