Poem: Body & Coda of “A Colorful Checklist at the Checkpoint” + Prefatory Notes + Auditory Afterword

Prefatory note (for the body):

“Tum Kaun Rang Ho?” is a performed poem by Sabika Abbas Naqvi (Kommune, Spoken Mumbai 2020). The title means roughly “Which color are you?”. A question of identity, affiliation, and how society codes us by “color” (religion, caste, gender, politics). The poem’s spine is a serial question: “Which color are you?” that keeps shifting target and context. Repetition as pressure tactic; identity as a moving target. (Watch the performance beats and crowd response to feel the escalation.) “Rang” operates metaphorically: communal labels, skin shade/colorism, political flags, even festival colors; one word, many traps. That polysemy is the poem’s power. It’s built for the mic with measured pace, pauses that let the audience answer (or fail to). This fits Naqvi’s project of reclaiming public space through poetry: the audience becomes a participant of the livelihood of poetry, rather than a perceptive spectator only. As the “color” demand narrows a person, the poem keeps re-widening: memory, body, shared streets, care. It argues that fixed labels are too small for a living human. (Consistent with her protest-poetry ethos.) “Tum Kaun Rang Ho?” weaponizes a simple question to expose how identity is policed and then refuses that policing by multiplying meaning, audience, and voice. Watch it for cadence and escalation; write with its question-mark spine.

[BODY] A Colorful Checklist at the Checkpoint

Poet: They stop me at the mouth of the lane, ask for proof of sky.
Crowd: I open my throat; they measure it in inches—kaun rang ho?

Poet: My grandmother stitched borders out of lullabies and salt.
Crowd: Your visa says silence, your stamp says hush—kaun rang ho?

Poet: I carry a pocket of rain; it refuses to enter their forms.
Crowd: Clouds don’t count, only papers count—kaun rang ho?

Poet: I learned my alphabets from railway walls: A for azaadi, B for bread.
Crowd: C for curfew, D for deny—kaun rang ho?

Poet: They paint the town in slogans, then call us the graffiti.
Crowd: We scrub slogans from our lungs—kaun rang ho?

Poet: A temple bell rings; even echoes show their IDs.
Crowd: God is held at the turnstile—kaun rang ho?

Poet: My mother’s bangles clink like ballots no one counted.
Crowd: The ballot box stays sealed—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The factory hum is a hymn with oil on its lips.
Crowd: Pay stubs vanish; night shifts stay—kaun rang ho?

Poet: On the school blackboard, the lesson is erased but the chalk remembers.
Crowd: Fingers go white; histories go blank—kaun rang ho?

Poet: They argue that hunger is apolitical, then tax the ladle.
Crowd: We serve the queue our ribs as plates—kaun rang ho?

Poet: I wear a scarf of monsoon; they prefer drought chic.
Crowd: Dry wells get ribbon-cuttings—kaun rang ho?

Poet: My friend’s name does not pass the metal detector.
Crowd: The beep learns to pronounce fear—kaun rang ho?

Poet: I asked the streetlight if it witnessed the beating.
Crowd: It flickered like a lying oath—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The camera loves order; the edit loves amnesia.
Crowd: We crowd the outtakes with truth—kaun rang ho?

Poet: I plant a sapling of questions; boots trample the punctuation.
Crowd: Still, commas sprout, asking for breath—kaun rang ho?

Poet: A rumor arrives on a motorbike, helmet full of hashtags.
Crowd: The timeline burns; the well goes dark—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The sea refuses their borders, keeps braiding strangers into shore.
Crowd: We name each wave after a witness—kaun rang ho?

Poet: I hold up a mirror to the checkpoint; it detains its own reflection.
Crowd: Even the mirror is searched for bias—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Last night I dreamt of a flag stitched from children’s drawings.
Crowd: Crayons don’t salute; they bloom—kaun rang ho?

Poet: If color is a prison, I’ll take the spectrum as a file.
Crowd: We rasp the bars to music—kaun rang ho?

