A Strange Bird in my Heart

Anum Nawaz
1 min readDec 27, 2019

There is a strange bird in my heart

That I don’t let it sing

It pleads and pleads to be free

But I am too tough on it

There is a strange bird in my heart

That I demean and keep it caged

Never allowing it to fly

I don’t know what it feels

Because I have shut down it’s doors

There is a strange bird in my heart

tired and exhausted of not being itself

Because I never am too rough on it

Killing it day by day

But sometimes I let it out,

at night when everyone’s asleep

I caress it, feed it, love it,

giving it a light of hope to be out one day.

But then i stop and cage it back

and that’s how we sleep those nights

But the strange bird always stays

And whispers and curls with me

So I chain it and put it in a dark chamber

Cutting off it’s wings so that it never flies

Caging it in a box so that it never communicates

There is a strange bird in my heart

Who bothers me and who I bother

But I have a strange bird in my heart

Do you?

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Anum Nawaz

Lecturer @IAC|Fulbright Alum @TheNewSchool| Founder @myvoice_unheard ,@academicsaccessible,@cc.canvasconnection,@la1dayuniversi1|Previously @rabtt,@yesnetworkpk