Muzna Syed

tappay koom tappay mein zhund dai
 za pa tapo da zargay dard qalarawoma 15 (Rizwana)

I do, I live: the tappa quieting 
the pangs of pain

When I chose to write about the Tappah, I was initially surprised at the great grief present in the poems when heard during funerals or wedding rukhsatis ¹. The /h/ sound that elongated the last word, emphasised it enough to make me think this was a pleading - a sort of concession to authority or some god. I realised after reading and hearing so many, that this was really much less about grief and one’s tragic positions in life than about many emotions/ events, varied reflections: occasions - burials, akikahs ², engagements, weddings, happiness ³, reminiscing friendship, rural architecture (Godar ⁴, mud-houses), motherhood, soma⁵ harvests, one’s lover, greenery before war; bodily autonomy; nature - flowers, gardens, animals, plants; mountain-tops; familial ties and neighborly affections; on protest against state-induced violence, stereotyping, poverty; vividly illustrating customs - funeral rites, Swarah⁶, Eid-day visits, Jahaiz ⁷, monthly flower harvesting, marriage - khaal ⁸, wearing red; moon sightings for Ramadan.

In In Search of our Mother’s Gardens, Alice Walker describes the African American woman’s representation in male literature/ or dominant media discourse as “exquisite butterflies trapped in an evil honey, toiling away their lives in an era, a century that did not acknowledge them, except as the ‘mule of the world’” (Walker). Conflict-ridden Afghanistan and the Pak-Afghan bordering regions where Pashtuns live, has led to this media-reinforced depiction of the Pashtun woman being only a product of war, or a consequence of bad circumstance. The Tappah which is impromptu poetry orally transmitted and so therefore uncensored, reveals a more complex Pashtun woman and an archive of womanhood in these tribes. In this essay, I choose two customs historically practiced by Pashtuns: soma-plant harvesting and Swarah to elaborate on the role of female literature in understanding customary practice. This results, through an understanding of affect theory present in this poetry, varied angles through which the Pashtun woman is complicated and thoroughly archived.

A fine translation of a literary text requires a preservation of the features that make that text worth teaching, say something that means the same as what has been said in another and so with my “little richer… thicker - contextualisation” (Appiah), I immerse myself in this exercise of translating text from Pashto to English of the given Tappay. What follows is a thick2 translation of the Tappa at the beginning of the introduction. Tappa koom: doing the tappa… is my… zhund: life…through the Tappa, I…. qalaar: calm…my…zargai dard: heart’s pain. Dard refers to the feeling associated with wounds, not the wound itself which would be a zakham but, rather, the state it (the wound) produces in a person - pain, hollowness, despair. Qalaar is used to describe a crying child quieted, an overcoming of chaos. Da zargai dard is innermost grievances and za means me/ myself. So, it is to silence the noise/ discontent/ anxiety present in the self that makes one sing the Tappa. The Tappa is relied on for internal calm. The practice of poetry is seen in society as idle/ or illusory compared to ‘real’ professions like school principals or doctors. It is humorously referred to in the following Tappa:

Plaar e doctor mor e mastara, lor e 
Lofara da tapay raata kaveena 16 (Rizwana) 

the father a doctor, the mother a school master, 
the daughter idle! She sings Tappay

However, the Tappa: “Tappay koom, Tappay main zhund dhai…” is a defiance of this social perception of the poet’s role. She says that she lives because of the (less economically rewarding yet spirit driven) Tappah. It gives her a resilience and freedom to express that no other profession can. She becomes part of a larger life - and assumes many roles: survivor, singer, poet, artist, dancer.

On Flowers

It is recognised that the pashto tappa is as old as Pashtuns are according to Rizwana Yousafzai who has written a book on Tappay and family bonds. (Rizwana) An old Tappa said before-Christ by young women when the soma plant was harvested by moonlight during a full moon:

spogmeya krang wakha rakheja 
yaar mein da gulo lao kavee guthay raibeena20 (Rizwana) 

oh moon, rise up brighter for my love, 
at flower harvest, may cut his finger

The singer says Spogmeeya: (oh moon) not Spogmai: (the moon) so that direct dialogue is established between the moon that is alive, awake and now at her familiar voice rising and becoming brighter. Meanwhile, her yaar: (beloved, love, friend), or in this case the congregation of people that have gathered to lao: (harvest) the soma plant. The soma plant is referred to in this tappa as gul: (flower). Gul is both plant and glad tidings, something representing a future that survives, flowers, prospers and is good. The men of the village that are physically gathering this soma plant, however, may cut their fingers in the dark and so she calls on the moon to help.

