The “Tall Order” by Zerine Wahid is an exceptional story of courage, the bravery of daring to be “beyond essential”, to establish the strength of individuality, the very feminine spirit of human life.
“He says my desires cannot be his desires
That my ambitions aren’t his problems
That I should learn to walk on my own
Nor wait to have his hand stretched out to hold.”
The opening stanza establishes a weight baggage of clarity between two partners. Although being together, there is a positive announcement of claiming one’s own dreams and purpose. An open discourse of winning and losing at one’s own cost.
“He says my home cannot be ours
My dreams he cannot commit for sure
My conversations he cannot comprehend
My writings he cannot understand.”
The utter dichotomy of a man’s role of being the provider, he but choses to be in the choices of a woman, her very own spaces beyond the emotional and traditional restraints. There is a formal order of being able of by being capable of!
“I pause for an answer….
The long wait has left me stranded in a dark corner
Civilization: I have left far behind
Learning to fight once again
My lone battle one more time.
The depleted strength regained
Are reminders of the days
When I stared fear in its face
Walking down my own path
Leaving footprints for others to fill.”
This I would say is the turning point for both the reader and the protagonist for She has to make a conscious choice to beg Him to stay or to decide, and take her first step “out” in years. The world that she has forgotten, the battle which she never fought to find out who She really is…
The Poet allows Her to interrogate her two dimensionality comfort and closure, She is in sight of someone can lead to an absence, to a ghostly emptiness she ought to acknowledge and move on, will she?
“Fading memories left behind
Replenishing the old with new dreams
Struggling to reclaim my space
In a new world order
Hoping none of it is a tall order.”
The “Tall Order” by Zerine Wahid is unapologetically honest in representing messy concepts of “Freedom”, “Strength” and being “Brave”. The consistent tug-of-war of emotions and the unavoidable guilt of staying within the sense of comfort of someone, only to realise, it had been always you who was holding on.
A tall order of identity, construction, destruction of self only to come back with self-love, you buried within you, only to love someone else.
Was it worth or was it just the brevity of closure She was waiting all this while to break free of the “Tall Order”!
