Written by Azar Hasani and translated by Sadaf Ghiasy
My womanhood is a crime with dark tales,
My days, flowers from the season of grieving.
At home, street, and city
They take my freedom from me,
and call me siasar.*
I am a woman, a woman from Afghanistan.
My eyes are lights
Made of the divine,
And I bring messages from the lilies in heaven.
My hands still smell like hope.
I am a woman, a woman from Afghanistan.
*Literally meaning black-headed, Siarsar is a slur used to marginalized and victimize women in Afghanistan.
Read this poem in Persian here.
Image by Free Women Writers-Balkh team of a mural in Mazar-e-Sharif.