Poet: If names are checkpoints, we’ll rename the street to “Everyone Arrives.”
Crowd: Roll call: present, present, present—kaun rang ho?

Poet: And if the mic is seized, we’ll sing to the lampposts.
Crowd: The city will learn our chorus—kaun rang ho?

Poet: They shut the internet, say it’s for our safety; even grief buffers.
Crowd: Our messages deliver tomorrow, our wounds trend never—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The census knocks politely; the questions come with fences.
Crowd: Who sleeps inside the box?—kaun rang ho?

Poet: A queue outside the ration shop bends like a question mark.
Crowd: The answer is stock-out, the stomach votes—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The river files a complaint against the dam in silt.
Crowd: Fish sign it with bones—kaun rang ho?

Poet: A uniform asks my tongue to show its birthplace.
Crowd: Accent becomes evidence, vowels frisked—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The algorithm ranks our faces by compliance and lighting.
Crowd: Shadow becomes suspicious, dusk detained—kaun rang ho?

Poet: A siren marries a headline; their child is panic.
Crowd: We swaddle it in context—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Dal and rice in the pot, caste still in the water.
Crowd: We skim and it returns—kaun rang ho?

Poet: They police our plates, count spices like contraband.
Crowd: Our kitchens pass the border checks—kaun rang ho?

Poet: A farmer folds his field into a petition.
Crowd: The tractor learns to speak—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The city builds statues taller than public clinics.
Crowd: We measure height in missing beds—kaun rang ho?

Poet: A textbook sheds a chapter at midnight, grows a footnote bruise.
Crowd: Syllabi march in lockstep—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The newsroom swaps verbs: fired becomes resigned, protest becomes traffic.
Crowd: We keep the old dictionary—kaun rang ho?

Poet: A ballot travels farther than an ambulance tonight.
Crowd: Sirens run on promises—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Heatwaves write their manifesto on our tin roofs.
Crowd: The ceiling fan canvasses sweat—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The landlord paints over mold and memory in one coat.
Crowd: The rent stays unaffordable, the cough returns—kaun rang ho?

Poet: They say the market is free; our wages are on parole.
Crowd: We unionize our breath—kaun rang ho?

Poet: A drone draws a halo over the rally.
Crowd: Saints of surveillance, pray for us—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The court calendar blooms with adjournments like late monsoon.
Crowd: Justice comes with an umbrella—kaun rang ho?

Poet: My city speaks many names for the same bruise.
Crowd: We answer to all of them—kaun rang ho?

Poet: If a gate is a question, we’ll answer with a bridge.
Crowd: Footsteps file the paperwork—kaun rang ho?

Poet: If fear is policy, mercy is our civil disobedience.
Crowd: We pass it hand to hand—kaun rang ho?

Poet: If home is contested, we’ll pitch tents of lullabies.
Crowd: Night watch, shift change, cradle—that’s us—kaun rang ho?

Poet: When they ask again, I hold up a bowl of light.
Crowd: Drink first, then decide—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The oven hums curfew songs at dawn.
Crowd: We proof our patience like dough—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Flour dust rises, soft as dissent, covering price tags.
Crowd: Inflation tastes of unsalted rage—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The recipe asks for sugar; the ration gives none.
Crowd: We stir memory instead—kaun rang ho?

Poet: A mother measures protest in teaspoons, not decibels.
Crowd: Her ladle is her loudspeaker—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Rolling pins lie like truncheons, but we use them for rotis.
Crowd: Kneading becomes negotiation—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Gas leaks promises; cylinders wait for subsidies.
Crowd: Flame still remembers hunger’s dialect—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The market bans coriander in the name of austerity.
Crowd: We season the air with rumor—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The neighbor’s smoke alarm mistakes samosa for sedition.
Crowd: Every aroma is suspect—kaun rang ho?

Poet: My apron stains testify better than affidavits.
Crowd: The kitchen keeps the minutes—kaun rang ho?

