A Kiteless Sky (A Play in Verse)

This is a play I wrote in 2009, after meeting an Afghan woman who told me of her life under the Taliban.

                                                 A KITELESS SKY

INTRO: This play would be held on a bare stage with a minimum of props. There are no separate scenes and/or acts and all moving of props will be done onstage during the performance, by highlighting the performance while the props are being moved around, so far as possible by the actors themselves, in shadows.

DRAMATIS PERSONAE:

Main characters (in order of appearance):

NAFISA, an Afghan woman

THE DOCTOR, a psychiatrist

AISHA, another Afghan woman

FIRST TALIB

SECOND TALIB

THIRD TALIB

SHAHIDA, Nafisa’s daughter

NAJEEB, Aisha’s husband

MANSUR, Aisha’s son.

Other characters:

Children

Other Taliban

Crying Woman

Men on streets

SCENE: Opens with a bare stage with the spotlight on a couch of the style psychiatrists are popularly supposed to have in their offices. Also, there are a small armchair and a little table with some notebooks and a pencil or two. The rest of the stage is dark. As the action proceeds the spotlight will gradually shrink until it illuminates the couch only.

When the play opens, the DOCTOR and NAFISA are, respectively, sitting in the armchair and reclining on the couch. The DOCTOR is making an occasional note in a notebook. His appearance is unimportant; he wears a suit, but can be short, tall, fat, thin, young, or old. He however requires a deep and carrying voice.

NAFISA is a woman in her late thirties who appears to be trying to hang on by her fingertips to what is left of her youth and not making a good job of it. She has streaked blond hair, bright red lipstick and fingernail polish, with a heavy layer of blue eye shadow on her eyelids. Her clothes are, correspondingly, “mod”: maroon slacks and a bright orange pullover. As the play begins she is speaking.

NAFISA: …see these things.

DOCTOR: And what would you rather do?

NAFISA: It’s not what I would rather do, it’s what I’d rather be

I’d rather be anything, anything in the world but me.

DOCTOR: Look into your heart and tell me, pray

Just what is it makes you feel that way.

NAFISA: I have looked within my heart

And seen that it is all darkness there.

A bare plain – bare so far as I can see –

Under a sky where no stars twinkle

Any longer, and where the moon

Has hidden her face, when she saw the stars stolen away.

I have seen

Blood run like water, and I have seen

Water precious more than blood.

I have seen

Devils come to do me good.

All this on my dark plain

Inside, indeed.

DOCTOR: Would it be correct to suggest

That you have been under stress?

NAFISA: You say so? I do not know

But to me it seems to be so.

Strange are the things I see

Things that should not be strange to me.

I see a child run at play

And I think it is another day

When skies would split and thunder fall

And bury a child under a collapsed wall.

I see these things and do not know

What kind of truth it is that speaks out so.

DOCTOR: And what are these images that come

Are they unbidden, or do you

Summon these devils up?

[By now the lighting should be illuminating only NAFISA and the DOCTOR’S hands, making notes, and then NAFISA only.]

NAFISA (talking in quiet tones as if to herself): The devils are not of my mind

They were, and they are, of humankind.

They punish me even when they are not

With their distant touch from lands I thought I forgot.

DOCTOR: You will have to exorcise them.

To this end, I suggest

To recall and describe them you do your best.

NAFISA: [As she says this piece the scene should be shifted quietly in the background. DOCTOR gets up and leaves unobtrusively.]

There was a field

Of flowers. Not real flowers, you understand

Real flowers were not for that land.

We slaved over them for years

To let them bloom.

It was not easy, in that land of terrible blight.

It was years of famine, drought and war

That soaked the soil with blood

That watered these flowers, and made them what they were.

I, and others like me

Were like plants winding through stony soil

In search of a breath of air. We came

To the point where just a grain away

Lay air and light.

But then came the famine

And threw us back again, piling rock on rock

And the devils came to save us

From the famine, war, and drought

By drowning us in something else.

[The lights have been dimmed and now they go out. NAFISA continues talking but leaves the stage. By this time the props should have been moved onstage.]

They told us thunder and lightning would bring us to

Paradise on earth

And we preferred to believe they told the truth,

Though we knew they lied.

We thought we were a force of nature

But our flowers came to know different.

We tried to let them grow, as best we could

In the suddenly arid soil

But they were torn up, all for their good

And thrown away.

