How long has it gone on for? I have lost count of the days and the months And the number of times Facts and fiction have been combined Made to stand hand in hand By the gentiles that stain these lands Caricaturizing, miming scenes Of zealotry and genocide
I have lost count Of the number of hospitals bombed Ruins atop tunnels where the Khamas abound And the aid workers killed Unidentified dangrerous women and men And the journalists sniped With their arsenal of 1984 daggers and knives And the doctors shot With nitroglycerin bombs hidden in their surgical gowns And the men raped in prisons With propagandist lore stuffed up their intestines And the women maimed Their bellies heavy with terrorist babes And the children killed Starved and stilled Their sinful blood spilled On the promised land
How long before this evil doth cease How long before the chosen ones can finally live in peace?
I sit here, open my laptop Look out at the sea From the terrace of an iconic hotel My work venue as a freelancer, a digital nomad I write, what does that make me? The titles meander endlessly Senselessly
This little bit of serenity This deliberate grasping of nature’s stillness Has become a habit now Preserving my sanity My emotional equilibrium if you will Before I dive into my world of responsibilities And regulations that keep changing Anew with ever more creative indignities
It’s time to reapply for the visa The one bestowing a residency - some permanency Is still ephemeral, a dream So I keep doing my tawaf Perambulating around the aspiration Denied to me Meanwhile I look for other little oft-trodden paths Like visit visas that are stark And tie and bind me into a cell Purgatorial, ‘twixt heaven and hell
I can’t put down roots I cant roam free That is for the other folks The ones with passports Thin as wafers, pristine Devoid of stamps and seals That pull you into parentheses An afterthought, you’re one of the horde Picked out from discord, erratically For a while allowed to be A part of regular humanity That throngs its shores In NY caps and Bermuda shorts Dollars and dollars Lining their seams Blissful, unaware of what runs in the veins Of those who smile and smile and gleam Who enthrall and beguile For a while before going back To the crumbling shacks That once were homes Pulverized by landslides and floods Now pulled together by mud and stones
How do I know? Because behind the smile I’ve seen the pain Heavy and sodden like monsoon rain Of the tuktuk drivers, the servers, the valets Whose three-wheelers bear me week after week - ceaselessly Whose lattes I sip while they look out at the sea - pensively Who stand there smiling, ready to greet - endlessly Their eyes have welled With tears, with fears; so have mine I know, I know and I understand Pariahs all of us in this land That is meant to be our home That has since become a tomb.
My story “THE GLIMMER” has been long listed in the Zeenat Haroon Rashid 2023 Writing competition for Women.
Zeenat Haroon Rashid (21 Jan 1928 – 8 April 2017) was the daughter of Sir Abdullah Haroon. She was a young stalwart of the Muslim League and founding member of the Women’s National Guard at the time of Independence, and throughout her life promoted a vision of Pakistani women as equal partners in the struggle for building a modern Pakistan. The Zeenat Haroon Rashid Writing Prize for Women has been set up to promote and provide support for women who wish to pursue writing as a career.
Thank you to this year’s judges, Amina Ahmad, Shandana Minhas, Mohammad Hanif, Sarwat Yasmeen Azeem and Shan Vahidy. Grateful and chuffed 🙏🏼🌸
But you have to wed There is no other way Unless of course I’m dead He’s family, my sister’s son Your cousin You’ve known each other Since forever Yes, he used to be my brother! LIKE a brother when you were little He’s not your brother Don’t say these bizarre things ‘Bhai hai! Khair hai, chai bana lo’ That wasn’t said so long ago By you mother, ammi, ammini, enemy
That was then and this is now I have a child Sing, drums play for you A son is born, sing! My child, so beautiful Come down sing drums play for you Sing drums play, come Down-sing-drums Play for you, come Down-Syn-Drums Play for you, come Down-syn-drome Pain for you, come, come down….
This is now and how it shall remain My child, golden Beautiful, so beautiful So angry, so tearful And also so dry-eyed, so agonized So angry all the time He screams again I close my ears sometimes I disappear now and then I look away from his little head Swollen with tears, angry, unshed
But I had to wed There was no other way He was family, her sister’s son Now my son my son, my beautiful, broken son There was no other way I had to become the bride Unless of course I had died.
I wish this verse was more wholesome and whimsical like Robert Frost’s “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”, but that it is not. This is about women determinedly forging on across streets, bazaars, workplaces, government offices, neighbourhoods and communities. This verse is also not so much about the woman hopeful of change (God knows that’s going to take its time in our blessed homeland), but the woman who is stoic and steadfast. It is the woman who goes about her day despite the odds that pull at her body, spirit and soul. It is the woman who dares to bare her true self despite and in fact because society expects otherwise. It is the woman who walks in her neighborhood afraid yet brave. May you find your grit and your grace for the rest of the days of your life.
A resolute, meaningful Women’s Day to all my friends and family 🌺
I wear my track pants And a pink shirt, long It says “Life is a song” I wonder if it’s too loud Stoking thoughts like a gong A shout To the world of men that teams about The streets Eyes peeled For glimpses of variously clad Women that are mad Enough to sidle into the periphery of their sight And special leery gazes Trained like full-throttled tasers On women who dare To bare More than the hand wrist down Or a smidgeon of a toe around Which sits an uncomfortable sandal A Soleful reminder To walk cautiously To always look behind her To shrink as small as she is able So she might pass With a warning glance From the men sitting around Jenetic Judges of right and wrong
For the women who dare To bare There’s a special gaze For their fall from grace From the fraternity that mills about The corners of streets Superior, upright Pissing in plain sight Marking their territories For the women who dare to bare More than the eyes Downcast, demure Vacuous and pure For them there’s the death stare Cutting them down to size I’m one of those Who - Dares - To - Bare The woman within The whole human being Self assured, aware She sits in my eyes Unfaltering, dignified Even as her heart drums inside As she traverses that den Of wolves, dressed as men.
Mahvash Mohtadullah 