I remember the grass,
my fingertips twirling between
the blades,
and the rays of heat
as they give life
to keep the past
in the present-
a dietary aid
to all,
with trees to provide
some shade

I had forgotten
because I hid inside
four walls that weren’t
just physical
but of the mind:
closed off to nature
and the care that
my loved ones deserved

Gradually,
the seeds have been sown
for I am outside again
learning about hard work
with hummingbirds
that mew in the wind
and bees buzzing
as they collect their due
from this life giving earth,
the one right underneath
that I always forget
to appreciate,
but will forever
find my way back
to her
and her healing ways

There's something...
infinitely beautiful,
dancing, delicately,
on pulled threads,
across nimble fingers:

the cat's cradle,
between emotional agony,
and mental silence.  

When every tear, is at last, exhausted...
when your lungs, wheeze, fluidly,
from helpless overexertion,
and, gasping for breath,
you turn your cheek, for air,
your pillow:
now, a man-made lake...

the numbness... suffuses,
your entire being.

Loud suffering, falls silent.
Red-rimmed eyes,
become too swollen,
to examine their own pain.

The nothingness blankets you,
in its warmest embrace.
You become swaddled; baby-soft, again,
yet plated, in auric detachment.

...Nothing, can touch me,
nothing,
can inform, my placid heart,
to beat.

in this moment,
I am free, of its emotional trappings.
its threads, can't pin me;
its pull, can't drag me down.

My lips,
shape a smile,
but it only serves, to show...
that it no longer hurts,
to stretch a wooden bridge,
across the gaping void.

...but even so... it's just a band-aid.

It won't fix, what's broken,
and the blood,
will seep through,
the gauze, again.
The pain, will return;
it'll grow knuckles,
that form fists,
which wield knives.

But, for now...
I lay myself, to rest...
blunted, mummified,
in a buzzing swathe,
of pristine, white.........





silence

काश उस दिन उसका भी कोई भाई होता,
आज वो सितारा हमारे बीच ज़िंदा होता।
काश कोई उसे जाकर बचा लेता,
कम से कम उसका तो ख़ून न बहता।

नरभक्षी भेड़ियों ने ली थी उसकी जान,
छोड़ा था उसे वहीं तड़पता, लहूलुहान।
चिल्लाती रही वो उसी जगह पर,
न जाने कितने ही जुल्म हुए थे उस पर।

नारी को निर्वस्त्र करने का परिणाम –
इस भूमि ने महाभारत देखा था।
धिक्कार है ऐसे समाज पर –
उसी भूमि ने आज यह अपराध देखा था।

जल रही हैं मोमबत्तियां शोक व्यक्त करने,
आंदोलन कर रहे हैं लोग और दे रहे हैं धरने।
क्या इस बार होगा उन दरिंदों पर कठिन शासन,
या फिर एक बार उभरेगा एक नया दुःशासन?

Alien.

That’s all it takes.
Say it enough times—
with enough pride,
with enough certainty,
say it like it’s harmless—
and you start to believe it.
You convince yourself some people
don’t belong here.
That some lives weigh less.
That some suffering is acceptable.
And soon,
you forget they were ever people to begin with.

This is where it begins.
Not with camps.
Not with walls.
With words—
small, familiar, deadly.
Words that divide.
Words that erase.
Words that strip humanity away
layer by layer,
until you look at a person
and only see a problem.

And what happens next?
We dress it up.
We call it safety.
We call it policy.
We call it normal.

But let’s not pretend.

Alligator Alcatraz is not a policy.
It’s not a technicality.
It’s not safety.
It’s a concentration camp.
Built by people who learned nothing
from the blood their ancestors drowned in.

And I am from Germany.
I know this pattern.
I know how fast words become walls.
How quickly division becomes destruction.
How easily neighbors become strangers,
become threats,
become numbers.

We screamed it into history books—
Never again.
We tattooed it across generations.
We carved it into memorials.
We taught it in classrooms.
We promised.

But promises mean nothing
if we look away now.

It never starts with gas chambers.
It starts with small lines—
borders,
walls,
categories.
It starts with us and them.
When fear speaks louder.
When division feels safer than empathy.
When language poisons the foundation
before anyone notices.
It starts
when people feel so distant,
so different,
that hurting them feels justified.

And I’ll say it plainly—
You cannot be neutral while this happens.
You either fight—
or you help them build the fences.

Because it always ends the same way—
with camps,
with cages,
with bodies counted in hindsight,
and the world pretending
no one saw it coming.

But we do see it coming.
We see it now.
And if we refuse to speak,
if we refuse to fight—

history isn’t repeating itself.
We are repeating it.

Cast on a canvas of colorless fun,
we look for the sun, hence shadows to shun.
Hidden's the day's dye backwoods a child's eye,
only some walk nigh where lost colors lie.

Days cradle dovey birth to raven death;
would-be colors jostle for the brief breadth.
‘Tis in the eye to hear the coo in the blue.
Hail the rat’s coup in the republic of rue.

Pick all vibrant hues, eschew the tethered.
Dyes of default-assent beget hatred.
Blinded casements ****** gold sentiments,
scold them to sediments of unsaid statements.

When sentinels descry where bluebirds fly,
the blues won't cry, but comply and chirp by.

Repost
© Hirondelle, June 25, 2025
    Arif Hifzioglu

drowning 6.20.25 (3:39 / 15:39)
drowning drowning drowning
flailing failing failure to surface on an endless
sea
of sad dark and death it’s all in my head i think
i think yes i’m right for once
it’s all in my mind and nothing is real
except the dark

drowning drowning can’t breathe
i’m going to die
g a s p  of  a i r
it’s momentarily bright
and then i sink
back
under
the sea