This interface of any two beings’ physical worlds (woman’s, moon’s) creates relations that are the same as those of poetic dyads (like moth-flame) in canonical Pashto theorisation on the ma’nawi level. Poetry can translate human and non-human worlds due to this metaphysical dimension that matter and imagery share and both operate upon the same meanings. (Caron)

On Swarah

Affect plays an important role in critiquing society, its demands or architecture, one must not only examine institutions but moments - moments of hate, love, stillness, poetry, resignation, loss, justice - these can be the basis for an entirely different demands on social order (Ahmed).

Swarah means to “carry.” The name suggests how a Swarah is to be received: greatly cherished. A Swarah is usually not supposed to touch the ground during her movement from her parent’s house to the groom's house on the day of the wedding/ rukhsati 3. A Swarah is a girl from an offending family’s household given to another family for marriage as a peace offering for crimes committed by a male family member. The following Tappa describes this:

Laala pa azmaka maree oukral
Nan ba daaddaa maa pa swarah ke warkaweena23 (Rizwana)

My brother killed another for property
Today, father gives me as Swarah

The girl speaks in great urgency nan:(today) signifying this immediate reality where she will be given to a family as a Swarah. She speaks of the irony of this practice, comparing how her brother was the one that committed the murder for land-acquisition and now, she, because of this crime will be given as a Swarah to prevent enmity between the two tribes - hers and the in-laws. azmaka maree: (land-murders) and maa: (myself) are in separate lines, reinforcing her innocence.

The woman becomes a Swarah, it becomes her identity. Swarah, initially a tribal peace stratagem to prevent unnecessary deaths and a loss of resources, was a symbolic giving of a woman from their family to finalise a peace-agreement. The woman was called a Swarah - someone so respected that she should not even have to walk - Swarah means to hold-up, to feel impressed by. Women would usually willingly offer themselves as Swarah to prevent further bloodshed between two tribes, however later on in the practice, Swarah was used to inflict further harm on the offending family even after forgiveness or Sula ⁹had been announced publicly. Many times, the women would also be unwilling to marry into that family because of the threat being a Swarah imposed on her well-being. It has become a marker of shame rather than the initial respectful acknowledgement it held. The Swarah was aware of the unfairness of being responsible for her brother’s/ uncle’s/ or father’s crimes, she would have to leave behind her lover or another marriage proposal and be at the mercy of her Swarah in-laws that may still begrudge her family for the offence. This is recognised in the Tappa as well as the fact that her relationship with family is changed through this exchange. Once a doting young sister, she abhors her brother.

The rift in this brother-sister bond after being given in Swarah, illustrates the woman seeing herself separate away from the family, she no longer sees their horizons as shared and repositions her imagination towards a separate identity that also allows her to criticise this practice of Swarah that would be difficult if she retained an appreciation of her immediate family and society. The family provides a shared horizon and gives one a sense of belonging as having a share at the table and within the family, we have objects circulated to accumulate positive affective value (Ahmed). A Swarah is placed in a state of exile- she is not a part of her immediate family anymore and her in-laws begrudge her presence and so she is similar to an “affect alien” - a feminist kill joy, melancholic migrant.

The following Tappay are a glimpse at her perspectives on the practice:

laa laa main khpal armaan pora krou
za ai da aur da rawaajoona suttee kram27

my brother fulfilled his passions
on the pyre of custom I am burnt

da pakhto Jabar ta gorai
loor pa swarah kai warkawee, zwai khlaasaweena28

look at the Pashtun's honour
Daughter given in Swarah to free the son

za bai gunah, qatil main ror dai
jirgah raaghlai maa swarah kai warkaweena29

I; sin less - my brother is the murderer
the Jirgah came and gave me away in Swarah

jaanaan la maaanaa marawar de
da asmaan sthorai ba jirgah warta legama30

my love is sad because of me
I will send him a jirgah¹⁰  of the sky’s stars

Zamaa laaa laaa la zeerai waarnakrai
Pakhto ai sar shawa xa ai khawrai eerrai krama¹¹

Do not give my brother anything, 
He says for pakhto  but he has made me useless dust
 

