Homeland

The Tree in Whose Body a Homeland Was Planted She stands— not like a silent statue, but like the trunk of a tree whose roots have been pulled up through her throat and planted in exile.

Her body is a map, not of roads, but of pain.

Inside her, a word has sunk: “homeland”— not into soil, but into flesh.

Her tongue is cut, yet her gaze still burns through the lines.

In exile, the wind is a stranger, but hope still runs through her veins— like a seed buried in scorched earth.

Maybe one day, someone will draw a new map upon her body— borderless, bloodless, filled with standing women who birth the homeland anew.