Do I love my country?
Do I love my country?
Do I love my country?
To the question above, I simply reply ‘Yes’
But the more they ask, the more I question
Do I really love my country?

If I do indeed love my country
Why thoughts of migrating keep invading my mind?
Why do I feel like just running away?
Why do I feel as though there’s no hope?
Why am I, why am I not doing anything about it?

If I indeed do love my country
Why is it
That when the national anthem is playing
When in the past, I stood still wherever I may be
Frozen in my path and in my actions
Do not even dare to wipe a sweat
But now, but now,
It’s so easy to joke and to play
To tickle and to sway
To laugh with friends
When the Negaraku is being played

If my country, I do indeed love
Why is it that I look forward to National Day
For its holiday
And not for the reason of the day

I question myself again
Do I love my country?

Where were you
when they called me ‘keling’ and ‘pariah’?
Where were you
when my grandparents arrived in a boat?
Where were you
when my kind slogged the railway tracks and roads?

Where were you
when they called me a snake and a rubber tree loafer?
Where were you
when they tore down my temples ‘coz there were one too many?
Where were you
when higher education was denied ‘coz some quota had been filled?

Where were you
when my kind were killed in prisons?
I didn’t know it was a crime to look like a black rapper with earrings;
Where were you
when my grandmother wept the first time she cast a vote?
Where were you
when my grandfather laughed, shaking hands with the Tun seated by the Brit?

Where were you
when I proudly held the nation’s flag up the Everest and in a squash court?
Where were you
when I wept at the sound of ‘Negaraku’ heard thru’ muffled speakers and a loud silence?

One Malaysia sorry *** was once believed but now delusional
When my kin are likened to toilet paper
Used when needed and then discarded!



@ shaqila 21/1/2013

Melt all the trumpets the trombones                                                                              
The bones of drums fed to the dogs                                                                                  
slit the cowhide’s belly cleave
the guitar open
see if you can find history
the muse of children running
their pulses are singing ‘Negaraku’