Have You Seen The Women?

Have you seen the women there, in the streets at the vanguard of the thousands, with scarfs on their heads and green ribbons on their fingers, with heads and defiant hands held high, marching, chanting, some dying with the men and the boys and the girls.

I can't imagine the courage it takes for them to march in a place like that at a time like this. I can't begin to imagine.

6:41:19 PM   permalink: []   feedback:   comments: []  

Then She Named The Cities

"So do you have travel plans?"

We ask them that, because they always do no matter when we ask, no matter how recently they've only just returned.

He smiled and looked to her.

"Khadija?"

She looked up with that half-smile that we've learned to interpret as yes.

"You do!?"

Yes, she had plans. So she smiled that half-smile and began to explain. Except this time, there was a brighter sparkle in her eyes as she said where they are going.

She has always wanted to go, she said. And you could see it from her eyes. You could hear it in the way she spoke, the tremor in her voice, the anticipation of something long desired.

And then she named the cities.

Bokhara. Tashkent. Samarkand.

6:21:23 PM   permalink: []   feedback:   comments: []