Every man who smiles at you is not your friend
Every man who compliments you is not your admirer
Every man who tells you to trust him,
may not be a man of his words
A man doesn’t have to do all that to be a man
It takes a lot to be a gentleman
Staring gracefully from a corner with a glass of wine
Indulging in a whispering campaign with a glass of champagne
Or exchanging winks while sipping their drink is NO humane
A man should seriously doubt his masculinity
If he can’t weigh his words or check his absurdity
If there isn’t any filter in his thoughts And he fosters perpetual vanity
A man isn’t a man if he can’t protect a woman’s modesty
Both in words and in spirit
He can’t be a man by just being well dressed
and fostering shallow chauvinism
He really can’t be a man by feigning elitism
Shaming a woman isn’t what makes a man
It takes courage
Courage to kill the slander and maintain it with grace
Don’t forget that your casual obiter dictum even eternity cannot efface
It takes courage to be different from the herd
And courage to appreciate and emulate the right
Just the way it takes two to tango
Similarly, it also takes two to let go
So be a man and live to inspire And not to add fuel to the fire.
The author is a Pune based academician, poetess and artist.
