Monday, January 02, 2012

Is this the freedom that you want?

Off a back alley, on the floor of a small room,
you lie  in a pool of crimson blood, dying
the doctor, with nothing but a bandage 
is unable to heal your gaping wounds

Your family pleads with strangers in orange vests
from far off Egypt, Sudan and Mauritania
because your privileged compatriots in the  City
show no empathy for your ilk


You are but a hoax to them, a conspiracy,
a figment of fevered, primitive minds,
who demand the right to freedom and dignity
and place their fate in the hands of  the divine

Your protestations are disturbing to them,
you expose their fake modernity for what it is,
the basest form of human existence,
privilege as reward for absolute subservience

They are the modern slaves whose master,
a deified leader with no redeeming qualities,
demands absolute obedience and yet,
unlike your God, shows no mercy or compassion

And so when one of the privileged
stands by your expiring body and chides:
"Is this the freedom that you want?"
you answer: "Yes, God save your rotten soul....."

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thank you for your conscience, your love of justice---your attention to what is happening. Your writing speaks where others often cannot.

Rabi Tawil (AKA Abu Kareem) said...

Thanks B.W. (AKA anonymous) for your support.

annie said...

This is such a moving poem. Thank you. I am reposting it.

Rabi Tawil (AKA Abu Kareem) said...

Thank you Annie.

Anonymous said...

I have been deeply moved by your blog. Continue to speak truth to power.

Amira