Nowhere, Everywhere
Sophia Kaur
The mirror reflects back to me
The lines of my mothers' eyes
And her mother's lips,
And the lines that were branded onto our lands
Our identities.
I don't belong where I was born,
Brown skin on land that has been occupied since 1492,
After my parents looked for the salvation of the Dream.
Nor do I belong where my parents were born,
A country whittled down like a piece of wood
Knifed again and again until it resembles the image of something that no
longer threatens those that hold it.
They tell me I can only move forward.
‘Progress’ they call it.
But my body is made up of the past
And creates futures
That I cannot even conceive of.
They tell me I can only restrict time.
The time to do, to be, to live.
--Living is only for the weekends,
For the after hours
Separated, because everyone is busy living at the same time.
They only know restriction.
The restriction of our lives, our memories, our nourishment.
And I've been taught it, force-fed it
Fighting the urge to teach its destructive ways to others.
I yearn to live across time
Across space
Both here
And there.
Still, I find I have to ask permission.
Permission to live by the will of others
When all I want to do is live a life uninterrupted
Like the record that never comes to the end of its etched lines
The dancing that never ends because we can always find our breath.
It’s a wonder that I'm being at all.
But I am here,
Defiantly
Living
Through my own means
Between here and there,
And nowhere.
All at once.
The lines of my mothers' eyes
And her mother's lips,
And the lines that were branded onto our lands
Our identities.
I don't belong where I was born,
Brown skin on land that has been occupied since 1492,
After my parents looked for the salvation of the Dream.
Nor do I belong where my parents were born,
A country whittled down like a piece of wood
Knifed again and again until it resembles the image of something that no
longer threatens those that hold it.
They tell me I can only move forward.
‘Progress’ they call it.
But my body is made up of the past
And creates futures
That I cannot even conceive of.
They tell me I can only restrict time.
The time to do, to be, to live.
--Living is only for the weekends,
For the after hours
Separated, because everyone is busy living at the same time.
They only know restriction.
The restriction of our lives, our memories, our nourishment.
And I've been taught it, force-fed it
Fighting the urge to teach its destructive ways to others.
I yearn to live across time
Across space
Both here
And there.
Still, I find I have to ask permission.
Permission to live by the will of others
When all I want to do is live a life uninterrupted
Like the record that never comes to the end of its etched lines
The dancing that never ends because we can always find our breath.
It’s a wonder that I'm being at all.
But I am here,
Defiantly
Living
Through my own means
Between here and there,
And nowhere.
All at once.
Sophia Kaur is a queer neurodivergent Sikh researcher and writer whose work focuses on (de)coloniality through the prism of security, silence, and trauma. They are currently a PhD student at the University of Glasgow and hold two Masters: one in Social Work and the other in International Relations. Sophia also has an undergrad Interdisciplinary Studies degree where she studied Psychology, English, and Philosophy. She loves to bring disparate information together and to share that knowledge through storytelling and poetry.
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