The Enlightenment

She was enslaved in a slog masquerading as domesticity. 

She was an innovative cook lost in her reveries, 

She dreamt of liberty with open eyes. 

Her kitchenette became the yielding machine of postulation. 

She was now a philosopher Chef De Cuisine. 

She was on tenterhooks, Yearning Liberty. 

The pan on the stove simmered with butter and spices gave the aroma of entrapment and the veggies bleed at the stroke of the knife. 

Her hand is empty but her mind isn't. As she garshined the cuisine and laid the table, Simone de Beauvoir laid a foundation in her mind. 

Red blooded men of the house were busy picking holes in fare, 

the women stood biding their time, 

but her mind went on asking why? 

And they reacted to her why, 

called it a stupid woman's rants! 

The personage retired to bed, 

But her duty was on scullery, 

While scouring the utensils, 

Angela Davis poured some abstraction to her mind. 

She was hungry for liberation, 

and the thirst for equality couldn't let her sleep. 

She was determined to change, 

The resolution hanged firm on her back. 

She woke up and went to her kitchenette, Lit the stove, burned the centuries old norm. When he asked where's the breakfast? 

She replied, I'm getting late , go and prepare it yourself. 

He stood benumbed, 

The basic survival skill was unknown to him yet he boasted to be wise. 

When she returned from the office exhausted, 

He ordered her to massage his head and get a cup of coffee ready. 

She was no more the smouldering coal of furnace, 

She shined bright in glory and declared- 

Oh Darling, I'm having a headache too!

Why can't we be the companion, 

helping each other out instead of you being the master and I the slave!

-Rifat Siddiqui