Saturday, February 17, 2007

Lost Clouds

Thanks to SirenSongs, I experienced this beautiful site, "50 Million Missing" photographs of Indian women and girls. This collection is a reminder of the beauty and diversity of the many faces of Indian women.

Sadly, the value of an Indian female has not improved where female infanticide and dowry deaths are still occurring. We hear about the tech boom, the educated classes and modern advances made in India, but when girls and women are still considered a burden, where will society end up? It is the "dehumanization" of women when they are valued with monetary measures. Here are some links to articles about this urgent issue: Missing: 50 Million Indian Girls and India's Missing Daughters.

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I had received this poem this morning in my inbox as my Poem of the Day and it seems appropriate for this mood.

A Cloud withdrew from the Sky (895)

A Cloud withdrew from the Sky
Superior Glory be
But that Cloud and its Auxiliaries
Are forever lost to me

Had I but further scanned
Had I secured the Glow
In an Hermetic Memory
It had availed me now.

Never to pass the Angel
With a glance and a Bow
Till I am firm in Heaven
Is my intention now.

Emily Dickinson

For my poetry-phobic friends, the poem speaks about a cloud that was missed, an opportunity to see "superior glory." The moment could have been saved and reused again.

We need to stop and save the images of the Indian women and girls lest they become clouds that fade away with the sun.