Ashes of the Fireborn: A lament of Queen Draupadi
I was born of fire, but I walked into a storm,
A daughter of a kingdom, in a royal, gilded form.
But the wind began to shift when the arrow hit the mark,
And my heart became a candle flickering in the dark.
I wasn’t a woman, no—I was a trophy on a shelf,
A prize for a champion, a shadow of myself.
He won the challenge, but the victory was a chain,
And the laughter of the crowd was the prologue to my pain.
Oh, Lord, can You hear the weeping of a queen?
The heaviest of crowns that the world has ever seen!
I was promised to one, but I was carved into five,
A heart torn in pieces just to keep a dream alive.
Divided by the duty, diluted by the law,
A love that was a banquet, but I only tasted straw!
I searched for his eyes in a sea of five faces,
But the man I called my own was lost in empty spaces.
One true love, oh, one true flame—that’s all I ever craved,
But I was the sacrifice for a dynasty to be saved.
Then came the hall of silence, where the kings sat in a row,
And they gambled off my spirit with nowhere left to go.
They pulled the threads of my garment, they stripped me to the bone,
While the men who swore to guard me stood like statues made of stone.
They thought they saw my shame in the nakedness of skin,
They thought the void of fabric was where the sins begin!
But as the silk fell away, a truth began to rise,
I saw the ancient Goddess through the veil of my own eyes!
For in this sacred land, where the river meets the sea,
The naked form of Shakti is the highest deity!
You cannot shame the sunrise! You cannot soil the light!
My honor isn't in the cloth—it’s the fire in the night!
Oh, Lord, can You hear the weeping of a queen?
The heaviest of crowns that the world has ever seen!
I was promised to one, but I was carved into five,
A heart torn in pieces just to keep a dream alive!
The drums of war came calling, the blood began to spill,
The wheels of fate were turning, grinding with a will.
They fought for their dominion, for their pride and for their throne,
Avenging me in whispers, for a seed that they had sown.
Only one of them—oh, only Bhim—felt the fire in his chest,
To tear the limbs of monsters and put the ghost to rest.
Now the crown is back upon my head, the gold is shining bright,
But I’m sitting in a graveyard in the middle of the night.
My father’s gone. My brothers gone. My sons—all swept away,
The price of a revenge that came a lifetime too late.
I am the Queen... of everything that’s gone.
