To Spend One Day In Srebrenica

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This is the city that no tours

                                     visitor guides

                                     to-do lists

take you to

or mention

it is better left underground

or in peace

this is the city neither seen nor heard

except by the people who waited to hear back from family

who went to that “safe zone”

                                      who didn’t know if they’re cousin was dead

                                  only that he left thinking he’d be “safe”

except by the women and children who watched it happen

        who didn’t have to wait because they saw it happen

my cousin Muśa who sat and watched her uncle

                                                                    father

                                                                    husband

                                                                    brother

                      rows in front of her

                      lined up

                      already in their graves

 

These are the attractive hunting grounds

       with the rolling hills and

       numerous viewpoints

these are beautiful landscapes where they fled to

       filled with wildlife and the bodies of Bosnians

the health resort the UN promised us

       filed into hunting grounds

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These are the fireworks that nobody sees

that are only heard

      for the pleasure of civilians

      who earned this treatment

      only through a different name

      for the same Him

 

                                                                                              her skin

                                                                                     open wounds

 

                war paraphernalia

                artillery shells

                bullet pens

we are the remnants

the unseen and unheard

under the sound of the fireworks

                not unlike my grandmother’s laugh

these are the fireworks that are only joyous

for the genocidal

These are the names that no one mentions

           that are only written on gravestones

These are the names of the ethnically “cleansed”

These are the names of the civilians

                                      the innocent

These are the names remembered by wives

                                                            sisters

                                                            mothers

                                                            aunts

          who wish to have taken their place

These are the names of fathers

                                      brothers

                                      uncles

                                      husbands

                                      sons

These are the names of over eight thousand

 

then the sun set

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         Link to a list of people killed in Srebrenica: 

         https://www.rferl.org/a/27114531.html

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