A Selection of Varied Poems by Raza Mallal
One day I’ll buy you a silver yacht
With sails of blue forget-me-not.
And I will find you a sea to sail.
Unmarred by storm, unmarred by gale.
I will sing you a soft-spun love song
To sing when the nights are dark and long.
So all who listen might understand
The charm the sea has over land.
And, I will give you, overhead
The brightest star that heaven has shed
So you might always guided be.
And find your way back home to me.
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A Little Shell ....
A little shell
Of humanity
Emerges
Warm -
Heartbeating
Soft -
For a moment
Then, the tiny, frail thing
Dies
Why did it enter this world
For everyone to see
Only to disappear again
In to Infinity?
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A L W A Y S
Always I will stay with you
Until the butterfly is winter comes
And nests in the snowy drifts
I will stay with you
Until the robin comes in summer time
And whispers gently to the rose
I will stay with you
Until the snowdrops bloom in April
The crocuses in May
Until the tide does not leave the shore
And the sun and moon meet in unison
I will stay with you
Forever I will stay with you
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War in the Trenches
Walking, walking through the dark trenches.
Looking at the enemy on the other side.
Suddenly a flash; rats are running
A bullet zips through the dark air.
A cry goes up- Someone dying.
All has gone for that one man.
The tragedies of war
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S O M E T I M E
Sometime
Somehow
Someway
I’ll meet you again
And we will walk together ....
Someday
And when that day comes
The sky will turn a deep blue
The sea will lap our skins
And the tide of our love will never go out
And leave us high and dry .....
And, alone together, we will walk hand in hand
Along moonlit sands
And our love will be forever
Someday, Sometime, Someway.
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MY PEOPLES MOULD THAT I WILL NOT ACCEPT
Each day I wake up -
Another day to live : how wonderful
To be me
I shall not conform to other peoples
expectations of me, that requires of me
Less than I am, that satisfies their
Society’s needs - regardless of my
Feelings, needs
I shall not be suffocated or crushed
I would rather be alone
Alone, me,
Me
I know that I am just fine, fine
I don’t need anybody’s definition of fine
I have my own. I like it.
If you don’t,
And can’t accept me for what I am :
A loving, Creative, intelligent woman
Human
and no less !
Then stay away.
I don’t want or need you.
I know that for you, a fine woman is
“respectable, honourable”.
I am respectable and honourable, and much more.
But according to you books.
Respect and honour means something different.
So you live with your book; I will live with my book.
Don’t touch me, don’t even try. Stay away, stay away.
I don’t want you; I don’t need you; stay away, stay away,
Do you know that “respect” and “honour” according to your books
Are tools that crush us women?
Do you know that these tools were needed, for your feudal society
to function in the way it did.
Our society needed us women to be child bearers, and
home minders. No more - no less.
Our society needed us women not to be fully human.
It treated us less than human beings.
It’s demands upon us were less than human.
And as if Acceptance of us as less than human beings
Was not enough among our loved ones and within our world -
“God” had had to be brought in too.
Our “next world” organised for us too.
So we had to become robots with no aspirations, no feelings.
Be“ respectable daughters”, “Sisters”.
“Respectable wives”, “Respectable mothers”.
Our pathfinders : our fathers, our brothers
our husbands, our sons.
Our people, our community, our God.
But not us.
The switch buttons for the robots, were, are, deep.
They go back centuries.
And if we allow them, they affect us deeply.
Physically, emotionally, spiritually, psychically.
You press your own buttons; I have my own.
Don’t touch me, don’t even try.
Stay away, stay away.
I don’t want you, I don’t need you.
Stay away, stay away.
I am reading my own book.
I am pressing my own buttons.
I am discovering how special I am.
How beautiful I am deep down.
I am going to grow, develop.
Become even more beautiful.
I am special. I am me.
I don’t need your book.
The End for now