Landay: For Muska
by Margery Parsons / August 17th, 2025
(for women in Afghanistan and everywhere under patriarchy and empire)
In a country with long history
of our empire’s soldiers, women write despite danger.
Muska sang poems into her phone,
dialing her defiance to be silenced, shut down.
Brothers beat her, drove her to her death
for the “dishonor” to author poems till last breaths.
Women, humans will make art, even
under guns, bombs, prisons, amidst rubble and ruins.
When we free the spirits from their cells
a tsunami of beauty will deluge a parched world.
Margery Parsons is a poet and advocate for a radically different and better world. She lives in Chicago and in addition to poetry loves music and film. Her poems have been published in Rag Blog, Poetry Pacific, Calliope, New Verse News, OccuPoetry, Rise Up Review, Haiku Universe, Madness Muse Press and Illinois Poetry Society, with a forthcoming poem in Plate of Pandemic.
Read other articles by Margery.
This article was posted on Sunday, August 17th, 2025 at 8:00am and is filed under Poetry.
