NADIA ANJUMAN -
AFGHAN  GIRL 

Poem for Today - May 21, 2014

THE SILENCED

I have no desire for talking, my tongue is tied up.

Now that I am abhorred by my time, do I sing or not?

What could I say about honey, when my mouth is as            bitter as poison.

Alas! The group of tyrants has muffled my mouth.
This corner of imprisonment, grief, failure, and regrets          –

I was born for nothing that my mouth should stay               sealed.

I know O! my heart, It is springtime and the time for           joy,
What could I, a bound bird, do without flight.
Although, I have been silent for long, I have not                 forgotten to sing,

Because my songs whispered in the solitude of my               heart.

Oh, I will love the day when I break out of this cage,

Escape this solitary exile and sing wildly.
I am not that weak willow twisted by every breeze.
I am an Afghan girl and known to the whole world.

© Nadia Anjuman, 

Translated from the Dari

by Abdul Salam Shayek

NEW YORK TIMES

November 8, 2005

Afghan Poet Dies After Beating by Husband

By CARLOTTA GALL

KABUL, Afghanistan, Nov. 7 - Nadia Anjuman, who had been gaining a name for herself as a poet in Afghan literary circles, died over the weekend in the western city of Herat after being beaten by her husband, police officials said Monday.

The death of Ms. Anjuman at age 25 was lamented by colleagues and condemned by the United Nations as a tragic example of the violence that so many Afghan women still face despite their advances four years after Taliban rule.

Ms. Anjuman was knocked unconscious by her husband during an argument Saturday evening, Col. Nisar Ahmad Paikar, chief of the police crime unit in Herat, said in a telephone interview.

Her husband, Farid Ahmad Majid Mia, is in custody and has admitted hitting his wife and knocking her unconscious, Colonel Paikar said. Ms. Anjuman died later in a hospital, he said. "She had a dark bruise under her right eye," he added.

Ms. Anjuman, a literature undergraduate at Herat University, published her first volume of poems this year, titled "Gule Dudi," or "Dark Flower." She was to publish a second volume next year, said Sayed Haqiqi, a local journalist and colleague of Ms. Anjuman in Herat's Cultural Association. Her husband, who graduated with a degree in literature from the same university, worked as an administrator in the literature faculty, Mr. Haqiqi said.

A spokesman at the United Nations mission in Kabul, Adrian Edwards, called Ms. Anjuman's death tragic and a great loss to Afghanistan. Her death "needs to be investigated, and anyone found responsible needs to be dealt with in proper accordance with law," he said.