You and I, we both deserve life

What am I? Simply, I am a kind man surviving a genocide. Did I cry today? Yes, I just did. One dear friend always tells me that I am a sensitive soul, and every time, it makes me wonder: isn't that what everyone should be? How can someone be so insensitive, that they can commit a genocide, and still promise us a never-ending one? How can they declare that we will never have a home, and that we do not even exist? And how does the world continue with its day, watching us break and suffer like this?

I am not sick, nor injured; yet l am full of pain and exhaustion. I have painkillers, but today I chose not to take them; to fully feel this and write it down.

Tonight, for the first time in a very long time, I felt the urge to cry. I found myself heartbroken, overwhelmed with hurt, and I told myself that no matter how hard I try, I simply cannot cry anymore. But another kind friend reminded me thatl still can, if I try. The world makes me cry, because it keeps moving forward, while I am here, uncertain about everything in my life. Do I panic? Yes, I just did. When I panic, I do not feel fear, I feel heartbroken, helplessness, hopelessness. My mind turns heavy and dull. I can't think. I can't say the simplest words. I can't do the simplest things. And I have been panicking for so long, that I no longer remember what it feels like not to. And while I am made to believe that I will not survive this, and the world is made to believe that it cannot save me, I am still here breathing through agony. I need a miracle, either to erase every moment that wounded me into this version of myself, or to let me cry out every last one of them, until I finally return to who I once was.

Who's this little sweetie? She's my niece, Ciela. Habibti, you have lived your entire life under genocide. When you first learned how to speak, you spoke about war and the closed crossing. The words you know so far are: war, ambulance, martyr, closed crossing, death, helicopter, quadcopter, bombing, aid, the north, fire, smoke, massacre, displacement, truce, tired, hungry, bored, scared and more. And you sing songs for martyrs all the time.

You and l, we both deserve life.

And we both will get to live.