Moon at Half Past Noon

1. The Inspection

They came, not as kin but as jailers,
their eyes like lanterns in a fog of custom,
weighing my smiles against scales of fate.
“She’ll fit,” they murmured,
their voices soft, as if they too were chained
to the same invisible decree.

I stood, a bird in a borrowed cage,
my wings clipped by their kindness—
a verdict sealed before I could sing.
When their gaze turned cold,
I mourned not their approval
but the irony: even prisoners crave a key
they never meant to hold.

2. The Offer

The job contract bloomed,
a lotus in the muck of duty,
its petals stitched with my name.
But the groom’s family arrived,
their hands cupped with unlit diyas,
promises flickering like stars
trapped in a monsoon sky.

“Shine,” they urged, their voices tender,
yet each word a lock on a door
they could not open themselves.
I left my city’s pulse for their courtyard,
where love was a bangle—
beautiful, brittle, sized to someone else’s wrist.

3. The Rebellion

The new job letter was a shard of light,
sharp enough to cut the threads of fate.
I offered it to my husband,
his eyes two black lentils
sinking in a broth of doubt.
He, too, was tethered—
to pride, to whispers, to walls
that held us both captive.

“Go,” he said, his voice a rusted hinge,
and I saw the chains he wore:
not anger, but fear of a world
that jails men for letting women fly.
My fists unclenched,
not in victory, but in pity—
for love, even here, was a crack in the iron.

4. The Shift

When his wages dried,
their warmth turned to damp rot,
soaking my late nights,
my chai-stirred “good mornings.”
He left gifts of resentment:
a cup slammed too hard on the counter,
“Madam” hissed like a courtyard rumor.

Yet I saw his cage—
the weight of eyes that mocked a man
whose wife outearned him.
His barbs were not blades but pleas,
and love, that stubborn weed,
grew through the cracks of our silences,
imperfect, but alive.

5. The Mend

The truce came in a darkened hour:
monsoon rains, a flickering bulb,
his fingers fumbling to braid
our daughter’s hair in the gloom.
“Help me,” he whispered,
the comb an offering,
his voice soft as the earth after rain.

Outside, the neighbors’ tongues
clattered like loose shutters,
but we were prisoners no longer—
or perhaps we’d learned to love the bars.
In that moment, love was no grand flame,
but a diya’s glow,
seeping through the ironies of life,
lighting just enough to see each other.