Two years after Tal Afar’s liberation from ISIS,
Zhiyan, the young woman who
survived the most brutal attack,
painted a disturbing portrait of a group of girls.
The crimson-red slams into the dark brown;
on the faces, on the bombed houses,
and on the road.
In the backdrop, the burnt artefacts,
the ruins of Nebuchadnezzar’s palace,
his magnificent throne, stolen.
In the far distance of the painting, the dark
charcoal-grey burnt texts
of the first human sport, performed
in Sennacherib’s Garden.
The portrait: terror incarcerated in such small space
(Tal Afar: A northern Iraqi town that was seized by ISIS in 2014)
Khaloud Al-Muttalibi
is a poet and translator. She resides in the United Kingdom. Her work has been published internationally by various magazines and journals, including Untethered magazine, Defenestration, The Glasgow Review of Books, Ink, Sweat & Tears, After the Pause, Dying Dahlia Review, Akhar, Ygdrasil, The Paragon and The Guardian’s online collection for world poetry day in 2016. She enjoys reading and charcoal drawing.