I am not afraid anymore

Hadisa Osmani

I am your daughter.
When I was born, you punched the wall.
You said:“Why couldn’t it be a boy?”

When I was barely a teen, you married me off*
For a crime your son had committed.

I am the sister you sold
In exchange for livestock.

I am the wife you demanded a child from
When she was fourteen.

I am the neighbor you yelled obscenities at.
I am a woman.

You may not celebrate that I was born female,
But I am happy to be a woman.

You maim my lips and nose.
You sew my mouth shut.

You believe that you can make me submit,
But I was born to be free.

My freedom and independence can not be taken from me
No matter how often you call me “half-brained.”

I am not less.
I am a threat to your power.

You prohibit me from working
because you are afraid of my independence.
You are afraid to admit that we are equals.

For years, I have been silenced,
But I still carry the determination to be free.
And today I have risen up.

 

*The practice of “bad” in Afghanistan is when tribes or families force their daughters into marriage to settle familial animosity.

 

Read this piece in Persian here.