The Price You Pay (The #metoo Syndrome) Poem by Bernedita Rosinha Pinto

Woman a lotus in the lake of enchantment
woman clearly out-stands her position
whether she is a wife or a mistress.

None can ever take away the perils of femininity
for woman is an embodiment of man's need and attention!
Men keeps looking at women,
desiring them when charm prevails,
man gets all the more enticed and captivated
when woman is young, attractive and vulnerable.

Women as a woman has her right to self-respect
women as a woman always intends to keep her modesty intact,
Women as a woman gains fame and sometimes fear
women as a woman gains applause and sometimes tears.

Woman chooses to conceal her past love-affairs
for her own secretiveness and social respect
yet some women resort to accusing man of abuse and harassment
whether it was in some apartment or at her own workplace.

She reminisces the past episodes which were so vehement
that she chooses to expose man for his follies
that were either circumstantial or forceful
or those which were not by mutual consent.

And just as no one ever pities a prostitute though
she silently satisfies her varied clientele without grudges,
yet some women never forgive nor forget their infliction.

Men thus keeps facing allegations from such women
only when his popularity and fame are at the top level
as women feel to trample back at him for his misconduct.

Woman without guarding her own reputation seeks vengeance
knowing the price she pays to expose such lost truth
is more gratifying than the suffocation, the silence
and the suppression she has reserved over the years.