She is grabbed off the innocent, sunlit street
one ordinary, workaday lunchtime
to be beaten, punched, taken
to a foreign land
imprisoned.
Not only punches and kickings
but unspeakable punishment
with cables, doors, things she cannot utter
by human beings wanting
human feelings. The probe and jab
of men’s weaponry, their mauling hands
as she stares at ceilings, walls.
They have no respect. They are weak.
They use other people for control.
She has torturous nightmares.
The world is a locked door.
She cannot find the words
to express her eternal pain
and somewhere, beyond all words
come tears, ancient as rain.
,,
Links: www.stopthetraffik.org
BBC Radio 4 drama, I Am a Slave, week beginning 03.06.2019
BBC Radio 4, Woman’s Hour, 06.06.2019
So painful to read, so well does the poet convey the inhumanity of the perpetrators, the strength of the victim.
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