"Tell Me"

To the acid burn victims,
I ask, how can you be so strong?
Where do you get the strength?
I am a woman like you.
I am Bengali like you.
Yet, when something so trivial goes wrong,
I feel like I can't go on.
I think I am suffering.

I am not suffering at all!
How can I?
We are women.
We are Bengali.
But you, you, the acid burn victims,
you are strong! You go on with your lives,
that have been shattered. As your faces have
been shattered! Stolen dreams.
You go on, with strength and dignity.
You are strong.
If I have one-tenth the strength you have, well then...
Just think what I could do.

Shailla Hoque Bari lives in UK.