Conclusion

The Tappa is where we actually are able to understand the female experiences and perspectives regarding customs like Swarah and soma harvesting, one causes the woman to use the tappa as a space to lament privately or publicly their experience within the custom and the other playfully engages the women in a less-documented aspect of female Pashtun experience that involves dance, song and joy. Using ‘flowers,’ I am able to draw a parallel between female hardship and unfair punishment while also presenting a ‘happier’ Tappa, expounding on what exists in the affectual ‘near-sphere’ of these women that admire, reflect and also resist; this is to underscore the purpose of this piece: the Pashtun literature as a space to understand a complexity to the Pashtun woman that is not discussed post-war. I saw myself in this work, and it proved, yes to be about the women present and that have existed before us. Our mothers and grandmothers, some of them moving to music not yet written and they waited (Walker).

References:

• Ahmed, Sara. "1 Happy Objects." The affect theory reader (2010): 29-51. 
• Appiah, Kwame Anthony. “Thick Translation.” Callaloo, vol. 16, no. 4, 1993, pp. 808–19. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/2932211. Accessed 21 Oct. 2025. 
• Caron, J. (2024). Kārwān’s talking forest: Materiality, poetic imagination, and the metaphysics of war violence. History and Anthropology, 36(3), 435–458. https://doi.org/10.1080/02757206.2024.2435662 
• Enevoldsen, Jens. Spogmeeya Krang Wakha Raakheja . University Book Agency, Khyber Bazar, 1969. 
• Foucault, Michel. "Discipline and Punish/Foucault M." N.-Y (1977). 
• Leder, Drew. The distressed body: Rethinking illness, imprisonment, and healing. University of Chicago Press, 2019. 
• Majrūḥ, Sayyid Bahā’ al-Dīn. 1988. Le Suicide et le Chant. Paris: Les Cahiers des Brisants. 
• Seigworth, Gregory J., and Melissa Gregg. "The affect theory reader." Durham: Duke (2010). 
• Walker, Alice, and W. Chester. In search of our mothers' gardens. Royal Victorian Institute for the Blind Tertiary Resource Service, 1986. 
• Yousafzai, Rizwana. Zamong Tapay Zamong Rishtay. Graan Khaparandaweya Tolana Swatd, 2021.

1. The night of wedding celebrations where the bride permanently moves from her parent/s house to her in-law’s. The bride’s family describe this separation through tappay
2. the seventh day of a child newborn is celebrated and called akikah
3. Happiness means, according to Sarah Ahmed in ‘Happy Objects’, to recognise a happening- that is to be affected by something, an intentionality - that means that happiness is to be happy about something intentionally, and evaluation or judgment - where to be happy about something makes that specific thing good or bad. (Ahmed). In the Tappah, close observations and illustrations of all: recognition, intentionality, and evaluation are present that make it a method of archiving ‘happiness’ or female affectual experiences and significance along with the Tappah’s intimate representation of human/ non-human worlds
4. Godar is a river bank where women would collect water for household use, or wash clothes and also became a meeting point for friendships and lovers. Then, dams, tubewells, etc resulted in godar as an institution to lose significance
5. Soma is a flower/ plant that was used in vedic spiritual practice and locally in medicine use, intoxicant, for certain religious rites. The harvesting of it is talked about in Pashtun literature and tappahs
6. Swarah is giving a women in marriage from the offending family’s house to an enemy’s family to end an enmity. It is done to achieve peace between two families that are in some disagreement because of murder, property disagreements, etc. This is usually done without consulting the bride that will be given as a Swarah who is not involved/ is innocent of these crimes done by male family members (brother, father, uncle). This Swarah criticises this practice herself in the Tappay mentioned in this piece, she laments her social obligation and the unjust punishment enforced on her innocence while her brother roams freely.
7. Jahaiz is a bride price - done by some pashtun families
8. a dotted tattoo on the face of a pashtun woman as a marker of beauty
9. Sula is forgiving another person or family for an offense. It can be achieved by elders giving compensation in the form of money, gifts, or a Swarah
10. The Tappah does not see the jirgah a masculine gathering, rather stars sent to the lover as an apology and gifts given. This sets the woman in control of an authorising presence and using it for her lover’s apology. She reimagines the Jirgah’s role but also recognises it apart from the idea of it being a largely male-dominated elders decision-point. 
11. Pashto is the language but also the way of life of pakhtuns and a moral code they follow.