Parallel by Diya Mehta (Toronto, 16)

​1899 - Suffrage

Mama used to bake braided bread every Easter.
The slap of calloused hands against
soft dough echoing through the kitchen
like a lullaby. The clump of flour
staring back at me could be anything
but smooth and light in my clumsy claws.
Tangled and twisted,
she would smack my hand,
perturbed by my wild spirit
and untethering eyes
Mama never liked me.
She knew what she had created.
A vagabond in a whistle-stop of conformity
So I left.
I let the salt-laden waves lift me away,
until Mama and her bread became a folktale.
​

1931, The Great Depression

controlled movements
tired palms blistered with red dots
move along fabric

dogged hunger songs
teeming rooms and dusty breaths

unbroken; breadline years

1960, The Sexual Liberation

Bolshy lady, quite contrary
Why do you insist on being alone?
With your signs and bared teeth,
stomping on thin ice underneath,
you could never make it on your own.

Stroppy woman, classless and mad
You screech about ‘sexual liberation’
Counterculture and contraception
Yapping about changing perception,
Your ideas are a disease to our nation.o the nation

1983

She finds comfort in the shadows of rainbow dance floors / masks;
quietly contemplating the actuality of freedom and ferocity.
The orchestrated chaos encircles and sings to her as an unsettling lullaby.

She wishes she could write about wild adventures and miracles,
that she could weave words till they caress the fabric of your identity.
She swears to one day write about the ‘good ol’ days’,
to recount tales of backpacking, iconic loves, and forever friendships.

Sadly, though, the writer is never the main character.
The tortured artist is outright predictable,
with the exact same tropes and dilemmas
as time immemorial.

2023, ?

She loves parallels. How very constant they are................ She collects them
and holds them close to her heart like a narcissist.............. might hold their secrets.
Unsaid, not unthought. As if saying the inevitable..............might disrupt the ebbs
and flows of unspoken pain. But every night ....................She whispers them
with disillusionment into the worn pages of her journal........For anyone, for everyone.

How very unsettling that the essence of human nature......... .is repetition. Forever and ever.

Her life is a constant that stretches to infinity....................The lives of the millions
of strong and defeated women before her.........................on the other line,
perfectly in parallel, forever on course. And when..............she feels her chest tightening,
when the situation feels too enormous to overcome,...............she draws two parallel lines.
To remind herself that someone’s done it before;....................life will run with or without her.
Life. Such a tiny thing to beat. Just a tiny dot....................on the slope, to infinity and beyond.


​Diya Mehta is a 16-year-old female writer based in Toronto, where she spends most of her time obsessing over historical figures, crocheting, and rereading her favorite books. Starting as an editorial writer and playwright, she has worked with Young Peoples Theatre, the Incandescent Review, and HerStry Literary Magazine