Mother – by Maxim Gorky

Got to know and love Gorky’s mother. Yes, that’s how I can put the experience of reading about her. The best thing about this classic is that it is told in the views of a simple and endearing village old woman. Yes, she is simple, yet she attains as much greatness as a human soul could possible do.

She does not rise as a heroine overnight, nor are there any incredible twists and turns that enable her transformation. Yet this gripping tale of a woman who is already past her times, regains a new lease of life through her comrades.

Sowing the motherly love she has for her own son, she reaps a much greater love with which she embodies the entire world. In her own words, she marvels at the vastness of her own heart.

The Mother, set in the revolutionary period of Russia, is the story of Pelagueya Nilovna, the mother of Pavel Vlaslov, a great revolutionary.

The mother is a poor widow of a factory worker. She has had a terribly hard life with her beastly drunkard of a husband, knowing nothing but beatings and constant terror of being beaten up. After his father’s death, Pavel also becomes a worker at the factory run by the rich and creamy of the society. The wealthy industrialists feed on the sweat of the peasants and factory workers. The country is under the czar’s monarchy, the authorities ruthless, and the people in undue misery.

The mother gradually observes that her son is very different from what her husband or other factory workers have been. She finds him reading in all his free hours and one day he brings home a group of strange people from the city, amidst whom there is also a young woman.

The mother very slowly comprehends that these "young children" are revolutionaries actively working for a movement through which they hope to create a whole new world.
A world as it should be! clean and beautiful, a world that has "everything for all, and all for everything". A world that worships work, and makes it obligatory for every living person. A world that is strange to evil, thievery, greed, and misery.

She first merely considers them as precocious children engrossed in a new play. She then involves herself into it, more out of her love for her son and his friends, than anything. But slowly she understands, appreciates, and voluntarily gives herself to the cause. She stimulates the rest of the mothers and fathers to be with their children, to help them in their journey of seeking truth; to be proud of their own sons and daughters who are willing to be tortured themselves so they can to free the spirit of the entire human race.

It’s a tale that moves you to tears, yet makes you laugh with the same childlike fervor that she feels.
It’s the tale of a mother whose pure love for her son makes her take the same rough path as his, so far only dared by dashing young men and women.
It’s a tale of hope and truth. It’s a tale that reminds you once again that the greatest things in life are always simple and humble, waiting only to be seen.

Paradise Rented Out...

She discovers the first sprout of life within her body. She does all she can to protect it. She eats and sleeps so that it grows healthy. She takes medicines and essential nutrients. She gets pampered and examined with care, all for the life growing within her.

She carries it and nourishes it with her own blood. She experiences the first ever movement of the life within her womb. She undergoes the pain and agony of labor. She puts her own life in stake and brings a new life to the earth. She gives the little one its first feed after birth.

Yet, it is not hers to claim; and never shall it be. She must hold complete indifference over the child and maintain the secret of its birth. The new-born is but a product of her business agreement.

Why? The egg is not hers; the sperm is not her lover's. She gets injected with both (or may be just the latter, in some cases.) She has rented her womb out for money - of which she is so much in need.

On the other hand, the couple who gave away the egg, the sperm, and probably a great deal of money are the rightful owners of the baby - yes, LEGALLY!

In most cases, I pity both the women. Yes, the latter deserves considerably pity too, if not as much as the former. I can very well understand the plight of a woman who realizes that she can never carry her own child in her womb. It is but a singular grief. She is therefore tempted to the alternative that the advanced medical science offers - to use a surrogate mother. After all the surrogate mother would be only a carrier. The child would have the life and blood of herself and her husband.

But, is it really worth it to put another woman's life in stake for your delight. And will it be a rightful joy, really? Can you hide the fact from the child that it was not you that bore it, but another woman, for your sake? It is certainly NOT like adoption, where the child was not borne for your own sake in the first place. It is a different thing altogether, and much more favorable.

Of course, it is difficult for anybody to give justice on this matter, because it involves two women who both deserve undue sympathy. However, renting out a mother's womb surely does not feel right to me.

Learn to cry

Learn to cry, my darling
Feel the pain as though it pierces your skin

Show your anger with violent kicks
Shudder at the injustice that prevails in to-be home

Let not the love and care I shower on you,
Make you dumb or your senses numb

Learn to get angry, my dear…
Feel the rage as though you are boiled alive

Cry your heart out for the butchery done on lives even as young as you are
Scream your lungs out for the incredible terror unleashed in the name of discrimination
Your first cry to this world means all this to me and more…

Once you’re born, I shall shelter you, care for you,
Try all my might that no pain touches you…
For I won’t then have the courage to speak thus to you…
But life is not so fair as to many other babies

I’ll tend you like a rose bud,
Treat you like a sweet-smelling herb,
But my innermost desire is that,
To see you as the firewood that sets ablaze
A whole load of muck and tripe