SISTERS AND BROTHERS WHERE ARE YOU?

© Rae Dosoo 2013

Rae Dosoo asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work. All rights reserved. No part of this can be reproduced or stored in a retrieval system in any form or by any means, without the prior permission of Rae Dosoo.

Sisters and Brothers where are you?

I am crying, I am hurt, I am distraught

My people’s tears soak my land

Even though we have sun

It hasn’t been enough to put a smile on my people’s faces,

Or warm our hearts

There has been rainfall for over two years

And…

You! My sister ask how the weather is

The weather is bleak here

And it does not look like it is getting any better

We do not know when the sun will smile on us again

My soil continues to be wet with mothers’ tears

Many have lost their sons and husbands

I ask you my Sisters and Brothers, Where are you?

 

My sisters and brothers have deserted me

Why are you punishing me?

Is there not more you can do, my sisters and brothers?

My cities are painted red

The sky has been brushed black

All I can see is Red and Black, Red and Black

Ashes and Dust

My beautiful home,

My beautiful home,

My… beautiful… home

Is no more

My sisters and brothers have deserted me

Why are you punishing me?

Please, my sisters and brothers come together, where are you?

 

I am so sorry, I have been rude

I am so upset, I am so distraught, I cannot cope, and I am far too distraught

Shall I introduce myself?

Here I am!

Is there even any time?

Before we ruin our selves

Before my beautiful home

My beautiful home

My… beautiful… home

Is ruined

They have once called me Assyria

They called me Levant

I’m one of many who has been in the hand of many carers and guardians

I have been adopted many times

From the Canaanites, to the Ottomans, to the French

I have never really had full ‘independence’

Like my acquaintances in the western lands

 

You know when a child moves out of his father’s house

The child goes out into the world and does things for himself

I am waiting… to… experience… this

You see, we are being controlled

You see, I have an overbearing and overreaching oppressor

Who is overstepping his boundaries?

I want freedom, liberty and equality

I want justice, representation and true emancipation

I want freedom! I want freedom! I want freedom!

Instead there’s confinement, imprisonment and suppression

 

I have so many siblings, I am one of five

Let me tell you about them

They all surround me

The other is an estranged sister

It does get heated between us

We have never ever, never ever, got along

They all banned me from our brotherhood

It’s not my fault that the head honcho misbehaves

Many of these leagues and clubs don’t know me

They acknowledge the mother’s tears

But do they really understand what is happening?

It’s not one team against the other

‘It’s one against one’ the news reporters say

Its asymmetrical, my brothers and sisters

One against the other, Two against the other, Three against the other,

Two against the Two, Three against that one and OHHHH!

It just does my head in

Why, oh, why my beautiful people, Can’t we just be a family?

 

My house is full of people from different faiths and different people

My brother believes in Allah, My half-brother believes in him too.

But their beliefs are different

My mother believes in Isa but shhh it’s a secret

I heard that my Auntie married a man who is Jewish!

My distant cousin is a Druze

I am home to people from diverse backgrounds

My grandma is Kurdish, My grandpa is Arabic

The other side of the family there are Armenians, Assyrians and Turkmen

I wish there wasn’t a divide in between my family

There is discontent between the ruling family and the other relatives

Why can’t we respect our differences brethren?

 

My sisters and brothers where are you?

You have all called for an end to the violence

Yet my mothers still cry, crying out for their fruits of their womb to come back to them

Do not sanction us, do not punish us my brothers and sisters

Let us all my sisters and brothers, Come together and let us find us solution.