An Arab Woman Blues - Reflections in a sealed bottle...

This is the first time I ever begin a post with an Arabic insult – Wa awlad al Gahbah. Sons of whores. I have nothing against forced prostitution, and I do not judge it, but I have everything against you, Ya Awlad al Gahbah. Whores, whoredom, is no simple prostitution...oh no! It is not. Whoredom is way deeper that selling one's body for a few dollars, euros or dinars... Whoredom is a system, a way of being, a way of cognizance, a way of life... And you are the professional, expert whores... You are the whores sitting in fortresses, in towers, made of invisible walls, made of words, made of language, made of a rationalizing "intellect", made of protocols and diplomacy...made of savagery... The high class whores of this world. Let me spit on you, let my saliva drip and dribble on your fences, like some signature, a signature of recognition...a recognition of your Whoredom. Whoredom, Kingdom, Freedom -- the "Freedom" of captives, chained by their ankles... With po...

I heard Mahmoud Darwish is in town. M.Darwish, one of the best contemporary Arab poets. A Palestinian who has been in exile for so long...surely he knows all about aesthetics -- the sublime, the ugly, the comic and the beautiful...surely he knows all about occupation, misery, loss, longings and tragedies... I cancelled whatever appointments I had this evening and rushed to hear him recite his latest. By the time I arrived to the old hall, it was so packed they would not let anyone in, anymore. Over 500 people were already in there... I tried squeezing in, and felt my dissapointment rising as I realized it was impossible for me to see or hear M.Darwish in person. I looked at the crowd, mainly young adults, in their late 20's, and a few from the older generation...That gave me a slight surge of hope. If Arabs can still appreciate poetic words streaming from one occupation, then maybe all is not lost. Or, maybe words are the only thing left... Words to compose poetry, words to convey ...

All I yearned for was a short afternoon nap...and I found myself in the Green Zone. It started off with my escaping in a taxi cab all the way to Baghdad... I did not tell a soul, I thought to myself, it will be a short trip. Then I find myself in the Green Zone. I pretend am a foreigner, carefully hiding my origins. I check in a 5 stars hotel, but it is so dark all around me. The lobby is full of prostitutes, crippled men, foreign contractors from all nationalities, and soldiers...A few bearded Iraqis are there, security matters. The hotel employees are all foreigners. They speak French. They are aggressive and nasty. I tried reminding one of them that this is not France, this is Iraq, he shrugged me off and told me "Rentrez chez vous." I wanted to reply but I am "chez moi" but stopped short...I swallowed the bitter insult. In the dream I promised myself to stay objective. I shall tour the Green Zone with an open mind, like a tourist... I came across a bunch of wom...

It's dawn here... The Muezzin just finished his call for the sunrise prayer. I am very tired but unable to sleep. I love the call to prayer. It pierces the leftovers of the night's obscurity, signaling a new dawn, a new day, another cycle to complete... I remember reading in a Sufi treatise, that the Muslim prayer is highly symbolic of this cycle...The cycle of the sun, the cycle of evolution, the cycle of the elements, the cycle of life and death...And "Man" is the focal point in that cycle on Earth... For instance,in the Muslim prayer, the standing up position i.e verticality, symbolizes Aleph ,(A), the Human State. The half bent position symbolizes the Dal , (D) and represents the Animal State. And finally the prostration, or Sujud in Arabic, which takes on the form of a Meem (M) represents the Vegetal/Mineral state. Aleph, Dal, Meem. or A-D-M stands for ADAM . The primordial Man (as opposed to male the gender.) And I assume, every day we go through these differ...

I was queuing the other day to have some official paperwork "authenticated and approved"... The queue was long, tediously long... We were lined up like a herd of sheep, patiently waiting for the "official's" stamp. That much needed stamp which will prove that we are still accepted here... Or that stamp that will allow us a few more months of breathing space... Or that stamp that will give us an illusory freedom in some temporary legality... Or that stamp that will confer upon us a seeming sense of belonging...Another illusion of a "home", however fleeting and ephemeral, that illusion may be... I stood there like everyone else, waiting for my turn, overwhelmed by a strange feeling that I am about to take part in a game of Russian Roulette... Strong apprehensive thoughts kept whirling in my mind, assailing my head, pounding away... What if he refuses to stamp, what if he finds an excuse not to stamp, what if he delays the stamp, what if he requests more ...

I'm in a musical mood... I've dedicated a song on the Uncensored blog to my friends in Spain. And am dedicated this one to my once beautiful Baghdad before her ugly rape by the barbarian hordes from the North... I am also offering it to all of Iraq's TRUE friends. This is the latest from the famous Oud (luth) player, Nasser Shamma accompanied by Latifah, the Tunisian singer. Unfortunately, I don't have the time to translate the very poignant/touching lyrics. If there's a translator in the house, who'd like to do so, be my guest. Youtube Video: by Namirkh - 12 January 2008

Today, for the first time in decades, the stars have been stripped away from our national flag. Our flag looks like some barren land with no stellar luminosity, some black hole, some chaotic big bang... There’s no Milky Way, no Venus and no Aphrodite... There’s an anachronistic, pagan, marble God scripted on a cheap satin flag. He's even desperately wondering who He really is. And He wonders... What am I doing on this flag ? This stripped flag, this naked flag ? What is this writing ? Why do they quote Me everywhere when I was not consulted ? Parties, banners, slogans, and loyalties... Do you think I really care? I am counting blood droplets, counting them one by one... like some efficient lab technician. I measure blood counts and hemoglobin levels... I keep track of severed limbs, like some dedicated accountant, I audit morgues and graves And I monitor survivors... I am not stuck on some new flag. You can find me in a street corner, begging, Or in some garbage dump, scavenging, Y...

What is Life ? You breathe in and breathe out...but you have no power over your breath. You breathe while you are unconscious and you breathe while you are asleep, and you breathe in your dreams and your nightmares...but somehow you believe you control your breath and that of others... Breathing is the vital function that indicates you are still alive. That life is still circulating in you... Torture is about leaving you breathing but with no life circulating. Torture is about exercising the ultimate control, leaving you to hover between life and death. Torture is not only sadistic, it is the ultimate ego trip of someone mistaking himself/herself for God, for “Pneuma”. I’ve written over 300 posts thus far, and if there one subject matter that paralyzes me with both - anger and indignation, it is that of rape and torture. I am deliberately referring to both Rape and Torture as one and the same thing. For me they are one and the same thing. Torture is a form of Rape and Rape is a form of...

Again, a big THANK YOU to Sinfo Fernandez from Rebelion.org for the following translations of my posts. http://www.rebelion.org/noticia.php?id=62728 http://www.rebelion.org/noticia.php?id=62209 http://www.rebelion.org/noticia.php?id=62100 http://www.rebelion.org/noticia.php?id=61591 http://www.rebelion.org/noticia.php?id=61140 http://www.rebelion.org/noticia.php?id=61079

I feel silly repeating it. But do check the other blogs. I hate advertising myself. I am finally getting acquainted with this blogging business- the technical side at least- and you can actually click under "my other blogs" and view the latest. Please do that, as I hate posting/informing you about each new entry. I guess am a prude after all. Who would have thought eh ?