Let the girl go free

Times are hard,

Like many damsels and lads,

With little things in hand,

She too had decided to hit the long distance road,

Without giving much thought

To what lay ahead.

Upon reaching destination

Like most, she had gotten lost in admiration –

Chalcedonies paved roads,

Sky reaching gilded domes, studded with diamonds –

So much so the rays from the sky

Are thrown back to where they came from.

The land is Bahrain – rich with oil and valuable stones.

Then she thought, at last for once

She had broken free

The umbilical cord of poverty and misery!

But only for few days.

In fact, the feeling wasn’t real –

It was chimerical.

Sooner had she settled in

Than she felt the slabs of quartz,

Umpteen times, she had to travel on back and forth

Rendering domestic services,

Way beyond she had been paid for,

Began her sole to bruise,

The fragile tarsus and other bones of her feet to frizz.

At times! Mischance knows no bound.

There too, behind the walls of the mansion --

Where the Law did not reach,

Morality had become fuzzy and bleached

Human value mortally breached –

Many gruesome ordeals began to unfold

Against a dreamer by members of libertine household.

Raping became the norm

By all, including genetically linked,

Young and old men,

Virile or be they valetudinarian.

Smelling reeking groins

Her own femurs did not invoke

Jealous wife in anger went amok.

As revenge violence became a daily occurrence --

Kicking the pudenda,

Prodding the breast with a dagger's hilt,

Splattering hot water into the young girl’s face,

Keeping her locked, denying her bread - - - --

The suffering went on day and night unheard.

Repeated gross abuses gone unabated

Rescue! She cried, but no one was around.

This turned the girl’s hackles hoicked.

One fateful day, she lost her head

And she stroke back with the only language

She had learned that was most effective in the household,

She had been living with.

In this land as in many,

The law operates in reverse.

On one hand, It is in harmony

With those who unfailingly commit felony.

On the other, It is most effective against victims,

Who live within the bound of law,

Who are morally vestal

And their human respect not prodigal.

But the scimitar is hungry

It must be fed

With unsuspecting neck

For all times sake

In full view of the public.

Let Yeshiwork go free

Copyright Haileselassie Girmay

22/12/2000