April 9, 2024 marks four years since Gulfisha Fatima, an MBA graduate, student activist and history enthusiast, was arrested by the Delhi Police. Fatima was active during the nationwide protests against the Citizenship (Amendment) Act, and was arrested by the police on charges relating to the communal violence in North-East Delhi in February 2020. While several rights activists were arrested on similar charges – in cases seen as a way to silence dissenters while letting those who instigated violence go scot-free – Muslim student activists like Fatima are still in jail. Their bail petitions have gone unheard and undecided for years. Fatima applied for bail before the Delhi high court in mid 2022. The court is yet to deliver its verdict on her plea.
Below are poems Fatima has written while in prison, translated into English. Some editorial notes and translations have been added in square brackets.
Read her letters from prison here.
§
Forgetting*
For the history exam
everything I would learn by heart,
but would always forget
the dates.
I forget now almost
everything
but remember
only the dates.**
[*Here the Hindi word bhul can mean both a mistake or the act of forgetting, there is a wordplay in the use of the word bhul which is not possible to translate.
**The reference here is to dates in court for bail hearings and trial proceedings.]
§
These walls around me
These walls around me
these four walls
have been standing silent
far too long
holding on their heads
the burden of
storms, tempests, scorching sun
I wonder, why don’t they speak?
No! maybe, they do.
Whenever the walls weather,
and sands and flakes fall
they say something for sure.
But everytime, the master
repairs the walls
and plasters their mouths.
Finally! one day,
these burdened walls collapse
and erected in their place
are new silenced walls.
§
My love*
My love,
for you beat
two hearts
in my bosom
forever in strife.
When by your side
a heart of mine
pines
if only!
these moments
could last my eternity.
But the other
cruel, brutal heart
would not endure
even a moment’s
proximity.
A heart restless
to be touched by you,
the other self-appointed sentinel
forbidding the briefest rendezvous.
A heart unfettered
in the confines of its fantasy,
the other turns the key
of a heavy lock
on your very memory.
Just show me this final mercy
put an end to these hostilities
just take away one of
these beating
hearts from
me…
[*Humdum is an Urdu word that cannot be translated very specifically, but has connotations of a friend, a companion, a loved one.]
§
In the darkness of last night*
In the darkness of last night,
on the gates of the prison
there was, a knock
of innocent winds,
of echoes of loved ones,
the lightning too,
screaming and appealing for mercy,
demanded our release,
the mourning of delicate branches
were also present.
Publicly,
after several failed attempts,
unrestrained
started flowing
the tears of fragile rain,
bumping into, the drum of earth,
the beats of raindrop
raised an
uproar of complaints.
Regardless,
the deaf serpents
kept dancing
unfurling their venomous fangs
spreading their barbed webs
and
raising their hands
the oppressed remained
in the darkness of last night…
[*The translation of this poem has been published in Suchitra Vijayan and Francesca Recchia’s How Long Can the Moon Be Caged. This translation adapts from the version published in the book.]
§
Listen Faiz
Listen! Faiz,
do you know?
the difference between your’s and my waiting
it’s only
the finiteness of time
“faqat chaand roz aur” (Just a few more days)*
you knew
this.
Like the morning squad
the mute clouds also
don’t tell me anything
when I
ask them
“how many seasons like this?”
“how many seasons more?”
[*The reference here is to Faiz Ahmed Faiz’s famous poem “Chand roz aur, meri jaan” that he wrote when he was imprisoned in Pakistan in 1951. The poem reflects Faiz’s feelings of longing and separation from his loved ones during his incarceration.]
§
The ADaLaT (Court) pronounces:
A – As you stand at my door
D – demand but do know
L – long is the wait
T – that will eventually exhaust you
InSaF (Justice): is my name, I am elusive, that is
I – inexorably human you
S – should clearly understand that in my pursuit
F – fathom yourself nigh finished!
[These two poems are difficult to translate. They use the Hindi letters that constitute the word Adalat and Insaaf to write corresponding phrases whose first word has the same letter. The specificity of the form hence gets somewhat lost in translation.]
§
Sahab Ji[1]
Its true, that I am but a girl
But I too am rooted in this land
I reject you because maybe
You, I understand.
Or, let me believe you to be the best
Let me believe you lead the rest
Let me believe you brought us boons
Let me believe you gave us no wounds
Let me believe you a magician
Let me believe you innocent of those demolitions
Let me believe that you did everything
Let me believe that you did nothing
Let me believe that we are flourishing
Let me believe that we are truly free
Let me believe you the powers that be
Let me believe you make our times proud
Let me believe you stand above the crowd
Let me believe you to be God to all
Just show me that you believe me
to be one of your own
That’s all.
