{"id":45017,"date":"2014-07-28T12:00:42","date_gmt":"2014-07-28T11:00:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=45017"},"modified":"2015-05-05T21:33:36","modified_gmt":"2015-05-05T20:33:36","slug":"not-only","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2014\/07\/not-only\/","title":{"rendered":"“Not Only– “"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Poem on Burma by a Rightly Angry Poet<\/em><\/p>\n

Not only Muslims should speak for Muslims.
\nNot only Burmese should speak for Burmese.
\nNot only Palestinians should speak for Palestinians.
\nNot only Cambodians should speak for Cambodians.<\/p>\n

How would N. Koreans speak for themselves.
\nWho spoke for the Jews while it was happening.<\/p>\n

Not only women should speak for women.
\nNot only the oppressed should speak for the oppressed.
\nNot only children should speak for children.<\/p>\n

How would animals and the environment speak for themselves and itself.<\/p>\n

I remember that terrible meeting in about 2002
\nwhen all the great ladies were talking talking
\nwho should speak for the Burmese.<\/p>\n

I said anyone who stands up for them should speak for them.<\/p>\n

Look at Inge Sargent, Austrian-born, husband murdered by the junta, speaking for the Shan.<\/p>\n

Look at those speaking for the Rohingya.<\/p>\n

Look at those keeping their mouths shut and pretending not to notice and not to see.<\/p>\n

Pretending it isn’t going on.<\/p>\n

Pretending it isn’t there.<\/p>\n

Pretending it’s all the victims’ fault.<\/p>\n

In 2010 I spoke for a disabled or differently abled young woman, because some officious fool overstepped her bounds and barged in on us, a committee of 3 with 3 Ph.D.s, one an HIV\/AIDs educator.<\/p>\n

The woman who barged in tried to tell us we should bar this differently abled woman from getting a prize.<\/p>\n

I was never so angry is my life.<\/p>\n

I stepped outside the glass partition and said, This is unacceptable.<\/p>\n

You can’t even properly name the mental disease you say she has.<\/p>\n

Besides, we only judge\/grade the paper based on what’s written in her paper.<\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

Later people asked me if someone in my family was disabled.
\nAnd the daughter of a missionary–white skinned.
\nI guess you would call it NGO on NGO abuse.
\nGive me a break.
\n_____________________________<\/p>\n

Dr Kyi Maung Kaung is a poet, painter, political economist, former professor and a Burmese woman in exile.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Poem on Burma by a Rightly Angry Poet<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[182],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-45017","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poetry-format"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45017","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45017"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45017\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45017"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45017"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45017"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}