Poet: A recipe crossed the border, carrying cumin and memory.
Crowd: Customs confiscate belonging—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The pantry’s last jar whispers revolution in pickle-brine.
Crowd: Fermentation becomes manifesto—kaun rang ho?

Poet: When the power cuts mid-bake, we call it rationed light.
Crowd: Candles rise like witnesses—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The oven’s timer outlasts the government’s promise.
Crowd: Ding! We serve accountability—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The table becomes parliament when everyone’s fed.
Crowd: Debate begins with bread—kaun rang ho?

Poet: And if tomorrow burns the loaf again, we’ll still bake.
Crowd: Resistance smells of yeast and faith—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The dough remembers whose hands were tired.
Crowd: We stretch it thin like rationed hope—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Aprons hung like flags of unfinished wars.
Crowd: Each stain has a manifesto—kaun rang ho?

Poet: They said it’s just cooking, not politics.
Crowd: Ask the grain who paid the tax—kaun rang ho?

Poet: I write my dissent in turmeric; it glows long after washing.
Crowd: Even soap bows to color—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Spoons clang parliament into the sink.
Crowd: The drain overflows with bills—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Hunger queues outside the kitchen door, holding voter ID.
Crowd: We ladle equality in whispers—kaun rang ho?

Poet: They ban words the way they ban meat.
Crowd: Silence fries in leftover oil—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The oven clock ticks louder than news anchors.
Crowd: We bake over breaking news—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Gas cylinders roll out like promises before elections.
Crowd: Empty metal is the new anthem—kaun rang ho?

Poet: I barter recipes for rent relief.
Crowd: My landlord eats democracy twice a day—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The grocery list reads like an obituary.
Crowd: Items die before payday—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Our tea leaves predict policy changes.
Crowd: Sugar rations the sweetness—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Bread rises, wages don’t.
Crowd: We eat the air for breakfast—kaun rang ho?

Poet: In this kitchen, we unlearn obedience.
Crowd: The ladle leads the march—kaun rang ho?

Poet: We break the fast with defiance.
Crowd: Amen, aameen, aamin—kaun rang ho?

Poet: When the state confiscates our spices, we season with story.
Crowd: The tongue remembers—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Every recipe I know begins with mourning.
Crowd: Every meal ends in promise—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The street asks for feet, not opinions.
Crowd: Asphalt audits our breath—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Posters sweat in rain; the glue won’t lie.
Crowd: Our palms learn the grammar of paste—kaun rang ho?

Poet: A policeman writes my height in a notebook of rumors.
Crowd: Tape measures learn ideology—kaun rang ho?

Poet: I carry names of prisoners like contraband vowels.
Crowd: Mouths become safehouses—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The march counts in heartbeats; my pace stutters like doubt.
Crowd: Courage drafts behind the loudest drum—kaun rang ho?

Poet: My half-room follows me outside, folding its corners into shade.
Crowd: The chair tries to sit me down—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The mic asks for a spine; mine sends a maybe.
Crowd: Maybe doesn’t move barricades—kaun rang ho?

Poet: A camera circles; the crowd becomes a caption.
Crowd: We refuse to be alt-text—kaun rang ho?

Poet: My body signs a waiver I can’t read—sweat for ink.
Crowd: Skin remembers curfews better than diaries—kaun rang ho?

Poet: A drone draws a curfew on the sky with light.
Crowd: Stars file a formal objection—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The rumor factory runs three shifts; fact-checkers walk.
Crowd: We pace truth like unpaid rent—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Sirens herd the evening toward a fenced conclusion.
Crowd: Night negotiates parole—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The river carries placards made of soggy cardboard prayers.
Crowd: Even water chants on beat—kaun rang ho?

Poet: I press my ear to the pavement: it hums with detained footsteps.
Crowd: We memorize the rhythm for roll call—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Someone live-streams fear; comments arrive faster than help.
Crowd: Hearts react; bodies must—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The algorithm prefers tidy tragedies with soft lighting.
Crowd: Our pixels refuse makeup—kaun rang ho?

