Minerva
By Saba Vasefi
My daughter's pencil case
Is full of my future.
As if they were my dreams,
She covers her exercise books
And carries them to school
Brings them home
Damaged and mute.
She takes out pencils,
All of them lead now
And looks for me in pallid shades
of Salvador Dali’s Blue Glass
Today she comes home
With no pack on her back.
The strings of her cello
Compass the ways
We are cut from our past.
Fanatic society,
A chameleon gang,
We keep our colour
But our freedom
Grows schizophrenic.
The road is a blade
And it smells of blood.
Where, now, in my heart
Can I steal her safe.
This poem is in response to the photograph 'Self-portrait at 40 Holland Avenue 2007, printed 2018 gelatin silver photograph'
by LaToya Ruby Frazier which is part of the Shadow catchers exhibition at Art Gallery of New South Wales, 2020.