Honour Killing

At last I’m taking off this coat // this black coat of a country

Time phrase ‘at last’ conveys the speaker’s epiphany as she’s been waiting to break free for a long time

 

The first-person pronoun ‘I’m’ has a rebellious tone to it

 

The verb ‘taking’ illustrates the speaker’s liberation

->The present continuous (active verbs) shows how everything is in the process

 

The extended metaphor used with ‘black coat of a country’ implies how black absorbs light and conveys the sense that the speaker is suffering as the darkness of societal norms is enveloping her and repressing her true identity

~black connotes evil and death

I’m taking off this veil / this black veil of a faith that made me faithless

The noun ‘veil’ references to Islam and demonstrates how her vision of faith and religion has been clouded how by ‘taking’ it off, there’s a sense of removing the religion

 

The metaphor further emphasizes how she couldn’t see ‘clearly’ as the adjective ‘black’ absorbs colour, implying how she couldn’t see past the norms that have been suppressed upon her and the restrictions placed on her by societal expectations.

That tied my mouth… and muffled my own voice

This demonstrates the speaker’s inability to speak up due to her voice being suppressed

-treated like a 2^nd class citizen

 

Alliteration of ‘m’ emphasizes the restraint on the speaker’s ability to speak out

I’m taking off these silks // these lacy things that feed dictator dreams

the soft sibilance used with ‘silks’ demonstrates how the speaker is defying objectification

The mangalsultra and the rings // rattling in a tin cup of needs // that beggared me

‘Mangalsultra’ is a sacred, auspicious thread which symbolizes marriage in Hinduism and so the use of personification in this phrase demonstrates how the speaker is resisting the denial of autonomy and contrasts riches with poverty, further emphasizing this sense of objectification

I’m taking off this skin // and then the face, the flesh // the womb

The listing of body parts used here demonstrates how the speaker is ridding herself of these exterior layers and stripping herself free of her identity, accentuating this idea of starting fresh.

 

The use of the noun ‘womb’ conveys how societal norms have been internalized so she needs to rid herself of it.

Let’s see… Let’s see…

This phrase has a structural shift and the contraction ‘let’s’ accentuates the tuning point in the poem as the speaker has finished divesting herself and conveys a sense of hopefulness as there are now multiple opportunities that awaits the speaker.

 

The anaphora of ‘let’s see’ demonstrates the speaker’s epiphany as she is finally free to do as she wishes

At my new geography

The possessive pronoun with ‘my’ emphasizes the speaker’s autonomy and her sense of ownership -> conveys her newfound liberation

the metaphor of 'geography' highlights how the speaker is mapping out her own course, further emphasizing the autonomy she now has on herself.