Poet: I post a paragraph when a presence was required.
Crowd: Screens don’t hold lines—kaun rang ho?

Poet: My timeline scrolls like a prayer wheel stuck on grief.
Crowd: Amen becomes refresh—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The interview reschedules itself into oblivion; courage waits in the lobby.
Crowd: Clipboard of excuses, pen out of ink—kaun rang ho?

Poet: I fold a leaflet into a paper crane for a child at the barricade.
Crowd: It learns to fly against water cannons—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The checkpoint stamps my chest with a pending status.
Crowd: Lungs appeal the verdict—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Graffiti peels, but the wall keeps the scar tissue.
Crowd: City as keloid witness—kaun rang ho?

Poet: I queue at dawn for a glimpse of a courtroom door.
Crowd: Justice opens at lunch—kaun rang ho?

Poet: A bus stop becomes a seminar on survival and synonyms for wait.
Crowd: Attendance marked in dust—kaun rang ho?

Poet: I practice saying STOP louder than my scrolling.
Crowd: Thumbs are not megaphones—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The chair I escaped shows up like an accomplice in my spine.
Crowd: Posture confesses the alibi—kaun rang ho?

Poet: We pass a kettle through the crowd; its whistle chooses a side.
Crowd: Samizdat of steam—kaun rang ho?

Poet: A mother tapes a photograph to the sky with a string of prayers.
Crowd: Wind becomes witness—kaun rang ho?

Poet: When the chant falters, we borrow breath from the ones inside.
Crowd: Their silence carries syllables—kaun rang ho?

Poet: I learn that shame is a curfew I put on myself.
Crowd: Keys rattle in the ribs—kaun rang ho?

Poet: If the street is a syllabus, tonight is cancellation class.
Crowd: We add footnotes in footprints—kaun rang ho?

Poet: If the city is a throat, we will not whisper through it.
Crowd: Volume is a right, not a crime—kaun rang ho?

Poet: And if tomorrow they paint over our voices again—
Crowd: We’ll stencil the echo, then sing through it—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The letter returns wearing black bars where the verbs were.
Crowd: Even affection is redacted—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Your qaidi number fits in my mouth like a stone.
Crowd: We learn to speak around it—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The jail calendar blooms with tomorrow, tomorrow, tomorrow.
Crowd: Adjournment seasons the year—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Courtroom clocks run on a fuel called meanwhile.
Crowd: Meanwhile fattens on our hours—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The remand sheet creases where my hope would fold.
Crowd: Paper cuts outlast the session—kaun rang ho?

Poet: A judge asks for silence; my heart files an appeal.
Crowd: Bail argues with its shadow—kaun rang ho?

Poet: I press my ear to the glass of mulaqaat; it fogs with longing.
Crowd: Condensation as affidavit—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Your handwriting paces the margin like a caged animal.
Crowd: The comma learns lockdown—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Books arrive with spines broken by suspicion.
Crowd: Pages serve time in quarantine—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The prison gate stamps our names with visiting hours.
Crowd: Love shows up on schedule—kaun rang ho?

Poet: A pigeon carries the rumor of a better magistrate.
Crowd: We bribe it with crumbs of patience—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Production warrant, transfer van, a necklace of handcuffs and road dust.
Crowd: Kilometer after kilometer of maybe—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The FIR spells you like a stranger; even your vowels wear helmets.
Crowd: We do roll call on the tongue—kaun rang ho?

Poet: A witness forgets, a file misplaces itself, a date goes missing.
Crowd: Memory cross-examines bureaucracy—kaun rang ho?

Poet: I stitch a quilt of photocopies; it fails to keep us warm.
Crowd: Xerox has no body heat—kaun rang ho?

Poet: I count your days by the mildew on our balcony.
Crowd: Rain keeps better records—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The warder weighs our fruit parcel like contraband tenderness.
Crowd: Oranges plead not guilty—kaun rang ho?

