WWE by Fatimah Asghar

View this email on a browser Forward to a friend July 18, 2016   WWE   Fatimah Asghar

Here’s your auntie, in her best gold-threaded shalwaar kameez, made small by this land of american men.   Everyday she prays. Rolls attah & pounds the keema at night watches the bodies of these glistening men.   Big and muscular, neck full of veins, bulging in the pen. Her eyes kajaled & wide, glued to sweaty american men.   She smiles as guilty as a bride without blood, her love of this new country, cold snow & naked american men.   “Stop living in a soap opera” yells her husband, fresh from work, demanding his dinner: american. Men   take & take & yet you idolize them still, watch your auntie as she builds her silent altar to them—   her knees fold on the rundown mattress, a prayer to WWE Her tasbeeh & TV: the only things she puts before her husband.    She covers bruises & never lets us eat leftovers: a good wife. It’s something in their nature: what america does to men.   They can’t touch anyone without teeth & spit unless one strips the other of their human skin.   Even now, you don’t get it. But whenever it’s on you watch them snarl like mad dogs in a cage—these american men.   Now that you’re older your auntie calls to say he hit her again, that this didn’t happen before he became american.    You know its true & try to help, but what can you do? You, little Fatimah, who still worships him?            Copyright © 2016 Fatimah Asghar. Used with permission of the author. About This Poem   “I’ve always remembered this image from my childhood: my immigrant auntie in her shalwaar kameez watching World Wrestling Entertainment. There were a lot of women in our family, and we would all watch it together. I never really thought that it was strange until I was older. I wanted to write a poem that explored those moments, as well as the relationship between us and America, and the men and women in my family. —Fatimah Asghar   Fatimah Asghar is the author of After (YesYes Books, 2015). She’s a teaching artist at Young Chicago Authors and lives in Chicago.   Photo credit: Reginald Eldridge   Poetry by Asghar   After (YesYes Books, 2015)  "So Much Happiness" by Naomi Shihab Nye from "Understory" by Craig Santos Perez "Mess Hall" by Solmaz Sharif Poem-a-Day   Launched during National Poetry Month in 2006, Poem-a-Day features new and previously unpublished poems by contemporary poets on weekdays and classic poems on weekends. Thanks for being a part of the Academy of American Poets community. To learn about other programs, including National Poetry Month, Poem in Your Pocket Day, the annual Poets Forum, and more, visit Poets.org.   You are receiving this e-mail because you elected to subscribe to our mailing list. If you would like to unsubscribe, please click here.   © Academy of American Poets 75 Maiden Lane, Suite 901, New York, NY 10038