By This poem is dedicated to Alan Kurdi and all the other children that have lost their lives at sea.
Whenever a child has a nightmare
We speak the dream into water
Water will lure away the mare and only leave night behind
We have spoken all our dreams into water
Be it a faucet or a river
The hope that our dreams will ebb and flow
Not succumb to the weight of drowning
Be left with the depths of this blue body
We are a people who know too well what it is like to be at the mercy of this benevolent tryrant
This is the prayer that mothers speak into water when sending their children
Onto the pacific
In the hopes that they shall make it
They do
As many have
Washing up shore like fish to a fisherman’s net
The question remains
Should we say alhamdullilah
That they didn’t have to experience the pain of living
Or should we say inshallah
That they outlive the dead
We keep finding ourselves in the midst of this abyss
Nothing to hold onto
The bluer the water becomes
The clearer we hear the whispers of the brothers and sisters gone before us
A constellation of stories weaving themselves together in the formation of fish
Oblivious to the fight in us
To the fear we feel
We put salt in everything
To remind ourselves of it’s bitterness
Drain every body of water we can find
Trick ourselves into thinking we control it
Each morning we empty the sand from our shoes
We can never quite get rid of it
I don’t know if this punishment for making it across
Or guilt that I made it and left my loved ones behind
If the ocean is a vengeful being
Or a reminder to sleep a little longer
Through the nightmare so we can dream too
Water is the most human thing
To be so cunning and cruel towards anyone that dares tread on it
But kind and loving towards those who succumb to it
this is why children wash up ashore
Replacing the seashells
Their hands as small as shells
For children who have been hunted by nightmares
They only dream of escape
When a child washes up shore
We mistaken their stillness for sleep
Death is too harsh a word to describe something so gentle
Instead call it sunrise
For they have escaped
And they can dream again