Poet: A lawyer sharpens arguments on the edge of my sleep.
Crowd: Dreams submit affidavits—kaun rang ho?

Poet: When the verdict delays, the sky turns courtroom gray.
Crowd: Clouds confer in chambers—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Now the body: it remembers curfews stitched under the skin.
Crowd: Scar is a syllabus—kaun rang ho?

Poet: My shoulders carry safety instructions nobody wrote.
Crowd: Posture as policy—kaun rang ho?

Poet: They legislate my hemline, tax my laughter, index my breath.
Crowd: Permission slips for joy—kaun rang ho?

Poet: A streetlight audits my silhouette; I refuse to itemize.
Crowd: Gaze is not governance—kaun rang ho?

Poet: I stamp consent on my pulse, renewable daily.
Crowd: Touch must pass customs—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The mirror testifies: hunger and hope share a rib.
Crowd: We count both like calories—kaun rang ho?

Poet: I name each bruise after a policy that caused it.
Crowd: Index of injuries, ISBN pending—kaun rang ho?

Poet: My feet negotiate potholes and patriarchy in the same route.
Crowd: Asphalt learns to listen—kaun rang ho?

Poet: Blood keeps its own archive; it files a monthly protest.
Crowd: Pads are not parliament—kaun rang ho?

Poet: When I run, the city recalibrates its threat matrix.
Crowd: Stamina becomes statement—kaun rang ho?

Poet: The clinic door measures pain in deductible units.
Crowd: We pay in breath—kaun rang ho?

Poet: I refuse the diet made of docility and doubt.
Crowd: Muscle votes yes—kaun rang ho?

Poet: I write NO on my spine in permanent posture.
Crowd: Vertebrae as placards—kaun rang ho?

Poet: If the state patrols the kitchen and the street and my skin,
Crowd: We patrol each other with care—kaun rang ho?

Poet: And if they ask again, I unzip the day, show them a beating heart.
Crowd: Count this color first—kaun rang ho?

Prefatory note (for the coda): Kamla Bhasin didn’t “invent” azadi so much as learn, adapt, and amplify it. The chant, "Aurat ka naara: Azaadi. Bacchon ka naara: Azaadi" ("Woman's slogan: Freedom. Children's slogan: Freedom"), was first raised by Pakistani feminists especially within the Women’s Action Forum during the Zia-ul-Haq era in the mid-1980s. Bhasin picked it up across the border and began improvising it for South Asian feminist rallies; she’s widely credited with popularising it in India, notably at a 1991 Women’s Studies conference at Jadavpur University and later at One Billion Rising gatherings, expanding the call from patriarchy to a broader demand for freedom from all hierarchies.

[CODA] “Azadi” (for the same poem)

Poet: If color is a question, our answer is a verb.

Crowd: March is a grammar—kaun rang ho?

Poet: If kitchens and courtyards and streets are one long sentence,

Crowd: We refuse the full stop—kaun rang ho?

Poet: They ask our shade; we offer our share.

Crowd: Bread splits even—kaun rang ho?

Poet: They count our breaths; we count each other.

Crowd: Roll call of pulse—kaun rang ho?

Poet: From patriarchy—

Crowd: Azadi!

Poet: From all hierarchy—

Crowd: Azadi!

Poet: From unpaid kitchens and priced lives—

Crowd: Azadi!

Poet: From borders drawn through bedrooms—

Crowd: Azadi!

Poet: From algorithms that grade our faces—

Crowd: Azadi!

Poet: From adjourned tomorrows and remand calendars—

Crowd: Azadi!

Poet: From shame sewn into skin—

Crowd: Azadi!

Poet: For bread, breath, books, bodies—

Crowd: Azadi!

Poet: If they ask again, “kaun rang—”

Crowd: Azadi!

Poet: If they paint over our voices, “kaun—”

Crowd: Azadi!

Poet: If the mic is seized, the streetlights dim, the checkpoint laughs—

Crowd (unprompted): Azadi!

Poet: Then this is my color, our color, the chorus we refuse to surrender—

Crowd (hold, louder): Azadi!

