Bizarre English! Poem by Ajit Das

A school-going girl living upstairs
dons whatever her clothes
with ‘flair'.
In class rooms and common parlance,
she displays sparks
of ‘brilliance'.
Her teachers and admirers
see her blossoming
into a ‘genius' in the future.

But, hold on.
These terms may be sexist;
so says a lady academic
from Cambridge.
They show qualities
assumed to be male;
not gender-neutral, they are
mismatch for female.

How bizarre,
label of genius for Einstein,
but not for Marie Curie,
Helen Keller or Jane Austen!

*a Cambridge academic finding words:
flair, brilliance, genius steeped
in gender inequality