Poem: Freedom is not a one-way street
As I travel to Dubai for business, the news of the Hamas — Israel clash comes up on my feeds.
My friend ‘Ramsey Hanhan’ had shared a copy of his book ‘Fugitive Dreams’. The book brings out deep insights about the Palestinian struggle for freedom. I had reviewed his book recently.
I began to wonder how is freedom one-sided. The coverage of violence is a thousand times more than the silent struggle for freedom and the omniscient presence of hope. Whether it is Holocaust victims then or Palestinians today, freedom is not a one-way street.
This poem is dedicated to the children of Palestine. Young, innocent, and trapped behind the barbed wires and the eyes of the guns.
Freedom is just a step back
Freedom is just a step forward
If Britain fought the Romans for freedom
Why did they colonize ever?
History is a broken story
That hides the truth
Or is it a convenient tale
Called the ‘oppressor’s narrative?’Does the suffering of the Holocaust go away
The indelible marks on the skin
The gas chambers and ghettos
History remembers Auschwitz
But…
Just because we got a seat
On the victor’s high table
Should they switch roles
from being innocent victims
to wanton oppressors.I am just a few hundred miles away
Life is peaceful and glamorous
But imagine those who are locked
In the largest prison in the world
A life cut down to size
Children behind barbed wires
Like animals in a zoo
Yet, they live on in hope
Can this world step back a little
and step forward once
to understand this -
Is freedom a one-way street?- Ashok Subramanian © 2023
