November 18, 2024
Genocide in Gaza
Writers have always believed in the transformative power of words to make sense of the senseless, to bring light to darkness, and to speak truth to power. Yet, at this moment, my words are drowned by the thunderous roar of genocide, an unprecedented barbarism.
I have written numerous letters to our Prime Minister, Foreign Minister, and Members of Parliament, pleading for justice and return to humanity. But I have received no response from any one of them. Nothing. Zilch.
In the past, even when I was critical of certain government policies, I received responses –sometimes detailed, sometimes brief. It seems now, however, that we are living in a different era, in a different time zone. Gaza and the Palestinians are off the radar, and the cries of the oppressed are met with suffocating silence. This entrenched apathy and collective impotence are paralyzing.
The 19th -century British novelist, Charlotte Bronte, who produced classics of English literature, once wrote: If other’s pain fails to touch your soul, then you dare not attach the word “human” to yourself.
This poem, The Last Breath of Innocence, is not just an arrangement of verses; it is an outpouring of anguish from the deepest fibers of my heart – a raw and unflinching appeal. It is not a polished literary piece, but a heartfelt plea. May it stir your conscience, as it has stirred mine.
Javed
The Last Breath of Innocence
There was a night when the heavens trembled,
Not from the weight of celestial bodies,
But from the grief that filled the void between stars.
In that dark silence, where the winds once carried whispers of life,
The earth drank deeply of the blood of innocents.
Their dreams, like fragile petals, crushed underfoot
By the merciless march of genocide.
And we—silent witnesses,
Eyes wide open, hearts sealed shut—
Stood on the precipice of history,
Watching as the flame consumed the nameless,
The powerless, the forsaken.
Far from the ashes of their homes,
In the corridors of power,
Men spoke not of salvation,
But of deals and treaties,
Of weapons traded like coins
In a game too old and too cruel.
The great nations, with hands heavy from the weight of their weapons,
Fed the fires of destruction.
The bombs fell, the guns fired,
And the dead multiplied, nameless, faceless,
As if they were mere shadows lost to the sun.
But what of the neighbors?
The Arab lands, standing still as statues,
Their silence a cold wind blowing across a field of graves.
What were they doing as the screams rose higher,
As bodies were laid down like stones on forgotten roads?
What prayers did they utter, behind closed doors,
While their brothers and sisters perished,
Reduced to whispers in the sand?
And the Ummah, the people of one faith,
Where was the fire of their unity, their outrage?
What became of the banners of justice,
Of brotherhood, of dignity?
Had the words of God turned to dust upon their lips,
While the cries of the dying went unheard?
Or were they complicit, too,
Their silence more damning than the swords of the oppressors?
History will not be kind.
The pages are already stained with the ink of our indifference,
And when future generations look back,
They will ask, "Where were you, when the skies rained death,
When the ground trembled beneath the weight of so much suffering?"
What will we say, to those who follow,
To those who will read of our era with disbelief?
That we stood idle,
That we turned away,
That we, too, bore the burden of silence
As the innocent fell in waves?
For the dead are not gone.
They linger in the air, in the soil, in the stories untold.
Their faces will be reflected in every mirror,
Their voices will echo in every chamber,
And when history speaks of us,
It will speak of shadows,
Of a people who watched, and did nothing,
While genocide consumed the light of a generation.
In the quiet aftermath of this tragedy,
We are left to reckon with the truth—
That silence is not neutral,
That inaction is not innocent.
And the blood of the fallen,
Though unseen, stains our hands.
Javed Akbar
Nov 11, 2024
