I am a Woman
I am a woman
–Joumana Hadad.
Nobody can guess
What I say when I am silent,
Whom I see when I close my eyes,
How I am carried away when I am carried away,
What I search for when I stretch out my hands.
Nobody, nobody knows
When I am hungry, when I take a journey,
When I walk, and when I am lost.
And nobody knows
That my going is a return
And my return is an abstention,
That my weakness is a mask
And my strength is a mask,
And that what is coming is a tempest.
They think they know
So I let them think,
And I happen.
They put me in a cage so that
My freedom may be a gift from them,
And I have to thank them and obey.
But I am free before them, after them,
With them, without them.
I am free in my suppression, in my defeat.
My prison is what I want!
The key to the prison may be their tongue,
But their tongue is twisted around my desire’s fingers,
And my desire they can never command.
I am a woman.
They think they own my freedom.
I let them think so,
And I happen.
(Translated by Issa J. Boullata)
(Recieved as an e-mail fwd)
Share this:
