Girl child thou art accursed!
Tears dug ravines in the hollow of your cheeks
Every moment you reminisced
About the sadness that you felt
Your mind awash with nightmares
Nightmares of the man devoid of the eyes
The vision to give
A vision to see the youth in you
The youth chained deep
Into the unforgiving abyss of culture
Torture,
Mere torture your little voice cries out
Being raped by your monstrous Uncle
Abused by your devious Aunt
They both fed on your insecurities
Is this the hand life has dealt you?
I wish the world felt you

Deep in your soul, your heart ached
These memories have been ingrained
In your mind like tattoos of the devil,
Eating away at your conscience like maggots
Being born a girl child
Means more vulnerability
In this world with two genders
You were forced inbetween two rocks
The other gender, your counterpart, getting the better end of the bargain
They prey on you and try to take advantage
Making you more vulnerable
Yet destroying your innocence.

Happiness was a small episode,
In the drama of pain,
When you saw the light in the tunnel,
You could no longer fight.

If only we chose our spoons
Then, maybe,
You would have chosen a golden spoon
And then, maybe, your folks would not leave,
Or maybe you would have been conceived a male,
And not have your chastity violated
And attain better education and better future
But these are nothing but mere maybes and ifs.

Social injustice,
minds rigid to change,
broken umbrellas
Under which you can't take cover
You became a wife to your uncle
A maid to your aunt
You stayed home working till dawn

Woman thou art accursed!
Placed in the jaws of a barbarian
A man whose body is like a bag of poison
Now you are on your last breath
Nobody cared if you'd succumb to cancer
Or,
Carry the virus at an age so tender
So innocent
So naive
Your life, in a blink of an eye
Was squashed out of your little innocent soul.
Girl child you are accursed!

***NICOLE GLADYS NYAHODZAH***