The Daughters of Abraham

By Arsch Sharma

We were born within perfect walls

Washed in lime, sanctioned

By wild rains

That fell mad upon our houses of stone,

Lashing bluebirds

In the drowning juniper shade

Of some rotting ark.

Our flesh was regarded by the sweet winds,

Each blossoming cusp, each

Smouldering lily tamed within

Hopscotch boxes, behind

Linen veils.

Whereupon came the hounds of that forgotten beggar,

The holy, the true and the masculine.

And how well these blessed beasts,

Upon His careful instructions,

In His love,

Licked the sin off our bones!

Our mothers kneeled

Before wooden altars that they built for us upon a hill,

Before deep valleys of sanctioned sin,

Before blooming oleanders by little streams

From which we drank in hopes of death.

They grope our flesh and pet our brow,

And tell us we mustn’t be loud

In our fancies and our childish games,

And the ancient fallacy of our inherited shame.

Creased with care, cautioned and shunned,

Made into icons, coloured by a sun

Vile and bright,

Staining our loins, exacted

By the bloodless,

Banished by our kind

To bordellos of the holy

And voluptuary shrines

Of their ravaging lust.

And our pyres burn bright,

Watched by the law,

And our pyres burn bright

By the rotting ark,

And our pyres burn bright

As the demons cry foul

And our pyres burn bright

As the gods behold

The ashes of their own:

The daughters of Abraham, the Jezebels forlorn.

By Arsch Sharma