{"id":16431,"date":"2021-06-04T11:30:19","date_gmt":"2021-06-04T09:30:19","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/stadtsprachen.de\/en\/?post_type=stsp_text&p=16431"},"modified":"2021-06-16T13:54:00","modified_gmt":"2021-06-16T11:54:00","slug":"mariam-rasheed-poems","status":"publish","type":"stsp_text","link":"https:\/\/stadtsprachen.de\/en\/text\/mariam-rasheed-poems\/","title":{"rendered":"Poems"},"content":{"rendered":"

WE ARE HERE TO DIE
\n<\/strong>
\nw\/ a line from Damascus Nights by Rafik Schami
\ni was waiting for the past one day and all i got was the ghost of her
\nafter quraan lessons
\nafter her mother served corn cake and black tea in tiny mugs
\nand we watched as the teacher sipped the blackness and turned it into light
\nwe discovered the holiness of touch
\nwe didn’t talk about the sin we’re committing a crime
\ncrimes are easier to commit than sins
\nbetween kisses laced with giggles she told me
\nthe cake was made with flour a bright yellow
\nshe taught me purity and whiteness are two different concepts
\nlight and its reflection are two opposite things we see as the same
\nthe difference between the sun and the moon is that one is a giver and one is a taker
\nwe are all the sun and the moon
\ntime is just the sound of wind at terminal velocity
\nnow more than eight million minutes have passed
\nminutes can pass and
\nfail you
\ntime is proof that we are dying
\nthere’s no way to capture a breath
\nno proof that we are living
\nonly proof that we were living
\ni’m scared i’m only going to return home when
\nthis body is nothing more than fertilizer to its grounds
\nmy city holds the dead gently
\nserves them black tea and corn cake
\nmaybe home is the place we go to die
\nthey say when a city has been lived in continuously for over a thousand years
\nits citizens inherit the accumulated eccentricities of ages past
\nmy city has been died in continuously for over a thousand years
\nshe’s home for the estranged
\na place we return
\nwhen we die time is the distance between the sky and the water on the horizon
\nmost days i envy the sky
\nshe’s a giver and a taker
\nand most days she too is blue enough to want to die
\nmost days my body is a resignation letter i can’t hand in
\neach day i edit a few words or one
\neach day it makes more sense why
\ni’m ready to give up
\ni’m not ready to give up
\nyet<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

TONGUE TIED<\/strong><\/p>\n

a tongue is a muscular organ in the mouth of a vertebrate
\na mother tongue is the native language of said creature\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0the first language they get to meet
\nwhen my sister had just learned how to talk, we moved to a country far away
\nthe orchestra of what’s familiar and what’s not turned that shapeshifter muscle of hers to stone
\nshe tiptoed around the words she heard, picked up as many of them she could
\ntill one day they spilled out of her mouth like confetti
\nwhen i’m asked about my mother tongue
\ni bite my lip and say my mother tongue is contortionist
\nshe bends herself tight enough around the foreign she almost becomes it
\nand just like that she grants me free mobility across classes\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0across oceans
\nmy mother tongue is paint cracks on a mosque’s wall\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0a stutter in worship
\ni say my mother tongue is bad belly dancer\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0she can’t waltz either
\nand my mother’s tongue is grinder
\nbut not that sand paper kinda shit she’s one that’s made out of diamonds
\ni say my mother’s tongue is immigrant
\nand when she’s not escaping my mother tongue
\nshe carries her to a safe place
\nsafe\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0from all of which she is but should not have been
\nsafe\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0from all of which she’s not but had to be
\nand what is safe anyway but a delusion?
\nmy mother tongue is my Arabic
\n\u0639\u0631\u0628\u06cc\u062a\u064a , borrowed and bruised, she puts a target on my back
\nshe gifted me my name, \u0639\u0631\u0628\u06cc\u062a\u064a , a weapon and a savior
\nand made sure i’m the random choice of every random check at the airport
\nstill\u00a0 \u00a0when it’s raining outside
\nwhen love doesn’t fills the gaps between my teeth but anger does instead,
\nwhen i’m being followed down the streets and i clutch my handbag tighter
\nthan the memories of pain bombarding my brain,
\nwhen the news of death of people who could have been my cousins burst
\nfrom the television screen like cries for help,
\ni whisper words she lent me
\nwords that are mine and i am home.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

WE ARE HERE TO DIE w\/ a line from Damascus Nights by Rafik Schami i was waiting for the past one day and all i got was the ghost of her after quraan lessons after her mother served corn cake and black tea in tiny mugs and we watched as the teacher sipped the blackness […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":16162,"template":"","categories":[44,11],"class_list":["post-16431","stsp_text","type-stsp_text","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-issue-18","category-lyrik"],"yoast_head":"\nPoems - stadtsprachen<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/stadtsprachen.de\/de\/text\/mariam-rasheed-poems\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale:alternate\" content=\"de_DE\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Poems - stadtsprachen\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"WE ARE HERE TO DIE w\/ a line from Damascus Nights by Rafik Schami i was waiting for the past one day and all i got was the ghost of her after quraan lessons after her mother served corn cake and black tea in tiny mugs and we watched as the teacher sipped the blackness […]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/stadtsprachen.de\/en\/text\/mariam-rasheed-poems\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"stadtsprachen\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/Stadtsprachen\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2021-06-16T11:54:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/stadtsprachen.de\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/05\/6.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"2287\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1660\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@stadtsprachen\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/stadtsprachen.de\\\/de\\\/text\\\/mariam-rasheed-poems\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/stadtsprachen.de\\\/de\\\/text\\\/mariam-rasheed-poems\\\/\",\"name\":\"Poems - 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