Courage in the Face of Adversity – Maryam al-Khawaja, a Father’s Pride

The Pearl’s Pillars
by Maryam Al-Khawaja

Five arms stretched from the ground
Each palm embraced the pure limp bodies in shrouds

Their reflection was a wide glow in the dark night

Shining down on the peaceful crowds
Five arms stretched from the ground
Each palm held a cry of “Allahu Akbar”
Held a revolutionary song
Held a poem of defiance
Held a scream for freedom

Five arms stretched from the ground
Palms covered with a grave of flowers
Fingertips pointing towards the heavens
A mother’s tears celebrating a wedding’s last hours

Five arms came down with vengeance
But heroes stood their ground
Flowers in hand
Bullets were the only answer they found

She stood there
Flag held high
The red splattered blood on the earth
As the remaining white screamed “I am peaceful!”

Five arms stood no more
Like the fresh buds of spring
Arms emerged from every futile earth
Rising above lands
Diseased with money and power

The red seeped through the earth
With the cries of the martyrs’ children
The ground shook
And the throne broke
King came down on his knees
In the air echoed the crown prince’s pleas

“I promise you words
Words worth your blood
Come now, don’t delay
Come to dialogue I say
Hand in hand
Pull me out from the quicksand
And in this dark hour
Help me stay in power”

The young voice drowned his pleas
Thus into hiding he fleas
“Accountability, accountability,
You have lost your credibility
When your army shot our sons
Using U.S. made guns”

So the tribe caught her
and beat her with knives and swords
Then showered her with stones
As they cried to the world
“Stone her she is sectarian
She eats at Lebanese restaurants
And owns Iranian rugs
Our unarmed tanks she hunts
No we swear those are not our thugs”
And foreign hands played the melody to their cries
As they spread propaganda and lies

Plays of deceit
Created by their playwrights
“You are Shiaa
Every year
We discover and foil your plan
Of overthrowing our clan
In the restaurant you were trained
And the rug in conspiracy we framed
Close down the restaurant
The rugs tear to bits
Quickly quickly
Before they discover our fibs”

Slowly but surely
From beneath the rubble
A fist emerged
“Do what you will
My voice you cannot kill
My land I will never betray
And from the path of righteousness I will not stray
I stand against every foreign intervention
While you invite them to kill and put my people in detention
My determination will not heed
Nor will your plays succeed
For I am not Shiaa
Nor am I Sunni

I am forever only Bahraini!