woman at sea

weaving-cultures.jpg

sure, love

is a four-letter mystery and so is home.

my sister writes poems in the back of engineering class

learning to build bridges back

to a place that blew her out so soft,

the way a womb expels a life

out of water.

a non-resident

patriot now

a non-resident poet

tacking up shelters with words.

the passport a scissor on umbilical cord.

a page for the stamps unfurls

into a stanza into a boat.

there is nothing else beyond

the horizon of what you see.

is poetry the country

we could ever belong to?

the womb is full of water

and that is where they have left us –

rootless and flailing

crying “mother,

i land

soon”.

the men don’t know.

so my sister tells the ocean or the internet:

megaphone into a void for the anonymous

behind white screens, those grinning harpooning men

place tenterhooks into her middle, they

reduce her:

her verses become small

recipes with too much spice:

1 immigrant narrative +

1 broken mother tongue

a dash of rosewater, turmeric, mangoes.

baby is an oriental dream, a sick fantasy,

baby you know nothing your pretty mouth is just

so pretty.

the men shrink

women into girls into things into salt

somewhere along the reservoirs of their eyes

on us.

the men like to break

crumble like their hard biscuits in hot tea

crush like cigarette ashes into the sea

they break and they break

us women and relationships and politics

into formulas now they think they’ll distil

my sister’s skin

into a equation to solve

with their touch –

they say that’s tough,

love.

oh baby, there's just no space

for words in different colours

for girls in different colours

writing, creating, loving and birthing

craggy mountainous zigzagging like border

-line imperfect

you're

too much.

too much spice.

too much spice in your food

too much spice on your tongue

too much spice in that woman.

my sister and i know

a woman's body is always flawed.

always ends invaded

by a man

always is a country carrying a sea

it may use to drown

to find peace

to fish out another fool.

my sister is from somalia

my sister is from punjab

my sister is from south africa, nigeria,

palestine and pakistan.

but you will not find her.

she is driftwood

somewhere along the rivers a man has created borders for,

ramming anchors into paper

in your africana studies class

in the writers of colour section of the local bookshop,

on your instagram

trying to recarve the maps

of her identity like a cartographer

of the self

for years we have learned

to wring the colour from ourselves

use it as ink

pen down

our narratives

somewhere

tangible

skin soil land earth wall

the graffiti of what it means

to be but not belong

this world is a darkroom

and we are flimsy cut-outs

of film

trying to develop

like those nations our parents left

once, and then again:

yearning to develop

like those nations never got the chance to themselves.

“third world” barcodes on their chests

home: for sale.

heart: sold.

hope: transaction pending.

when they tell us we need to progress

do you remember how those hijackers came

and took the steering wheel away?

led the cars of our futures into micro macro

accidents

put the gear in reverse and then called us backward

they said “be grateful for this pain

we are burn-ishing you

we are making you

golden

we are dipping you in the sun

shine for me, baby.

shine like glitter.

so we continue to churn

bleach like milk

to whiten our coffee

-coloured women

shine for me baby, shine like a white

diamond i can touch.

it’s a kind of stockholm syndrome

making poets out of immigrants

like my sister.

and at the end of the day

someone writes on instagram:

“wow.

this is so moving. you have my

thoughts and prayers.”

and we applaud,

the palms of our hands

slapping

together.

For Ijeoma, Chimamanda, Fatimah, Warsan, Jamila, Safia, Aziza, Melissa and the many others I read and look up to.

Artwork by Sam Kirk and Sandra Antongiorgi, "Weaving Cultures"

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