Freedom

Who invented you, Freedom?

Was it a dreamer, tired of chains?

Was it a prisoner

naming the air outside the bars?

Or was it the land itself

whispering: I am incomplete without it?

How can a homeland exist

Without you pulsing through it, Freedom? Without you

A land is just a map drawn in dust

a cage with painted skies 

They tell us

“This is your country.”

But how can it be mine

if my voice is strangled?

How can it be home

if my steps are shackled

if the ground beneath me

feels borrowed

if even the wind

is questioned about where it blows?

They tell us

You are not an ornament

Freedom

not a luxury of the lucky

You are the breath of every homeland

Without you, a nation is

A graveyard with a flag

A body without a soul

You are the marrow of belonging

Were you always there

woven into the earth? 

Why do they cut you out of our soil

Hide you behind borders

and lock you behind guns? 

why do they blame us

for searching for you

in every stone, every prayer

every heartbeat that refuses surrender? 

So let me ask you again:

Who invented you, Freedom?

Do you exist?