Thank you for the honor and your hard work.
Upheaval
Coup d’état! Civil Unrest!
Rebellion against a colonizer, a pest,
Businesses men, family men
Gathering together are arrested, put in a pen,
No pillow, blanket, toilet, only a feast
Of roaches, ants, creepy crawler beast
Of fear, for men who get no rest.
Seeing my dad get arrested was a great test
For an 8 year old girl, whose lack
Of understanding of politics didn’t give a frack
About all that, what I did care about
Was security, family, cousins, who had clout
But whose men were all indisposed,
So, women and children traveled
Away to reduce the stress on the men.
What about me, us? Noone asked and couldn’t ken
That the upheaval was traumatic,
But none spoke of it, rather it was repeated in frantic
Run to another border, unhygienic bathroom,
Food, Unfamiliar, on the go, speeding away from
Bullets ricochet in the Sky, while explosions
Rock the buildings around us. Decisions
On the fly got us safely to a country,
Safe, at that time, then traveled to London, fully
Anticipating another run, but, we spent
Ramadan there with friends before being sent
On another plane, to Canada, immigration,
What a fiction of safety needing integration
To survive, but beliefs, ethics strive
To cause trouble in the hive
That western society creates
For immigrants needing a place to forgets,
As trauma continues its hold, bold
In its fight to take root, but I won’t, under it, fold.
©️ Malak kalmoni chehab ©️
My poetry book, Perfectly Flawed poetry for change, is available on all eplatforms including Amazon. It was on the finalist list for the Canadian Book Club Awards 2023.
https://www.amazon.ca/Perfectly-Flawed-poetry-Malak-Kalmoni/dp/1525582518
Poetry for Change 