Night Wrapped Its Shroud Hiding Everything Poem by Latha Prem Sakhya

She listened to the gentle snoring of her beloved
And the fruit of their first love.
But her heart alone
Like a trapped bird
Hopped from one thought to another.

The reality, the truth of being a woman
An angel of the house?
A perfect wife?
Stereotypical images of womanhood
Abject beings, self effacing doormats
Shaped by patriarchal hegemony.

Sudden vision
Of unlimited horizon
Opening before her
Released the trapped bird
To fly to heights unknown.