i am not that woman by kishwar naheed
Kishwar Naheed, a contemporary Urdu Pakistani poet was born in 1940 in a Syed family of Uttar Pradesh, India. She moved to Pakistan during the partition of sub-continent in 1947. Settling down in the conservative environment of Pakistan, she had to struggle in order to get education. She studied at home and received a high school diploma and went on to receive a Masters degree in Economics from Punjab University. She won many prizes which are a proof of her high literary status. She achieved this high standing in the literary world because of the uncensored voicing of her fight against her society. Being a part of the partition of subcontinent, Naheed witnessed harassment against women and its effect is greatly reflected as we see women subjugation the main focus of Naheed’s poetry. Naheed’s poems “I Am Not That Woman” and “The Grass Is Really Like Me” voice the lack of dignity and respect felt by the females and how they come to terms with it. Feminism being Naheed’s forte is the main theme of the two poems. Naheed highlights how females are reduced to mere objects of use with their emotions put aside, are used for physical satiation, thus puts forward the theme of Commodification. Though robbed off the right of opinion by men she still hopes for a better life with equal rights to men introducing the theme of Optimism in her poems. Fathers, brothers and husbands being responsible for the suppressed life a female spends as they are her disloyal guardians and killers of her freedom as well, gives way to the theme of Male Chauvinism. Though making an effort of trying to rise and throwing away the shackles that confine their movement some weak women surrender themselves in the hands of the society thus allowing it to control their life, displaying the theme of Reification in one of the two poems. Naheed very skillfully has made use of poetic devices like Connotation, Symbols, Metaphors and Personification to heighten the impact of her message in the two