PRAYERS FOR AISHA LULU
Today Aisha Lulu, 5 years old
An orphan from Gaza
Died alone
Ah! The small martyr
Nobody from her family
Allowed to follow her to hospital in Jerusalem
Because that’s the rules
Of checkpoints soldiers of Zionist
Though Aisha Lulu was fighting for her life
From a chronic brain tumour
Only an unknown woman
Allowed to accompany her
For love and compassion of a small orphan
Who doesn’t know anything
About political game of the mighty and the powerful
That’s the pinch of humanity
Shown to Aisha Lulu
The orphan from Gaza
And Aisha Lulu died
Crying to the end of her life
Oh my!
Where is humanity
What is humanity
Of the Chosen ones?
Al Fatihah for Aisha Lulu
Maybe death is better for you, my angel.
PEACE BE UPON YOU DAVOS
Peace be upon you Davos
Thank you
For wanting to make
This world
A better place
A happier place
But for whom?
Peace Be Upon You Davos
What about my friends
Osama from Baghdad
Mohamed from Jericho
Dunya from Syria
Shaif from Iraq
Ibrahim from Kosovo
Also Rahman from Rakhine
Peace be upon you Davos
Yes! I know
American fighter jets need to be sold
Sophisticated Israeli drones
Need to be researched and produced
So that more could be killed
By pushing buttons
Arms factories in England have to operate
So that her people have jobs
And they could go for holidays
To Third World countries
Etc…..
Etc……….
Etc……..
Peace be upon you Davos
Don’t forget
Osama from Baghdad did not choose to be refugee forever
Mohamed from Hebron didn’t want to lose his identity
Dunya from Aleppo didn’t want to live uncomfortably
Shaif wants to go back to his beloved Sanaa
Wounds on Ibrahim’s soul are still there
Traumatised by NATO bombs in Kosovo
Rahman doesn’t want to have children and grandchildren in Cox’s Bazaar
Peace be upon you Davos
All my friends
Also, want this planet to be better
To be happier
To be peaceful
Forever
AT TIME LIKE THIS
At a time like this
I want to hold your hands
hug you tightly
and cry on your shoulder
as loud as possible
and let you cry
on my shoulder as much as you want
because the wave of pain
not decreasing at all
in fact, they are more
humiliations after humiliations
thrown at us
and we could only watch
as words are useless
Palestine oh Palestine!
Since young, I heard stories of your pain
and we grew up
approaching sunset
with your tears and blood
My man
times and times again
I had said
your pain is my pain
at times like this
my restlessness
are united with yours
and we the defeated ones
inseparable and remained together
the way you want it.
Rokiah Hashim from Malaysia writes using the name of Siti Ruqaiyah Hashim. She graduated from the University of Science in Malaysia in Theatre and Drama, then continued her studies in the University of Sydney and obtained Post Graduate Diploma in Translation from Institute of Translations and Books in Malaysia. Starting from 1987 her poems and short stories were published by mainstream literature magazines and newspapers. She is also prolific in film and theatre critics and wrote since 2007 in her column in a major national daily in Malaysia and published a film critic book in 2015 titled Kritikan Filem Siti Ruqaiyah Hashim and some 250 articles. A bi-lingual anthology of her poems titled Catharsis/Katarsis in English and Bahasa Melayu was published in 2015 and Spanish in 2016. Her bi-lingual anthology together with 12 other world peace poets titled News From Strasbourg was published in 2017 in E-Book form. All translation into Bahasa Melayu was done by Siti Ruqaiyah herself. Her bi-lingual second World Peace Poem anthology titled Peace Be Upon You Davos was published by Kultura Snova, Zagreb, Croatia in June 2019.
Her collection of poems were translated and published in Albanian recently by Ditet E Naimit 2019 titled Rerat E Sri Lavender. Her latest bi-lingual book is translations of Shaip Emerllahu poems In Bahasa Melayu and English titled Epal Tetovo/Apples of Tetovo published by Kultura Snova, Zagreb, Croatia. Her works also appeared in numerous other anthologies together with other poets from all over the world and in foreign magazines and newspaper. Her poems were translated into 16 languages including English, Mandarin, Croatian, Uzbekistan, Arabic, Mongolian, Spanish, Albanian, Turkish, Russian, Bosnian, Serbian, French, Japanese and Romanian. She attended numerous local poem festivals in Malaysia and all over the world including Peru, Taiwan, Czechoslavakia, Morocco, Macedonia, Bosnia Herzegovina, Tunisia, Albania and Croatia. She is currently living in Europe and an associate author with International magazine Diogen Pro Culture for World Peace (USA), Poetrybay (USA), GreenWatch Dhaka, Bangladesh, Campus 247. WordPress (Ghana), Atunis Galaktike Poetry (Brussels) IWABOGDANI (Brussels) and many others. Her poem won Best Poem in Split, Croatia in May 2019. She was awarded by IWABOGDANI and Yalta Chekov Festival 2019.
