The Eagle’s wings are being clipped… in Egypt

Roqaya Chamseddine

The United States of America now stands stark-naked - in all of its unashamed complicity, in all of its hegemonic cabal, in all of its depraved hypocrisy.

But, this is not about Washington - nor is it about the West. I refuse to grant them center-stage where they may take advantage of being cast as lead or even a supporting role when they are irrelevant. This is about the Arabs, as a people. The Arabs have suffered decades of oppression under the steel boot of colonialism, being forced into submission as pawns in the elusive game of Western hegemony - and over time unashamed apathy became their undoing. Their suffering was furthered by their detachment. They no longer resemble done another in character and dignity; each man becoming nothing more than a foreign entity to the other, divided and decayed.

Decades. Decades. Decades.

For years, arrogance was used to mask harrowing shame - a shame which wept of a homeland occupied, of a people partitioned, of a nation in darkness, of a language numb and powerless.

And they waited, the Arabs, for a single hero to rise.

And they waited.

But, one can only wait so long before slumber pulls at your eyelids, dragging you into a hellish coma - without virtue, armed with nothing more than a pillow of humiliation and a blanket of disgrace; a sleeping death.

The Arab youth became caged birds, creating lullabies for uprisings yet to come. And yet, it came. O' God, it came at last.

The Tunisian trigger sent a shock-wave up the Arab spine, like a sharp thorn into their backs. And they awoke, in Egypt - where there are no negotiation tables, there are "peace-processes", there are no meek and hesitant crowds. There is no circus of submitters who lay before dictators and prostrate so that they may eat, just a morsel, off the plate of temporary sustenance.

There is only defiance.

The dust beneath their feet wraps itself in batches, clinging softly to their skin in an act of worship.

I say to you, that no one will understand the cries of a generation lost nor could they understand that of a generation liberated, until they feel this crazed desperation run as deep as their veins. In the streets of Cairo we found our souls, safeguarded in the iron fists of revolutionaries - souls once lost and left idle amongst a valley of old memories long forgotten.

Egypt has become our ballad - a testimony before the world, crying out that we live and submit to the glory of the revolution.