I .... ain't any different
Dr. Yasmin Haroon
RB Poem
February 28, 2013
I .... ain't any different
I need not stand among you for a reputable status,
Nor, I am one of the crowd to lavish extravagance.
I need not be a celebrated legendary figure, demanding a big round of loud applause,
I need not even be the one to share a jest.
Simply, I am 'the' one of you, just like anyone of you,
Deserving to be granted my innate human rights,
Those you profoundly so belittle.
Why do you look down at me?
I appear and in fact am just like you.
How do you haughtily deny my home and rights?
While you have explicitly stated yours and have sternly held on to them.
Why do you disown me from the very mother land I was sent to flourish on?
Why do you rip off my roots?
While you safe guard yours.
Why do you let me perish?
While you demand to be reigned.
While we speak in the same dialect,
Why do you not hear and understand me?
Why do you detest me?
When I can live in harmonious companionship with you,
And gift ourselves a promising future.
Why do you label me despicable?
While I offer you loyalty with indefinite sacrifices.
How can you leave me in desperate plight?
Why do you dispel me from what’s rightfully mine and yours, indeed.
We cannot question our fate to be born on this very land that you and I are belong to.
Wholeheartedly, we can celebrate each other's better sides and,
Set aside our differences.
Proudly commemorate our ancestral fathers and,
Commence an amicable brotherhood together,
For all our generations to come and practice Freedom in its truest sense.
Dr. Yasmin Haroon is senior medical intern at Gulf Medical University in UAE and is a native Rohingya.