[Lights rise. The stage now bears a few assorted pieces of furniture and a small TV set to one side. The floor is covered by a thin straw mat. When the light goes up about ten small children should be sitting on the mat, cross-legged, talking quietly to each other. A few more come in and take their places. Most, but not all, of them should be girls. Their ages should be in the range of six to eight years, not more. There is none of the usual childhood exuberance.

Enter NAFISA. She should have done a quick change, replacing her bright coloured clothes with something more subdued, but still “stylish”. Another woman, AISHA, of the same age and general type, enters with her. Since, later on, both will be seen in burqas, it would be easier for identification if there is a marked difference in their heights. Both wear headscarves.]

NAFISA: Things are getting tougher, things are getting worse.

Each time I think it can’t, I’m wrong

In this land bereft of music, laughter, and song.

AISHA: I know. But we must carry on

There is nothing more we can do.

The children here know all they know

From such as me and you.

We cannot

Possibly give up now.

NAFISA: I just wish I could have, just once

A wish granted from the thousands I have made in these months.

AISHA: Which? If wishes could be horses, we would be far away

With these children in the light of day. 

NAFISA: It doesn’t matter. Not really. Anything will do. I’m no longer particular. I mean, I’ve been making wishes till I’m blue in the face and still it has not got any of us anywhere.

AISHA: So, shall we get on with it? I’ll let you begin. I think we should be shifting from your house somewhere else soon. It makes me uneasy to remain in one house too long.

NAFISA: I know, Shahida doesn’t like it either. She says it makes her feel nervous.

AISHA: That reminds me, where is your daughter? I haven’t seen her around.

NAFISA: She sits in darkness and sights despair

And wishes sometime to breathe free air.

I tell her the time will come.

She’s not convinced – she says hope’s dead and gone.

AISHA: Maybe she has a point at that

I think I should go and find

Some other place where these children can develop

Their collective mind.

Meanwhile I stand at the door

To keep an eye out and watch for those

Who would force us at gunpoint to become pure. [Exits]

NAFISA [to children]: Come on, boys and girls. Please make no noise, and we shall begin. How many of you know the nine times table? [She takes up a notebook and opens it.] Come on, who knows it? [A few children raise their hands. She points at one of them.] Yes, you, Fatma.

FATMA: (Begins reciting the nine times table in a typical child’s sing-song) Nine ones are nine
Nine twos are eigh-teen

Nine threes are twenty-seven

Nine fours are -

[Enter AISHA, running.]

AISHA: The Taliban!

NAFISA: Quick, here begins

The race to disguise subversive things.

[She hides her notebook, opens a bag and begins handing out little pocket Korans. Enter three TALIBAN. They are all tall, in black turbans and long beards, dressed in salwar kameez and carrying sticks and guns slung over their shoulders.]

FIRST TALIB [He must be physically imposing, with a deep voice]: What is going on here? The Devil’s work, I’m sure

There is a smell of all things impure.

NAFISA [covering her face with her headscarf ]: I beg indulgence, it is not true

It’s the Book we teach here, look around you.

We are not doing anyone harm

We just help children understand religion’s charm.

FIRST TALIB: You stand shameless, bare, talk back to us

Why should we believe your words, tell me first?

I see the Devil lives here too

There is his instrument, right before you.

[Points to TV set]

That thing there we will take.

On the street it we’ll break.

The pollution of the immoral world

You and yours can do without.

And for your children, the Amir said

If you teach them, you’ll wind up dead.

When we have funds, schools we’ll build

And with the girls they will be filled.

Beware lest we come after you.

To your painted face, you know what we can do?

Careful, hussy, give it all a miss

You don’t know what can come out of this.

[The other two TALIBAN carry the TV set out.]

AISHA: Children, pray, go on home

No classes today; do your lessons at home

And do not forget how to pronounce the suras

Correctly. Go on home, children, pray

There will be no more classes today.

[Children get up and leave room quietly, with none of the usual after school chatter.]

NAFISA (in an aside, to AISHA): And not just today, unless I mistaken am

We could be in a real jam

Teaching children – well, it could be worse

In this life lived under a curse.

AISHA: Shush, sister, let them not hear

Bend your back and let them see your fear.

That satisfies them, and happy they are

A little victory in a greater war.

Like the reed that bows the wind before

When they’re gone, we straighten up once more.

[Lights dim and disappear. AISHA and NAFISA exit. Spotlight focuses on FIRST TALIB, who comes stage centre. Other lights go off.]

 

FIRST TALIB: Yes, I know what you think of me

But it’s not that simple, why don’t you see?

