Poem by Summiaya Nilofer Kichloo

FOR EVERY DREAM

I am in the fields for every dream shattered under the weight of traditions

and every freedom shackled by chains of customs. For every sister traded for her brother's honor and every mother abandoned and abused for the birth of a girl child. For every bride tortured and burned alive for the dearth of dowry and every daughter deemed less worthy of education and inheritance. For every child whose books exchanged with henna and every wife whose autonomy was buried

with the vows of her marriage. For every woman, called names and judged impure,

because her body fell prey to your lust, shall rise a generation with anger in their eyes, anger, that does not forgive, that does not forget, that does not breed years of generated trauma. A generation of gallant men and women, who are not afraid

with the idea of equality. A generation of women who do not need men to define their worth and beauty, who are not slaves to the notions of centuries, who are not silenced by fear or consolation, who breed children that fight for a world where men and women walk on the same road not as subservients and masters, but as equals and worthy, with might and dignity

and grace, that God created them as worthy and beautiful. © Summiaya Nilofer Kichloo