A poem!

My friends….
when they came with guns
they looted everything.
My house, my shop
my orchards
my sheep and goats
cows and donkeys.
My history
my music
my family roots
my mother’s jewelry
and
my father’s rusty gun.

They ruined my schools
raped my dolls
orphaned my children
widowed my sisters
and I kept silent- like a stone or tomb!
stone or tomb?

But no….! no!
no, my friends no!
I proved worst…
they stood there where they were!
firm and poised
they cried, shout and rose to the occasion too!
and I ran away…..
because I was a man!
and because we lacked
alphabets
in our dictionaries
and words
in our books
where
to flee was a curse
bitter than death!

Farid Gul, London, 30 October 2009