Contributor: Susie Gharib

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They had robbed me of my history,
chiseled my name off the ancestral rock,
snipped my natal cord with a pair of pincers,
rewrote my stars with a single ink-drop.

They shipped me to some distant land
to be nurtured in a foreign pot,
no basin for my tender feet,
no anointment of temples, no armorial cot.

I search for the indelible image of my mother
in every blooming flower-cup.
Out of my reach my father's remains
are in a monitored jar and under lock.

Don't ask me about my language or creed,
they had been blotted out.
Though my genes can spell out my seeds
I remain the woman of the eon mask.


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Susie Gharib is a graduate of the University of Strathclyde with a Ph.D. on the work of D.H. Lawrence. Her poetry and fiction have appeared in multiple venues.