Paranoia
An Afghan student gets 20 years
For merely asking a question
About women’s rights under Islam
In a class.
Shocking.
Global outrage.
A girl writes poetry about suicide
Like so many in their teens or twenties,
Calling herself a cool name,
Like ‘the lyrical terrorist’,
And law courts, real ones,
In a democracy get involved.
Shocking.
Where’s the outrage?
II
More teenagers with
Poisoner’s handbooks
Or contraband
Under the bed are
Arrested, and let’s face it,
Teenagers all over the West
Have suicide letters and copies
Of books like ‘Black Medicine’,
SAS handbooks, everything from
Broadcasting pirate radio
To making bombs or fireworks
Under the bed or in the shed;
The powerless and the
Not-powerful-yet have always
Sought to change the world
And the simplest ways are
Always the easiest to find.
Usually most never get as far
As using the stuff, it sits around,
And finally gets thrown away
With teenage poetry, old clothes.
Let’s face it, if these kids weren’t Muslims…
They’d never have made the news.
Well unless they were ‘hoodies with knives’.
So perhaps it is the becoming-adult
We are afraid of?
But then surely we should
Call it what it is?