Afterword with notes I do not want framed: 

I am a cowardly rebel with good handwriting. I am writing this to remember, not to be forgiven. I sit in a half-room that has memorised my weight. The chair is an accomplice: it leans, it hushes, it pulls me back from the door with the soft authority of habit. Outside, women are screaming poetry into the afternoon with mouths like lit matches, throats disciplined to thunder. Inside, my voice trembles under sunlight and makes do with typing. The sun is a witness I keep trying to recuse. It refuses the bench. I inventory my fear like groceries. Turmeric for courage stains because the soap doesn’t remove it, only moves it around. Tea leaves for prophecy because they keep telling me nothing I didn’t already dodge. A ladle for announcements as it taps the rim, asks, “today?” I say maybe. Maybe is delay dressed as care. Maybe is my most fluent language. Maybe buys me another hour in the half-room, where rebellion is a draft and the mic is a rumor of steel. I watch their poems arrive like ambulances with siren-first and purpose clear. Mine arrives like a ration line: it waits, it inches, it apologizes to the person behind it. I have been postponing courage the way people postpone dental visits knowing exactly what is wrong with the mouth, unwilling to open it for sharp instruments and brighter light. Call me a coward if you must; the name fits like an old sweater I refuse to throw out. It has pockets for excuses. It’s warm. It smells faintly of deadlines missed and dinners made on time. But I cook politics into everything. I salt the dough with names I cannot say aloud. I write dissent in turmeric on the chopping board and slice through it anyway. I season rice with small angers, let them steam shut under a lid. I have learned that kneading is a kind of negotiation: you push, you fold, you wait for the rise that may or may not come. The oven hums its civil service exam. I fail with full attendance. I fail at shouting, but pass at feeding. Somewhere I read that nourishment is not apolitical; so I underline it with oil. The half-room is not only fear; it is also archive of that fear. The window keeps minutes and the kettle keeps secrets. The apron testifies it. Each stain is a committee report: tomatoes on policy, smoke on budget, turmeric on memory. I file them carefully on the hook behind the door. If there is ever a commission of inquiry into how I lived, call the apron first. Apron will tell you. It keeps better minutes than I do. I have never seen the street. Because, it asks for feet, not opinions. So, mine hesitate, then ignore errands. I have never seen the barricade. It asks for volume. So, mine shuts with the throat, which never forwards the request to the ribs, which are still busy holding in a lifetime of just-in-case breath. The mic, when it does come near, smells like other people’s bravery. I pass it along as if it were too hot to hold; later I brew tea alone and tell myself the tea is also a speech, just quieter and more hydrating. I know the prison calendars that say tomorrow in every square. I know the visiting-hour arithmetic. I count the mildew on the balcony like days owed to someone I would love. I remember the first time my name trembled at a checkpoint and how I laughed about it later, privately, the way people laugh after a near-miss on a staircase. I keep a private list titled: THINGS I WOULD HAVE SAID IF I HAD STOOD UP. It is long, it is brilliant, it is useless. Next to it, another list: THINGS I ACTUALLY DID. There is bread. There is proofreading. There is not showing up at dawn to hold someone’s bag while they shouted. There is not writing their bail application draft. There is some sending of links, and cash, and casseroles. There is never body heat, because when can I ever bear to leave the half-room? I outsource courage to couriers and casseroles. I am not proud. But I am not absent [I HOPE], it is a hope I keep telling myself like a lie. So, I have learned the choreography of "small rebellions" (note: they are still small, very small, always small) which now I think, might be a well-behaved, unraged brother of "weaponized incompetence": seatbacks that straighten when a slur enters the air; a door that opens to a stranger with paperwork; a phone that becomes a lighthouse for a moment and then a kettle again. I have learned to hold a sign in the kitchen, where the audience is onions and they always make me cry. I have learned that shame is a curfew that lives under the skin; some days I grant myself parole. Call me a cowardly rebel and I will set the table silently knowing it will be a blue moon before that changes. I will write the names in the margins because the center column is dangerous. I will mispronounce bravery in public and practice it in private until it knows my mouth. I know what the women outside are doing to the sky; they are teaching it decibels. Envy is my shadow’s tutor and gratitude is my homework. Bless them. I know that they will also shout my name into the permission I cannot yet sign. and scrape the rust from the gates with their vowels because they can and they are doing it. Some afternoons, the light grows unbearable and the half-room shrinks. On those afternoons I stand, I put on shoes, I let the chair sulk. I count to three before I open the door. I step into the corridor with the fragile authority of a mushy bowl of soup carried for myself: spillable, necessary, trembling, moving. If courage is a muscle, mine is still in physiotherapy. It can never carry the pot. It can never hold a banner for two intersections. It will always return to the half-room and write what it saw, not as alibi but as ledger. Receipts, not epics. Never epics. I will never be the loudest in the square. And I will be the last to leave the kitchen light on, and I will never change the door that is locked. But, I am still writing it. Because I don’t want the half-room/kitchen to be romanticized or glorified. I want the fear, the shrinking, the self-inferiorizing, named without sugar. And. I don't want any praises. No consolation prizes. No gourmet metaphors. Just the thing itself. Let the record show the tremor. I just want to write it down. I am not proud of the half-room. I am not proud of the chair. I am not proud of the Wi-Fi, the drafts, the safe angles of courage. I am a cowardly rebel because I am scared. Fear is fluent; I am always learning its accent to answer back. Because the siren in my throat drowns me before I start. Because I watch the women with lit mouths and I shrink in the glare, and that shrinking feels like being cut out of my own outline. I inferiorize myself on schedule. I rehearse disappearing. I compare my pulse to theirs and call it evidence. Do not pin a medal to my typing. Do not turn my soup into symbolism. Do not rebrand hiding as “holding space.” It is hiding. If there is nourishment here, it is for me, not the movement. If there is light here, it is the kind that exposes dust, not doors. I am a desk protestor because the desk is heavier than I admit. Not because the desk is noble. Not because the desk is necessary. Because fear is a talented jailer and I sign the register. I feel emasculated, by which I mean: disqualified from the theater where courage is credited. Yes, I know the word is messy. That is the point. I feel smaller than my own name tag. Envy is a metronome: tick, their poem; tock, my silence. I hate that I measure myself like that. I hate that I lose. I don’t want your absolution. I don’t want your ergonomic pep talk. I don’t want the beautiful myth where the quiet one is secretly the hero. The truth is simpler and uglier: I am afraid of the street and the street knows it. I am afraid of the mic and my hands know it. I am afraid of being seen failing at bravery, so I fail in private where it stings less and lasts longer. I will not call this “care work.” I will not call this “strategy.” I will not call this “baking politics.” Today it is avoidance. Tomorrow it might be effort. I am allowed to say that. I want to be outside. I want to be counted among the loud. I want my body to stop negotiating against me. I want to stop wanting and start going. So here is the only pact that isn’t a poem: I will stand up when the chair feels like glue. I will step outside before my reasons ripen into excuses. I will be counted badly rather than uncounted well. Badly still counts [I HOPE...]. I will tell on myself when I hide. I will not let a metaphor escort me back indoors. If I return to the half-room (and I will), let it be from weather, not from fear. If I write again (and I will), let it be about what I risked, not what I plated. If I fail (and I will), let the failure be public enough to teach me. Let embarrassment be the tuition, please! I am a cowardly rebel. Full stop. Some days that is the whole sentence. On other days I want a different grammar. When the women scream poetry, I will try to join the consonants. When my voice fractures under sunlight, I will keep it there until it learns. When the gate asks for volume, I might carry my small voice to it like water: spillable, insufficient, honest. I hope. And, I know. Begin anyway. No laurels. No consolations. Just a door, and a body, and a choice. I will keep making until it stops feeling like fiction. Witness: this sentence stepping outside.

~ Oizys.