Woman: Note to Self / Wanita: Nota Buat Diri

I saw you look at my face, you’re a man mesmerised

Fantasising something hushed hidden in my eyes

Prodding questions you asked - questions full of dangers 

To unearth my secrets, while your heart’s caught aflame

My polite answers were vague but you deemed as enough

To assume who I was, that I longed for your love

Even though we were mere strangers

And you barely knew my name.

Dear Sir,

My mind is more beautiful than my face

Any other yardstick to measure me will be grossly misplaced
My gentle soul and her attitudes you know not at all

My womanly beauty is not for Tom, Dick and Harry to see

My body is sacred, I’d guard it with my hijab

The epitome of my beauty lies in my courteous adab

My taqwa moulds my grace, a true muslimah I aspire to be

Nothing more, nothing less, a mere slave to The Almighty.

Wahai wanita, wallahi!

Mindamu adalah lebih indah dari wajahmu yang terserlah 

Rohmu yang tidak terlihat di mata kasar manusia

Tersirat dalam geraklakumu yang selembut sutera

Adabmu perlu dirapi lagi agar tuturkatamu 

Lebih menusuk kalbu dari bibirmu bergincu merah

Senyuman dan tawamu terbit dari mata riang gembira

Kelahiran hati penuh taqwa dan tulus ikhlas

Suaramu harus merendah persis padi masak di bawah mentari panas

Beradab, bersopan - tundukkan mata di depan mahram

Bukankah malu itu sebahagian dari iman

Dan inspirasimu adalah Khadijah, Aisyah dan Maryam?

Civilisations rose and fell

For Cleopatra and Nefertiti

A thousand ships were launched

For Helen and her famed beauty

All is fair in war and love
 - is that true, or is that fiction?- 

Beauty can’t be just skin deep

There’s more to me than what you see

A muslimah, a hijabi
This is my conviction
My heart of clarity.

Khalas! 

By:
Zaie Hamzah
28th August

Mont Kiara