ON FIRE AND BLOOD

            SYMPHONY OF FREEDOM 

             
*This article is an honorary entry for Kashmir Solidarity Day Competition*

  

Hide my broken wooden soldier, 

Hide my soccer ball too, 

Hide the jigsaw puzzle pieces, 

Hide my half burnt shoes. 

  

The scattered pieces of a bomb, 

That destroyed my world in an instant, 

Hide my teddy bear under the bed, 

Where the monsters watch from a distance, 

  

You search for childhood in my eyes, 

You want them to have a million lights, 

How can you see anything but fire,  

In eyes which lost everything in one night, 

  

Hiding amongst the clouds up high, 

There lies my innocence in the sky, 

Lost and drowned in darkness, 

Buried under piles of lies. 

  

Hide the tears that have run dry, 

Hide the heart that they turned to stone, 

Hide the flames that my soul holds, 

Hide the hatred buried in my bones. 

  

The laughter that channeled out of me, 

The colors that once bloomed inside, 

The once ecstatic land lies barren, 

The dreams I once held have died, 

  

Once there was, once there wasn't; 

The paper boats set sail for the stars, 

The toy cars that took us to the Sun, 

All perished in a fight that wasn't ours. 

  

To the moon and back, remember? 

The melancholy of men gone mad, 

The promises that were meant to break, 

And the promises that broke us bad. 

  

Hide my broken wooden soldier, 

Hide my soccer ball too, 

Hide the shattered pieces of my soul, 

Hide the blood they've dyed blue. 

By Zarbab Zafar

FMDC