A Poem for Rabia weaves together the stories of three women from the same bloodline, in three different lands impacted by colonization, in three different states undergoing major political shifts, across 200 years: Rabia, on an indentured labour ship departing Calcutta, India in 1853; Betty, in Guyana as it begins to undergo the messy process of decolonizing from Britain in 1953; and Zahra, a queer activist in Tkaronto in 2053, navigating a Canada that has just legally abolished prisons.
Keywords: Drama, Indo-Caribbean, queer, South Asian, Guyana, Toronto, India, abolition, colonization, decolonization, past, future, time travel
Genre: Drama/Comedy
Suitable for students 14+
Content note: Contains swearing, references to incarceration and colonization
Cast size: 6 actors
Male roles: 3
Female roles: 5
Trans/Non-Binary/Gender Non-Conforming roles: 2
Doubled roles: 4
Casting note: 6 actors playing 10 roles total.