You think me a brute, all without heart

But it’s not that easy to play my part.

I do god’s work, why don’t you see

And what I do isn’t up to me.

I love little girls just like you

Somewhere my sisters live on too.

I grew up in camp in a foreign land

Seeing my nation ground down to sand.

My country I love too, you know

I was distraught to see her so.

Vultures tore her insides out

Left no room for love or doubt.

These people you would set free

Were saved from death by such as me.

In the streets the bombs that fell

Made of life something worse than hell.

Opium fuelled the horror here

Drugs and violence, hate and fear.

My Amir tells me what I must do

Tells me what is false and true.

He called; we came, and we saved

Women and children from men depraved

Men who were worse than beasts

Who invited Satan to their feasts.

Who raped and robbed, who killed for fun

Who would all pity, all compassion, shun.

Would you rather we’d left the people to them, alone?

We’d have had hearts then, like stone.

It’s for the people’s good this we do,

And Allah will bless them too.

We open for them Heaven’s gate

Save them from evil, confusion, and debate.

Kites or gambling we don’t allow

Music is against the Amir’s vow

To make this land pure as pure

We will do all, be assured.

[Stage goes dark, FIRST TALIB exits. Lights come up, slowly, one by one. The scene now is the same room, but now there is a look of being a conventional living room – of course the television is still missing. The straw mat has been rolled up and removed, and the furniture has been redistributed to give the impression of being cosy.

SHAHIDA enters. She is a girl in her middle teens. Thin, pretty in a sulky way, she is dressed in a light grey sweater and faded blue denims with old white sneakers on her feet. Her arms are wrapped around her chest. She shivers.]

SHAHIDA: I’m cold. I’m cold all through. [Looking around the room and raising her voice]

But what does that matter to you?

NAFISA [entering, in the same clothes as previously, she begins to talk before she is quite onstage]: What matters to whom? What are you talking about?

It’s winter. It’s cold. Those things go together

As you should know by now.

SHAHIDA: If my father were here this you wouldn’t say

He would have kept the house warm. Today

We would have had a fire burning

And warmth here

Instead, the chill eats into my bones.

If only my father were here.

NAFISA: He’s gone, we don’t know where

He went without a word to me or to you

Without a word of goodbye

Or news of where he is

Don’t you think I deserved better

I, who bore his seed

I who was his life

Or so he said?

Don’t you think I deserved better?

And what of you, his darling daughter

Whose hands he would kiss

And say they were princess’ hands – you whom he promised the world

Where is he now for you?

Don’t you think you deserved better?

SHAHIDA: I am me, myself, entire

I decide what I deserve

Because I know my worth. And I know

Maybe he’s gone. Somewhere. To a better life.

Maybe he sleeps now in a king-sized bed

Or in a shallow grave dug in stony ground. What of it?

He is not here. But we are.

NAFISA: And do you think, perhaps

It would be better if we were not?

SHAHIDA: I don’t just think it; I know

There is still a world outside

Where one can go out and feel

The sun on one’s hair

The wind in one’s face.  

And what have we? A life

Where we cannot even look out of the window

Where we are beaten

If we go out alone

Even though we hide inside a burqa

With nothing left of who we are inside.

Yes, mother dear, I think it is

Better by far that we were not in this.

NAFISA: And what do you think we should do about it? Tell me

I want to know what through your eyes you see

Maybe I have grown old and stale

I see things through an opaque veil

You’re young, maybe you know

How one makes hope again grow

From the desert sands of years

Watered by blood and unshed tears.

SHAHIDA: I once used to hope I would be someone

Maybe a media professional, on TV

Or an author – isn’t that a laugh?

Who can read now, who has the need

Of spending time on words on paper?

I used to dream of a lover, I used to think

Of how his kisses would feel on my lips.

Who can even see me to want me now

Who could ever read a thing I write?

It might have been better if only I didn’t know

That there is a world outside

And out there things are just not this way

That there women can walk in the light of day.

NAFISA: I see

That you blame me for not taking you away.

Do you think I should have

Left all we have here, little as it is

And gone where we have nothing?

SHAHIDA: Do you, mother, if you look into your heart

Think we have anything here?

What is a house, what is a home

If men with guns can come in and tear your life apart

What is a city, a neighbourhood

When its life is all gone

Where beggars beg to stay alive

But inside their hearts want the peace of death?

Look at me, mother. Look at these eyes

Look at my face. Why did you birth me, bring me up

Was it to drain the dregs from this bitter cup?

