Women Of The Night Poem by kodwo brumpon

Along the street, as a shelf displayed
Like royal palm decorating a driveway
Line the wined ‘women of the night’
In clothes and colours, merrily scented
Offering services that fouls our morals
It reeks of fornication and adultery

In smiles and tears, they work the night
A service to men and their drank egos
Like slaves and subjects, they respond
Performing acts to satisfy selfish delights
With groans that mocked their dignity
Driven by poverty, pimps and pleasure

Men hallow their touches at night
Merrily whispering desires and fantasies
And moaning the regrets of a caged love
They listen, all unheard in the wanton air
To the sorrowing beats of bleeding hearts
To secrets, of men sick with affectations

And yet, we call them names with disgust
They, who comfort fathers and husbands,
And out of respect, vault their secrets
They who rest in the day like vampires
For fear our faces will bring out secrets
Why suffer the ‘women of the night’?

We shamefully behold them as strangers
Taunting their dreams with sexual epithets
Doused in a dirge cursed with weariness
Short is memory, ‘women of the night’
We’ve forgotten that thou art family
Once, you were sisters and mothers

Your pride plunges into a maddening cry
Breathing laments softly in your hearts
And anguish bellows deep in your bellies
With screams of ‘whys’ directed at fate
For your critics are clients and customers
Who demonise your image in the day