Year 7.
Exactly six years ago, in a dark delivery room, obstetricians and midwives gathered around a tattered mattress covered with torn sheets while rats and roaches scurried past, on the edges of its forgotten walls...
Exactly six years ago, her screams of agony were heard, the midwives rushed with no anesthesia, no gloves and no syringes, rushed to watch in anticipation the birth of this new infant...
It was designed, genetically modified, cloned and conceived overseas -- implanted in vitro through a brutal gang rape, implanted in her womb on a dark night, 6 years ago.
Its conception took over 13 years, and its delivery was not without violent labor contractions and pangs...not without gut wrenching pains...
No electricity that night, just the brisk light of projected missiles falling like shooting stars. The obstetricians and midwives rubbed their hands with glee and told her -- watch the fireworks greeting your newborn. A firework of phosphorus green and red bombs...
The delivery was slower than predicted...they brought in 1000's of forceps to pull it out, by force. Deliver it, deliver it -- they shouted...
She started hemorrhaging. So they stuffed her womb with newspaper articles and essays, cursed her for being so stubborn, so hard headed, so non submissive...and they brought in more forceps....
We will pull it through, we will pull it through...Shut up you are not hurting, shut up you are not bleeding, shut up this is for your own good...It will be greeted with sweets and roses...wait and see.
She screamed some more, so they stuffed her mouth with more newspaper articles, gagging her and taping her lips...sealing them with secrets, lies and ploys...
She resisted, kicking, squirming under their forceps, they handcuffed her wrists to the metal bed, wrapped chains around her ankles, and blindfolded her with bags made of desert sand...
Deliver it, deliver it -- they commanded.
What shall we call it ? We will call it Buffalo Bill Liberation. No, no, we will call it Mullah Freedom...
How about that for a name ? they asked her, as she lay paralyzed, in a semi coma, in the dark delivery room...where rats and roaches scurried along the forgotten walls splashed with fresh blood gushing from her womb... smears of a million hand palms plastered like banners on forgotten, smouldering, smokey grey walls...
It is here, it is here -- they exclaimed with joy. It is born, it has arrived...
In her half dead state, she opened her eyes and was horrified by it.
It was a monster infant. A hydra with a hundred heads, a hundred skulls, an octopus with a hundred arms, a deformed face with hundreds of eyes, bulging..its skin made of scaling scabs, its body made of slime, an invertebrate crawling, with no legs to stand, and from its mouth, instead of gurgles, it drooled a burning caustic froth...
The city was quiet, a ghostly silence...
You would hear in the distances, muffled wails...the ululations of Liberation and Freedom.
What colors should we dress it in ? Blue, Pink ? No drape it in a black gown...the gowns of Liberation and Freedom.
No one greeted it with sweets and roses, as in the tradition for any newborn...instead plates of bones and flesh circulated around...an offering to the new gods of Liberation and Freedom.
Its crib was made of ghettos, dungeons, rubbles, ruins, graves and piles of garbage....it would nap in any of them, one day here, one day there...
And for toys it was given drills, ropes, guns, canes, chains, hooks... and its playground was the cemeteries...
It was fed with bullets, blood, urine, excrement and decomposed, putrid corpses...
And it has kept crawling for 6 years already, sniffing like a rabid dog, sniffing for more...keeping scum for company and preying for more fresh blood...more fresh meat...
It was exactly six years ago and she is still lying in that delivery room which now looks like an overused, stenchy morgue...drowned in her own blood, mummified with slogans and jargon...her womb and mouth stuffed with newspaper articles and essays...with words...stuffed with a silent forgotten death, like the desolate forgotten walls of this city, where rats and roaches furtively scurry along, feeding on the monster's vomit and excrement...feeding on ashes and dust.
Painting : Iraqi artist, Ziad Bakury
Exactly six years ago, her screams of agony were heard, the midwives rushed with no anesthesia, no gloves and no syringes, rushed to watch in anticipation the birth of this new infant...
It was designed, genetically modified, cloned and conceived overseas -- implanted in vitro through a brutal gang rape, implanted in her womb on a dark night, 6 years ago.
Its conception took over 13 years, and its delivery was not without violent labor contractions and pangs...not without gut wrenching pains...
No electricity that night, just the brisk light of projected missiles falling like shooting stars. The obstetricians and midwives rubbed their hands with glee and told her -- watch the fireworks greeting your newborn. A firework of phosphorus green and red bombs...
The delivery was slower than predicted...they brought in 1000's of forceps to pull it out, by force. Deliver it, deliver it -- they shouted...
She started hemorrhaging. So they stuffed her womb with newspaper articles and essays, cursed her for being so stubborn, so hard headed, so non submissive...and they brought in more forceps....
We will pull it through, we will pull it through...Shut up you are not hurting, shut up you are not bleeding, shut up this is for your own good...It will be greeted with sweets and roses...wait and see.
She screamed some more, so they stuffed her mouth with more newspaper articles, gagging her and taping her lips...sealing them with secrets, lies and ploys...
She resisted, kicking, squirming under their forceps, they handcuffed her wrists to the metal bed, wrapped chains around her ankles, and blindfolded her with bags made of desert sand...
Deliver it, deliver it -- they commanded.
What shall we call it ? We will call it Buffalo Bill Liberation. No, no, we will call it Mullah Freedom...
How about that for a name ? they asked her, as she lay paralyzed, in a semi coma, in the dark delivery room...where rats and roaches scurried along the forgotten walls splashed with fresh blood gushing from her womb... smears of a million hand palms plastered like banners on forgotten, smouldering, smokey grey walls...
It is here, it is here -- they exclaimed with joy. It is born, it has arrived...
In her half dead state, she opened her eyes and was horrified by it.
It was a monster infant. A hydra with a hundred heads, a hundred skulls, an octopus with a hundred arms, a deformed face with hundreds of eyes, bulging..its skin made of scaling scabs, its body made of slime, an invertebrate crawling, with no legs to stand, and from its mouth, instead of gurgles, it drooled a burning caustic froth...
The city was quiet, a ghostly silence...
You would hear in the distances, muffled wails...the ululations of Liberation and Freedom.
What colors should we dress it in ? Blue, Pink ? No drape it in a black gown...the gowns of Liberation and Freedom.
No one greeted it with sweets and roses, as in the tradition for any newborn...instead plates of bones and flesh circulated around...an offering to the new gods of Liberation and Freedom.
Its crib was made of ghettos, dungeons, rubbles, ruins, graves and piles of garbage....it would nap in any of them, one day here, one day there...
And for toys it was given drills, ropes, guns, canes, chains, hooks... and its playground was the cemeteries...
It was fed with bullets, blood, urine, excrement and decomposed, putrid corpses...
And it has kept crawling for 6 years already, sniffing like a rabid dog, sniffing for more...keeping scum for company and preying for more fresh blood...more fresh meat...
It was exactly six years ago and she is still lying in that delivery room which now looks like an overused, stenchy morgue...drowned in her own blood, mummified with slogans and jargon...her womb and mouth stuffed with newspaper articles and essays...with words...stuffed with a silent forgotten death, like the desolate forgotten walls of this city, where rats and roaches furtively scurry along, feeding on the monster's vomit and excrement...feeding on ashes and dust.
Painting : Iraqi artist, Ziad Bakury
