The other day, the news reported on
the case of a young woman
strangled by her mother
for refusing a combined match.
Human history and fable are full
of broken hopes and fugitive dreams:
in the sharp Arabian nights, in the dusty Afghan days
in the rich suburbs of high-tech Mumbai
in the basements of New York.
Once , there was a girl up North
-- Aino was her name --
who didn't want to marry an old man.
She would rather lay down her jewels
and diadems, eat crusts of bread
in her father's house
than end the joy of her days
in the embrace of an old stranger.
Her mother blamed her
and ordered that she should
wear gowns with hems of golden
and silver thread
but Aino cried and cried
as she circled the family garden
until she ventured out,
measuring the river bank
through her small steps.
She hung her fine tunic on the branch of a birch
her belt on a white poplar
and left her socks and sandals
on a flat rock.
Then, she saw a golden boulder
far in the middle of the river
and swam to reach it.
AS she sat and looked around
over the shining water
full of the glittering promises
yet to caress her prominent cheekbones,
the golden boulder sank and crumbled
down into the river depths.
There among eddies and whirlpools
Aino died.
And as she realized her end was near,
these words echoed in her mind:
water on any face is a balm and a sign of grief.
Today my life is over
and I haven't tasted a single berry
from my childhood basket.
