By Sunavya Kaur Pahwa
Sitting in a dark cave, I weave a web,
Made of tragedy, laughter, love, hatred and not only thread...
In my veins flows an emotion, a feeling,
Resentment at its peak, with a reason, a meaning...
I had challenged a Goddess and clearly won!
But of course, like any other time, it was I, the mortal, to be shun...
In a weaving contest, I had been entangled,
With Goddess Athena, who even after losing had me strangled...
We weaved and weaved and weaved,
My tapestry unfolded a scene; the Gods misleading us mortals interleaved...
Athena's was a tapestry of time, mortals comparing themselves with Gods,
Every dying mortal redeemed the Gods of being the best without any odds...
But I objected! I refused to bow,
To disrespect myself and my art, I would not allow...
Athena and I showed our tapestries to the women and men,
And as expected, they agreed with the Goddess again...
Yet, I still objected, showing how much better I was,
But the angered goddess would not budge, ignoring my cause...
Provoked and irritated, the Goddess cursed me,
"Now, you will weave for your entire life, without stopping, I guarantee..."
Those were the words of the Goddess before she turned me into a spider,
And now, as the people gasped and ran, in my own town I became an outsider...
Instead of two arms and two legs, I have eight of them,
To hold up my enormous body, which has been condemned...
Now I sit in caves, weaving tapestries and webs,
My children and I make our homes, with the unending threads...
By Sunavya Kaur Pahwa
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