Wake up those sleepy eyes

COME ON BABY GET UP

Come on baby now get up and don't give up

Wake up those sleepy eyes and look inside

Ain't no safe place left for your conscience to hide

When will you realize what you've been denied

Time to run up the hill and leave the past behind

Shed this enslaved skin, this colonized mind

I'm tired of telling you all the stuff that's up

If we insist they will wipe out all of us

(by Fazeel Azeez Chauhan, 1996)

Absorption

Absorption

Outside a closed church

Damaged by the earthquake

I pass by him

Every afternoon around 2

The air of broken dreams

The marks of spilled guts

Stain the sidewalk

Around his escaping body

Facing the wall

Asleep on a cardboard

Next to a pillow

Of strange belongings

A thousand footsteps come and go

Ten thousand cars drive by

Does anybody really see

Or worry about him?

Why don't I ever say hello

Or ask how I can help?

Fazeel Azeez Chauhan

9-16-99

447

447

'fore '47 my father was Indian

And his fathers ages before him

Now they shred us

Into a thousand tribes

And a hundred shades

Between black and white

Columbus sailed to plunder India

But found West-Indians instead

Europeans invaded Indians

In both hemispheres

And natives were made to change

Natives and Indians are all the same

We still share our roots and a name
   When the link is forged
          Our global circle will emerge
                Standing face to face
          With our commanding surrogate parents
     We will be honored
We will make it a sensible place

'fore Pakistan my father was Indian                             

And his fore fathers ages 'fore him

(by Fazeel Azeez Chauhan)

1-15-99