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That day somehow my name sounded
heavy, even loaded, to me.
Raazia? Shafique?
Two slabs
of seriousness- surrounded me,
keeping me shrouded in walls and walls
of black silk cloth.
Raazia: a round-edged top
with a see-through hijab.
Shafique: a long-sleeved full-length
buttoned-up dress.
The height of oppression
that name
became.
And now, when meeting
someone, anyone, i flash
a big smile, offer my
hand, and say ‘Ms Abundant Sweet!’
Each time (or almost) it produces enthusiastic
response, ‘Ms Sweet? Oh how sweet!’ spreading
joyful confetti on
the city street.
One day, as i was serving
Ms. Sweet with the morning
Raag Vibhas on a YouTube
playlist, she said: ‘i have a dream,
ya know!’
‘Oh! You do?’ LOL… I laughed out
loud.
‘And so did Martin
Luther King’, she
sounded very cross.
‘Indeed, it is true’,
i said, putting joy on
a temporary hold. ‘Tell me.’
‘I dream of a time
when your closet has me as your only hijab’, Ms Sweet said
with a longish pause.
‘Only one hijab?’ I checked my closet- white burqa, black burqa, colorful
burqini, a floral silk hijab, a green cotton- it went on and on. ‘Should I…?’
‘Call big brothers this very day.’
But monogamy was not my forte that day. ‘Perhaps’, I said,
‘Dreams are dreams / only / in an unreal world’.
First published in LCP Chapbook Series: AHVAZ // AAVAZ // AVAAZ: A Chapbook Anthology of South Asian Poetry, ed. Shazia Hafiz Ramji, League of Canadian Poets, 2022
Artwork by Rubya Mehdi
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Fauzia Rafique 