NAFISA: Have a thought, love, for what is here.

This soil, this land, this dust

Bore my ancestors and yours. This land has seen

The centuries come and go

The kings and rulers come and go

Great and small, they lived and died

And my ancestors and yours lived and died

All in this land, they turned to dust.

Prince and tyrant, good man and bad

Nothing is left of them now. As tomorrow

Nothing will be left of the tyrants

Who rule over us today. This I believe.

I was a teacher, as you know

I taught the children, and I try and teach -

And I try and keep

The little flame of knowledge aglow

When the tyrants come and darkness falls

The little flame is all that stalls

The forces of ignorance and evil

From wiping us, all that is us, away

Like chalk marks on the blackboard of history.

I cannot leave, that is the truth

I have a duty here.

SHAHIDA: You teach the children, so say you

And what do you call what happened in this room

Just a little while ago? Was that your light aglow?

I would call it the light going out.

Wake up, mother, if there is still a way

Let us, let us, flee this terrible night

And seek the light of another day.

NAFISA: If I thought it might be better

If I thought the world outside would be better

I would have gone, at least for your sake

But going would be a terrible mistake.

Do you know what a refugee’s life is?

Hell to that is a picture of bliss.

One sells one’s body, one sells one’s soul

Is still left with an empty bowl.

SHAHIDA: I’ll think about it. I’ll think about what you said. (Coming front stage, and the spotlight focusing on her as the rest of the stage goes dark and NAFISA exits)

Mother, you see things in terms I can’t

In me there is a hunger, in me there is a want.

In me stir things I cannot name

I want things I don’t understand

But I do know that none of them is here.

No love, nothing for me.

I’m a clever girl, you know, mother

And I tried my best to please you and my teachers.

Was it all just for this?

If you will not leave at least I will

I’ll find a way, tomorrow if not today,

But I will go, this I promise me.

Forgive me but let me go

I want to go far – far away

Where love and laughter still find play.

Where I can open my eyes and see

The beauty of the world that lies before me.

Forgive me but let me go

To the sunlight let me go.  

[Exit SHAHIDA as the spotlight goes out. Lights rise on the same scene, but the position of the furniture has been changed around and a bed has been added. This is AISHA’s home. AISHA’s husband, NAJEEB, is sitting at a table, sipping at a cup of tea. He is short, plump, dressed in an ordinary, shabby suit without a tie, his shirt collar open. He has a beard of the standard length imposed by the Taliban (at least one fist) and looks older than his years and defeated. In the other hand he holds an unlit pipe and every few seconds he will pull at it.]

NAJEEB: Aisha!

AISHA (offstage): I’ll be there in a moment. (Enters. She is dressed in slacks and a sweater, and is rubbing her hands together.) I wonder if we will ever be able to afford a bit of heat again. What’s wrong?

NAJEEB: Tell me what happened at your friend’s house

I hear talk. This is dangerous, what you’re doing

You should know this. I told you before that times are bad

And when bad times come, only the careful survive

Only the clever are careful

I told you all this.

AISHA: Stop sucking at that pipe. It’s disgusting the noises you make

Nothing happened at Nafisa’s, it’s all a mistake.

I don’t know why you believe these lies people tell

Village chatter at the village well.

I believe we are doing good

Teaching the children, telling them of the world

Of knowledge. I won’t stop if you tell me to.

NAJEEB: Teaching them what? The Taliban say

All that they need to know is already in the Koran.

There is nothing more they need to know

Or at least their radio tells us so.

AISHA (laughs): Radio Sharia! What does it know of life?

And you talk of it to your wife

Who can’t remember when last she laughed

At something that was not a matter for tears

But too sad and mad and bad for tears to flow.

Radio Sharia talks of things it does not know

It mixes religion, tradition, myth

Makes a monster of all of it.

You know it yourself – why, you told me once

Laughing, as I recall, how mullahs who didn’t know Arabic

Would recite the Koran by rote

In Arabic, and refuse to answer questions

Because they didn’t want to show they did not understand

You told me of this once, and laughed

And I recall I laughed with you.

Where is that laughing man?

NAJEEB: That man died. Somewhere along the way he left

And the husk of me is all that remains

But still I live on. Do you want to know what we saw today,

Our son and I?

AISHA: You went to the football match with him.

We all know what goes on there. Did you have to see?

Couldn’t you have not gone?

I can see it myself, not having seen it once.

Being a woman, the only way I could see it

Would be if I were down on the field, between the posts

For the first time and the last.

