we are not numbers

emerging writers from Palestine tell their stories and advocate for their human rights

Our different prisons

Many people live in their own types of lockdowns.
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Gaza asks the world,
How does the lockdown feel?
We are in a forever lockdown.

Gaza is my beautiful prison.
It's beautiful because
it's home.
It's a prison because
I can't fly, sail or trek
without running smack into a wall
or being threatened with a gun.

Musa* is beautiful
but he is imprisoned too.
Africa is his beautiful prison.
It's beautiful because it's home.
It's prison because lack of money,
and prejudice,
makes traveling even out of his city
just a dream.

Blockade is a prison.
Poverty is a prison
Fear is a prison.
A pandemic is a prison.

Let's stand at the balconies
and sing a song for our broken humanity*.
For everyone around the world,
for our different blessings
and different prisons.

*Musa is a young Kenyan the WANN executive editor met on her travels. He grew up, an orphan, beneath the bridges of Nairobi. Yet he has found a way to eke out a living for himself by giving "alternative" city tours to tourists. And the singing? The Italians are showing us how to find joy in the midst of panic.

 

Woman in sunglasses in front of fountain.
Mentor: Pam Bailey

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