Echoes of Silence

By Farnaz H. Sha

In the valley of shadows where rivers once flowed,

Now lay the bones of the forgotten, so cold.

People erased and a culture lost,

Victims of hate are forever the cost.

The screams of children and the tears of the old,

Still echo through the deserted fold.

The wind whispers secrets of the crimes unseen,

In the silence the horrors are gleaned.

Flames engulfed homes once filled with laughter,

Now reduced to ash and sorrow's aftermath.

Families torn apart by hatred's grasp,

Leaving scars that forever will last.

In the land of the free darkness descended,

A systematic evil that souls intended.

A deliberate erasure of identity and name,

Leaving only memories in flames.

The list grows long, of humanity's score.

The world watched as innocent lives were lost,

And the perpetrators their crimes were glossed.

History shall remember the faces and names,

The stories of those, who suffered the flames.

To prevent the repetition, of this horrific drive.

It's time to break one's silence, To speak out loud,

Against genocide, and ethnic cleansing proud.

For in our collective humanity, we find,

The strength to prevent, this evil to unwind.

By Farnaz H. Sha