Saheem Haris | Participant 10
As far as my memory goes
my happiest days
were on that see-saw
painted violet, around my pre-school buddies
taking our turns
lifting each other up.
Then came the day
I cried to sleep the very first time
'boys don't need bangles'
shouted my mom,
but I still have them
in my box of the past
indigo coloured
with glitters of gold.
Every time I went to school
I remained lonely
like a refugee in a foreign land
the odd one out,
solitude got the best of me
and I gave in.
Thats when I got this role
in a small school play
as a maiden
flaunting her blue gown
holding a basket full of love and roses.
For the very first time
I felt like myself,
I felt so alive
my insides screaming at the world watching
'This is who I wanna be'.
Still tied down
by the chains of solitude,
my high school years coursed by
confused about my identity
an anomaly of creation
a curse and a taboo.
Each day waking up as someone else
my lean body
drooping like a question mark asking myself
'Am I a man or a woman?'.
But with all the nickels i gathered
and grandma’s pitching in
bought those bright green heels
which I proudly wore
whenever I felt alone,
my most cherished posession
and my closest confidant.
In college
I chose to forge my uncertainty and fear
into arrows of courage and pride
I walked into my parents room
and told them of my pleas.
What happened next was all a blur
dad with his belt and
mom’s prayers to God
'Please cure my child of this disease’
Days followed
with me locked behind my door
but I never begged them to let me out
for maybe I always enjoyed being alone.
Then came my grandma
a kind heart knitted with rose petals
holding a necklace filled with love
and a pure yellow sapphire in the middle.
With my college life coming to an end
I couldn't take it anymore,
'I am a woman!'
I said into the mirror one day
'Why do they not know?'
I tore up my shirt,
turning them into britches and blouses
the mirror smiling, said to me
'You are finally free’
With all that I could carry
I fled from my home, my birthplace
found myself a new home,
even though small and shaggy.
And thats when I saw him
through the wooden window to the right
among the new tenants
that also moved next door,
wearing an orange polka dot shirt
and a smile as pretty as the full moon.
My heart went crazy
I could feel each beat
butterflies finally woke up in my stomach
from their long dormant sleep.
But I knew I was never made to love
or to be loved
and with a broken heart
I lived in that dark, cold room.
Poetry was all that I had left
coursing through my veins,
learning to tuck the pain behind the verses,
black words against white sheets
until all that was left
was the colour grey.
Oh wait!
'But where is the colour red?'
you may ask,
maybe its what defines me now.
I am now writing this,
the pen perched on my rogue-tinted lips
as a doctor
whose hands lightly stained
with scarlet blood.
On a violet chair,
in an indigo print saree
newly bought green heels
and that same old yellow necklace
of my grandma’s.