Beneath The Weight Of My Silence

A night spent on my mother’s grave,
This place, a haven of late.
I feel the soil’s texture through my torn shirt,
My dry blood and scars tell the tale of yesterday’s fight.

I remember, like a flash, that hopeless day,
The day that stole my joy and my treasure.
Darkness fell like heavy dew,
And my hope froze each morning, only to vanish away.

They took my clothes—and my mother’s too.
Both fit and unfit became theirs.
A home, once filled with love, became hollow,
I became homeless in my mother’s house.

My body, next, became theirs to claim.
I became a slave within the walls of my home.
My cries for help fell on deaf ears, as they mocked me,
Laughing, saying the beating is what rebels suffer.

The day I blossomed was the last time I saw my school’s gate.
-Seeking a suitor and mutilating my body-
Became business at my uncle’s barazas.
My dreams vanished, my hope fully gone.

Who becomes a mother to an orphan?
What of the mind that understands their story?
Tell me of the ear that hears their cry?
What of the shoulder on which they lean?