"I don't think that being a strong person is about ignoring your emotions and fighting your feelings. Putting on a brave face doesn't mean you're a brave person. That's why everybody in my life knows everything that I'm going through. I can't hide anything from them. People need to realise that being open isn't the same as being weak."

- Taylor Swift

Monday, April 27, 2015

Comfort Women

Brethren!
Remember-
You are the daughters of comfort women

Perhaps not.
Perhaps not all.
Perhaps some of us
Are the daughters of happy wives

Perhaps some of the grenade martyrs died
With bile in their mouths
And ‘Mother’ on their lips

That is your story, little white boy
Clutching poppies and rosemary at dawn

This is mine.

Perhaps some of my conquerors
Died scraped-knee, grass-stained boys
Without the scent of a woman on their skin

But-
Some of them went home
To make comfort women of their unhappy wives
Making love to a memory
Of guns, germs, steel
And the stench of death

Making love with our blood on their hands

Our lost childhoods
And our dead babies in the river
Are lost to the history books

But blood is thicker than water
And sticks to the conscience like mud

Lest we forget.

No comments: