An Iraqi Evening
By Yousif al-Sa'igh
Clips from the battlefield
on an Iraqi evening:
a peacable home
two boys preparing their homework
a little girl
absentmindedly drawing on scrap paper
funny pictures.
--breaking news coming shortly.
The entire house becomes ears
ten Iraqi eyes glued to the screen in frightened silence.
Smells mingle:
the smell of war
and the smell of just baked bread.
The mother raises her eyes to a photo on the wall
whispering
--May God protect you
and begins preparing their supper
quietly
while in her mind
clips of the battlefield flicker by
carefully selected for hope.
It's ironic that I randomly picked this poem to analyze when i've been focussing on rereading A Thousand Splendid Suns. While reading this poem I couldn't help but constantly connect it to points made in the book. In the novel we see how the war going on in Afghanistan effects each of the characters individually and get to see different side of what is going on. In the novel we see what some of the characters (Laila,Mariam,Tariq, Aziza and Zalmai) went through as a child and how this effected them overall. They lose their innocence much too soon and it is unfortunate to see that this is a common occurrence to these kids who are exposed to war.
Which in this poem it shows that these children are still holding on to their innocence and trying to keep some form of normalcy in their lives. While the mother is terrified not just for her but mainly for her children and what will happen to them, which in A Thousand Splendid Suns we also saw how the women went out of the way to do what was best for the children even if it would harshly effect them (such as when Laila decided to marry Rasheed when she found out she was pregnant and had nowhere else to go).
This poem can also show how people have no voice in what their government says or does. These innocent civilians are getting caught up in the crossfire of war (We actually can see this even with what has been going on over here in America with the riots).
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