Tazeen Fatma

By: Tazeen Fatma
Bengaluru, Karnataka, India

I remember my brother playing hitman when I was younger. He would spend hours on the computer aiming targeted attacks at the enemies. He was pretty good at it. I, on the other hand, usually lost since I killed a lot of innocents in the process. It annoyed me. I mean, wasn’t it okay if a few civilians got hit? I did eliminate the targets as well. What, really, is the value of one life in a game? 

But when bridges collapsed, mass shootings occurred, and the army took over, I resorted to reading jurisdictions, history, philosophy, and religion. I also watched Star Wars. The metamorphosis of the Jedi Knight Anakin Skywalker into the Sith Lord Darth Vader when he forwent morality in his quest for revenge was, I think, the last straw. Idealism had lost its path.

biological warfare I scrub off dead skin

By Tazeen Fatma
Karnataka, India

A woman sits on rubble, her crimson eyes staring into yours. No one is left to grieve in another neighborhood. You have unknowingly cracked a few knuckles, picked up a dagger, and destroyed lives counting tens, hundreds, and thousands… 

In trying to teach them a lesson, you’ve instilled fear and thereby infused terror in someone, somewhere. Politically, you struggle to define it in a way such that your bloodied hands are stain-free. The sun sets yet again but the night sky lights up every now and then. Many have lost their tomorrow, others wake up to a bleak one. The air still smells red. 

tattered tatreez—  
how beautiful it once was