Their Daughters

Paracetamol legends I know For rising fevers, as pain-relievers— Of my people—father’s father’s mother’s Mother, dark lush hair caressing her ankles Sometimes, sweeping earth, deep-honey skin, Amber eyes—not beauty alone they say—she Married a man who murdered thirteen men and one Lonely summer afternoon her rice-white teeth tore Through layers of khaki, and golden white skin to spill The bloodied guts of a British soldier who tried to colonize her. . . Of my land—uniform blue open skies, Mad-artist palettes of green lands and lily-filled lakes that Mirror all—not peace or tranquil alone, he shudders—some Young woman near my father’s home, with a drunken husband Who never changed; she bore his beatings everyday until on one Stormy night, in fury, she killed him by stomping his seedbags. . . We: their daughters. We: the daughters of their soil. We, mostly, write. (First published in Quarterly Literary Review, Singapore)