I got a call my beloved friend was killed.
May God grant him peace.
I hung up and went to sleep.
Rubble fell over my head.
I saw my mother’s head severed,
my siblings dying one after another
while calling for help.

My head started to bleed,
I could barely breathe.
I tried to swallow all the air around me,
and that is when I woke up,
a tear falling from my eye,
hot and salty on my lips.

That is when I felt alive,
when my heart rejected numbness,
when it reclaimed its humanity.
That is when I knew
a piece of my soul passed away
the moment I was forced to leave
my beloved home,
Gaza, Palestine.

Away from them,
I tremble a million times,
remembering how unmercifully bombs fell while I walked the streets,
warplanes whispering, “You’re next!
We’re coming to rip life from you,
to shatter you beyond recognition.”

My heart turns blue in quietness,
no one can fathom my sadness,
not even myself,
desperate to let tears flow,
but my eyes are as heavy as clouds
that cannot cry.
How lucky are the clouds that cry,
when rain washes the pain away!
But this heart cannot cry.
Guilt is all I feel.

My face might be vibrant and bright,
but my heart has turned dark,
darker than my brown eyes,
it needs a sip of sanity to survive.
A sip that would make the world realize
a ceasefire is the solution.
the beginning of a new, difficult journey,
the start of healing.