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Rafeef Ziadah - 'Shades of Anger', London, 12.11.11

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    I wrote this poem when we were doing a direct action
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    at my university, there were Palestinian citizens and Israeli soldiers
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    and I'm very petty about this thing so I said
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    "I will only be a Palestinian, I refuse to be a settler or soldier."
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    So, I was lying on the ground and this guy came
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    and kicked me in the guts and said:
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    "You deserve to be raped before you have your terrorist children."
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    At the time I said nothing but then I wrote this poem.
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    for this young gentleman.
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    Allow me to speak my Arab tongue
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    before they occupy my language as well.
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    Allow me to speak my mother tongue
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    before they colonise her memory as well.
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    I am an Arab woman of color.
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    and we come in all shades of anger.
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    All my grandfather ever wanted to do
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    was wake up at dawn and watch my grandmather kneel and pray
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    in a village hidden between Jaffa and Haifa
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    my mother was born under an olive tree
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    on a soil they say is no longer mine
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    but I will cross their barriers, their check points
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    their damn apartheid walls and return to my homeland
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    I am an Arab woman of colour and we come in all shades of anger.
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    And did you hear my sister screaming yesterday
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    as she gave birth at a check point
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    with Israeli soldiers looking between her legs
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    for their next demographic threat
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    called her baby girl "Janeen".
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    And did you hear Amni Mona screaming
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    behind their prison bars as they teargassed her cell
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    "We're returning to Palestine!"
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    I am an Arab woman of colour and we come in all shades of anger.
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    But you tell me, this womb inside me
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    will only bring you your next terrorist
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    beard wearing, gun waving, towelhead, sand nigger
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    You tell me, I send my children out to die
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    but those are your copters, your F16's in our sky
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    And let's talk about this terrorism business for a second
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    Wasn't it the CIA that killed Allende and Lumumba
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    and who trained Osama in the first place
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    My grandparents didn't run around like clowns
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    with the white capes and the white hoods on their heads lynching black people
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    I am an Arab woman of colour and we come in all shades of anger.
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    "So who is that brown woman screaming in the demonstration?"
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    Sorry, should I not scream?
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    I forgot to be your every orientalist dream
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    Jinnee in a bottle, belly dancer, harem girl, soft spoken Arab woman
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    Yes master, no master.
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    Thank you for the peanut butter sandwiches
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    raining down on us from your F16's master
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    Yes my liberators are here to kill my children
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    and call them "collateral damage"
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    I am an Arab woman of colour and we come in all shades of anger.
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    So let me just tell you this womb inside me
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    will only bring you your next rebel
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    She will have a rock in one hand and a Palestinian flag in the other
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    I am an Arab woman of color
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    Beware! Beware my anger...
Title:
Rafeef Ziadah - 'Shades of Anger', London, 12.11.11
Description:

RAFEEF ZIADAH is a Canadian-Palestinian spoken word artist and activist. Her debut CD Hadeel is dedicated to Palestinian youth, who still fly kites in the face of F16 bombers, who still remember the names if their villages in Palestine and still hear the sound of Hadeel (cooing of doves) over Gaza.
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Video Language:
English
Duration:
03:42

English subtitles

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