Poem I
Title: Raliv, Galiv ya Chaliv
Letter from a Kashmiri Pandit woman to her rapist's wife
No. I haven't died. But my ghost sleeps beside you in your bed, humming: Raliv, Galiv ya Chaliv.
I am so far yet your husband's voice sings in my year as he keeps raping me in my dreams every night: Raliv, Galiv ya Chaliv.
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Thirty-two years ago, as I tiptoed around the field of my husband's softest parts, winter broke the valley into clot-shaped moons and the chants of Raliv, Galiv ya Chaliv.
My body then smelled of chinar leaves and the bluest chunks of sky and my eyes chased dreams of spring without hearing Raliv, Galiv ya Chaliv.
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I never realised when my body had stolen all the blue from sky and stones started raining from the reddish blackness above in the metre of Raliv, Galiv ya Chaliv.
I still thought my mother's lullaby is enough to sustain me as I orbit through seven gates of hell when they gutted my husband, gouging out his spring-green eyes and the black blankness there reflecting the words Raliv, Galiv ya Chaliv.
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Your husband climbed on me and brushed my lips with my husband's blood and then bit my tongue, imprinting on it Raliv, Galiv ya Chaliv.
My body broke into a river, deep-garnet weeds growing between my thighs and breasts and dancing in the rhythm of Raliv, Galiv ya Chaliv.
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The crows were against us, the owls were against us, and they all chased us away from the valley chanting Raliv, Galiv ya Chaliv.
The valley turned into a kaleidoscope of coal-cold butterflies and our temples willingly torched up their own bodies echoing Raliv, Galiv ya Chaliv.
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I'm an old woman now, sister, yet my dreams of my homeland are growing arms and limbs, but they have no ears to hear the warning in Raliv, Galiv ya Chaliv.
Sister, you must've been me some thousandth birth before, yet it was you who pointed the hiding place of this kaafir to your husband, reciting a prayer: Raliv, Galiv ya Chaliv.
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Notes:
This poem is about the victims of Kashmiri Pandit genocide in 1990
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Raliv, Galiv ya Chaliv: means Convert, Die or Run in Kashmiri. It was the slogan used to warn Kashmiri Pandits to leave their religion or die or leave Kashmir valley.
The slogan used was Asi Gachi Kasheer. Batav Ross, Batnyev Saan meaning We want Kashmir. Without Hindu men, but with Hindu women. Kashmiri Pandit men were told to leave their women behind.
Posted Oct 20, 2022, 3:39 PM UTC · edited