I can see it in my mind

The bare field and the bound man, the bound woman, made to kneel

For who knows what sin, real or imagined.

I can see the blood money, if any would be offered for a life

Turned down. Because what is money anyway

For a life? What value is a life?

I can feel the terror of the bound kneeling

Person, no longer man or woman

Just a human being

Terrified and alone

Waiting for the bullet – the crash of the bullet

To end all thinking, all feeling, everything.

I can feel it all. What can you say to me

That I do not know already? Nothing.

NAJEEB: I don’t want you to end up there

Between the goalposts. Think of our son, if you will

Think of him being left alone.

[Enter MANSUR. He is about nine years old, bright eyed and excited.]

MANSUR: Mother! Do you know what we saw today?

It was so exciting!

[Since the next part of the play will require a lot of changes in the props, the lights should go out from this time and the spotlights come on to illuminate AISHA and MANSUR only, and then, little by little, focus on AISHA alone. NAJEEB exits.] 

AISHA: You found it exciting? Tell me why you thought it exciting

And we’ll talk about it.

Did you understand what it was that you saw?

MANSUR: Someone who had killed

Someone else, for something

Was punished as he should be

And shot. I saw him jump and fall.

I saw the blood flow, mother, dark on the ground

The ground soaked it all up. I cheered, mother

And when I cheered, the guards looked at me and smiled.

AISHA: Listen, son, my love

It was very wrong to feel that way.

Try and imagine

What that man had felt

Never to know, to breathe, to taste anything again

To see the sky, to see the grass

Never to hear a sound. Never to be again.

Can you imagine

The metal taste of fear in his mouth?

Can you feel the frantic beating of his heart?

MANSUR: But didn’t he kill someone

Didn’t that someone feel just like that too

Didn’t that person suffer?

AISHA: I could tell you it’s not for us to judge

I could tell you a lot of things

But two wrongs don’t make any kind of right.

We don’t know, I don’t, you don’t, nobody knows

Why that man had killed, or if he had

Death is never good, I can tell you that

Death in whatever form, I have seen too much of it.

MANSUR: I know a Talib

Who told me women are too weak

To know wrong from right.

He told me that men are strong

Men know right and separate it from wrong.

He is big, handsome too

He says what he says is true

He drives a pickup and has a gun

And is feared by everyone.

When I grow up I know what I want to be

I want to be like him, I want him to be me.

[Exit MANSUR]

AISHA [clasping her hands to her heart, in distress]: I feel myself in a void

Of emptiness and fear. I see no up, I see no down

I no longer know which is solid ground.

It’s all very well to talk of truth

To talk of tomorrow’s gentle youth.

It’s very well to talk of lasting through the storm

I just wonder if I am strong enough

To stand it any more.

When I say words they sound false to me

Because they contradict everything I see.

I talk of love and I talk of life

I talk of a world without strife

And my son cheers when blood is spilled

Talk of compassion leaves him chilled.

Am I a failure? Am I worse

Am I part of this endless curse?

Tell me world, tell me what to do

I’m left in silence and all I have is you. 

[Spotlights go out and AISHA exits, but is heard offstage]

My husband broke, he bent so far

My son’s a victim of this war

A victim of a different kind

Healthy body, wounded mind.

All I had is what I do

And I no longer have that too.

Tell me world, must a woman weep

Is there no promise she can keep?

Even to herself, can she make amends

If her life turns dust and ashes in her hands?

 

[Lights rise. The scene is now a marketplace, with very poorly stocked vegetable stalls and a few men, some attending the stalls, some buying things, and a few standing around aimlessly. A couple of beggars squat in a corner, ignored by everyone. Enter AISHA and NAFISA in blue Afghan shuttlecock burqas with nets over the face. Their burqas come down to their white socks, which must be visible as they walk.]

NAFISA: Here we go again, forced to hide ourselves in our clothes like frightened mice. And I have a degree in physics.

AISHA: Try not to think about it.

NAFISA: But it’s only thinking left for me

All else’s gone, why don’t you see?

My man has gone, my freedom as well

It’s like a black magic spell.

My child’s cursed because she’s a she

And with her future she curses me.

AISHA: This is a sky

Free of kites, and a land

Free of music.

But I remember the shell that landed where we are standing now

I saw it fall, saw the child who did not weep

Who could not understand that he would not walk again.

Some things change. There are no shells falling.

Do you remember that time?

[They walk over to a stall and begin selecting vegetables. Enter the three TALIBAN.]

