For Immediate Release by Colin Dardis

I am not a silent poet

(blackout poem based on

https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2017/05/09/statement-press-secretary-1)

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Colin Dardis is a poet, editor and freelance arts facilitator from Northern Ireland.  He co-runs Poetry NI, and is editor for Lagan Online. One of Eyewear Publishing’s Best New British and Irish Poets 2016, a collection with Eyewear, ‘the x of y’, is forthcoming in 2018. His work has been widely published throughout Ireland, UK and USA.

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www.colindardispoet.co.uk
www.poetryni.com

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Song for the Yazidi Women by Iris Anne Lewis

I am not a silent poet

Who is this that cometh out of the wilderness?

We were terrified and ran to the mountains.

The beams of our house are cedar and our rafters are fir.

We stayed in a very dirty place, stinky and filthy.

Who is she that looketh forth as the morning?

They told us we would be sold.

We have a little sister and she hath no breasts.

Twelve years old, they raped her with no mercy.

I am the rose of Sharon and the lily of the valley.

He tied my hands and legs and blindfolded me.

They have made me keeper of the vineyard.

I did all the work: cleaning, cooking, washing.

Stay me with flagons, comfort me with apples.

They did not feed me for six days.

I have washed my feet, how shall I defile them?

If I washed, he would sleep with me.

I will rise now and…

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