Naseem Shafai Analysis

As postmodernism puts everything in doubt, it is very important to question and critique the position of woman in such a murky space. Feminism serves as a yard stick to fathom and measure the intense pain of the gentle and fair gender which puts forth the argument in a legitimate way by stating that woman is rendered helpless and reduced to a victim by being persistently hammered into non-entity in a patriarchal system. The paper intends to study the plethora of the chronic mental anguish as rendered by the dweller of the paradise on earth— Naseem Shafai. Naseem Shafai— a marvellous, subtle and intense poetess of Kashmir, whose literary talent conferred on her Sahitya Akademi award in 2011. She carved her space in the

The verse, “whenever we had an encounter/ you were always in haste” is contained with the insensitive brutal assault of time which strikes as it likes to strike devoid of the consequences. She sums up the poem beautifully in last two lines, “I am yet to play with my dolls/ And have to take leave of my friends” where in the whole structure of society and its conventional roles assigned to women are unfolded. The poem establishes the subjection of women not because of their natural inferiority but as a result of male-centered society they cannnot avoid living in. The poem can be read against the backdrop of Simon de Beauvoir’s definition of feminism, “One is not born a woman but becomes a woman.” However, contesting the role of a woman in a society where she has to part from her innocence (“I am yet to play with my dolls”) is a social construct. The verse is a manifestation of a woman’s desire where she feels she has suppressed her wishes but she has no option as this is what a society demands of her. This leads to her domestication where in she is conditioned gradually for the future role. A similar poem which echoes the same pain is “The Solicitude— for the girl child”: Gently rouse her, calling her in tones