SECOND TALIB: What is this thing called woman?

What does she want?

FIRST TALIB: This is a mystery of the ages. I do not know

But something within me tells me

Women need to be protected. Also

We well know,

Our enemies are yet unbroken

And we have more important things

Than women to think about.

SECOND TALIB: The world says we oppress them.

FIRST TALIB: The world is a den of iniquity and vice

Evil through and through.

It is no surprise, look at what they do.

Their women are forced to work

Like men in the marketplace

And yet when we save women from that

They say it’s a disgrace.

SECOND TALIB: Yes, you are right

The world should be shown the light.

THIRD TALIB: Someone told me women are evil

Temptresses sent by Satan.

FIRST TALIB: I don’t believe that myself

But there are things I do not know

And things where what I believe

Are irrelevant. Maybe I think that it’s a failure of men

That they should be swayed by women

Or maybe I believe that Satan

Throws a spell on us all.

Maybe I do not believe anything.

What does it matter what I believe?   

SECOND TALIB: We do what we are told to do

We believe what we are told to believe

It is better that way. But still I would like

To fly a kite again

Someday. When the war is over

Maybe we can have kites again.

THIRD TALIB: I had a sister once

Who ran away from her husband.

He was older and beat her, that is true

But it was still a disgrace.

If I found her I would kill her

It’s a matter of honour, my honour, the family honour

Her honour too, the honour of us all.

FIRST TALIB: Look what we have here. Hey you!

NAFISA: What? Are you talking to us?

FIRST TALIB: Of course we are talking to you. What do you think you’re doing?

NAFISA: I don’t understand.

FIRST TALIB: You don’t understand? Should I explain?

I would have thought your crime is plain.

AISHA: Crime? I do not understand

I thought we followed the laws of the land.

FIRST TALIB: I can see your hands. You should know

They can’t be put out on show.

And it’s white socks that you wear

On us to spit you dare.

Our pure white you defile, witch

You would want it black as pitch.

[He and the other TALIBAN lash out with their sticks.]

AISHA: How can we buy without showing our hands?

There is a limit to your commands.

FIRST TALIB: That’s not our affair. The order stands.

[Hits AISHA with the stick.]

Go home and repent

Vile woman, on Satan’s business bent.

[Some other TALIBAN pass through with a young boy on a rope. A woman is running behind them, crying and beseeching through her burqa. The TALIBAN with the boy ignore her.]

FIRST TALIBAN: That is a thief. He will lose at least a hand.

We show no mercy to criminals in this land.

His victims need no longer fear

To protect them and theirs we are here.

And go home now, before trouble comes your way

You have had enough today.

[Lights go down slowly, as women go away silently. Slow music starts in the background and swells until it stops suddenly and darkness falls. The spotlight once again shines on the psychiatrist’s couch, where NAFISA talks to the DOCTOR.]

NAFISA: That was long ago and far away

Yet I think of it every day.

A kiteless sky I still see

And I know not what it means to me.

DOCTOR: And your friend? What of her?

NAFISA:  Who knows, she keeps to the way

She learned in the market that day.

Perhaps she’s happy, perhaps not

Or she is resigned to her lot.

Little I could do or say

She chose her place in her way.

Perhaps she thinks of kiteless skies

Perhaps behind her net she cries.

They say that now she is free

It does not look like it to me.

One set of devils gone perhaps

Others already filled in the gaps.

Someday my land free and fair

Will see kites flying in its air.

When that time comes, I don’t know

Maybe girls will breathe free and grow.

[Spotlight goes out momentarily and comes on again, focusing on FIRST TALIB. He comes centre-stage.]

FIRST TALIB: You think you beat us? You’re wrong

You were wrong all along.

Call us “Taliban”, “Legion”, or what you will

We are too many for you to kill.

We wear saffron robes, suits too

Not just the black turban before you.

On Bible, Koran, or other book

We hang our purpose like a hook.

When one mask falls up one comes

All over the world beat our drums.

Not just in Afghanistan, all over Earth

Your own society gives us birth.

Be scared, be very afraid

We’ll make you as we want you made.

You’ll never know what hit you

You’ll think that lies are true.

You can’t hide though you run

I’m within you, every one.

So look in your mirror and the face you see

Is a face that belongs to me.

[Lights fall slowly towards darkness, to be replaced by a low red glow as the curtain falls, with the FIRST TALIB seen in silhouette to the last.]

                                                            (CURTAIN)

Copyright B Purkayastha 2009/2012