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You, the witness.
Meeم A’yن
***
Daastan Publishing 2025
First Published in Pakistan by Daastan PVT LTD
House # A-41, Madni Street, Lala Rukh, Wah Cantt, Punjab 47040
Text copyrights © Meeم A’yن
Book Design Copyright © Meeم A’yن
Edited by: Syed Ommer Amer
The moral rights of the writer, illustrator, and editor have been asserted.
All rights reserved
This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or distributed in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
ISBN 978-627-526-044-8 (Print)
ISBN 978-627-526-045-5 (Ebook)
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***
Dedication
Bismillāh ir-Raḥmān ir-Raḥīm
Dedicated to Allah, Lord of the Worlds, Knower of the unseen.
“Surely Allah knows the unseen of the heavens and the earth, and Allah is All-Seeing of what you do.” (Surah Al-Ḥujurāt, 49:18)
To the steadfast people of Palestine—the mujāhidīn defending Palestine and the sacred Masjid al-Aqṣā.
To the widows—the ṣābirāt—whose unshakable faith upheld families amid loss and grief, teaching us the strength of tawakkul and īmān.
To my soul sister Kiffah, and to every heart that refused to surrender its ʿizzah or tawḥīd.
Your suffering is not unseen by Al-Raḥīm. Your silence was faith in Al-Ḥakam, the Judge of Judges.
This book humbly echoes your cries—to remind the world that the believers are never defeated, for their final return is to Allah.
“And never think that Allah is unaware of what the wrongdoers do. He only delays them for a Day when eyes will stare [in horror].” (surah Ibrāhīm, 14:42)
Epigraph
~“ Oh Allah! Do not take my soul until I have prayed in Al-Aqsa Mosque and borne witness to the freedom of Palestine: Senator Mushtaq Ahmed - Member of the Global Sumud Flotilla
Preface
This book is a sketch of words, born from a need to bear witness to a profound human tragedy: the siege and genocide in Gaza. My mission has been to move beyond the statistics and headlines to capture the overwhelming emotional weight of these events—the terror, the staggering loss, the unwavering steadfastness (sumud), and the sheer mental anguish of the Palestinian people.
These poems are a conduit for emotions that defy language, an attempt to give voice to the unspeakable. The writing is visceral and evocative; it is less about describing events and more about making you, the reader, feel them. I have not sought merely to tell you about the pain, but to meticulously pour it onto the page. I chose poetry because it felt like the only medium capable of conveying a truth too complex for prose alone.
A necessary and striking aspect of this work is its split lens. One moment, you will be immersed in the immediate, gut-wrenching reality within Gaza. The next, the view pulls back to frame this suffering against the often-detached, paradoxical, and failed response of the world outside. This juxtaposition is intentional. It highlights the brutal contrast between the ground truth and the international community’s inability or unwillingness to act, framing this collection as both an elegy for the lost and a sharp critique of the silence that enables their loss.
Yet, even here, I also write of hope and solidarity, chronicling the journey of the Sumud Flotilla—a testament to those who refuse to look away.
This book does not offer easy answers or political analysis. It is a deeply human and artistic response. It is a vital record of emotion and a compelling call—for your empathy, your attention, and your action in a world that too often chooses to look away, or doesn’t even bother to look at all.
This is my testimony.
Now, you are the witness.
Contents
Gaza, Swallowed by the Sky. 19
Nightmares become living nightmares. 27
Gaza's Fire, My Frozen Tears. 30
Your Silence is the Second Genocide. 49
***
3 AM
The clock’s hands stab at 3,
a witching hour where shadows gnaw.
Outside, the night presses against the windows—
a thick, suffocating dark.
I curl into my comforter—
soft, forgiving, a cradle for the weary.
Yet my gut howls,
a hollow beast gnawing at my ribs.
Dinner was at 8:30.
Then why—
why does my stomach gnaw at my spine?
A pillow muffles my gut,
a child’s attempt to hush a monster.
My skull—
a stone,
a pendulum,
swinging between nausea and vertigo.
My limbs—
empty sacks.
I close my eyes.
Then—
Gaza flickers to life behind my eyelids:
A mother splits her last crust of bread
into smaller and smaller miracles
that still won't multiply.
A father's hands tremble
as he pours air into his child's mouth—
a cruel pantomime of feeding.
A baby's ribs press against skin—
a xylophone of starvation
playing the same hollow note.
The headlines brand themselves
on the walls of my skull:
"Famine by design.
Bodies subtracted—
by will
and wire."
My hunger is fleeting.
Theirs is archaeology—
digging deeper into absence
until even the memory of fullness
crumbles to dust.
Gaza is not starving.
Gaza is being starved.
Hunger is not just an empty stomach.
It is:
- A clock ticking down to death.
- A child forgetting the taste of milk.
- A scream that lost its voice.
- A boy licking dew off bombed concrete.
-A man’s last breath, escaping as a whispered "why?"
-A man folded into himself like origami,
his stomach digesting its own lining.
My hunger is a whisper.
Theirs is a scream that no one hears.
The pillow grows damp.
Does it matter if it's sweat or tears?
My saltwater is nothing compared
to their rivers of thirst.
Morning will come.
I will eat.
They will continue starving—
not because the world lacks food,
but because cruelty
has learned to use hunger
as its favorite weapon,
sharpened daily
on the whetstone of indifference.
I close my eyes.
The darkness hums
with the sound of stomachs
eating themselves alive—
a chorus of voids
singing the world's cruelest lullaby.
I clutch my aching belly and understand:
This gnawing is just an echo.
Across the ocean,
an entire civilization is being
consumed—
not by famine,
but by the calculated cruelty of men.
This is not hunger.
This is a war, a genocide.
This is not natural.
This is made by hands.
Hands that could stop it.
Hands that refuse to.
What is ‘Truer’?
Are words better than pictures?
When you have to describe…
The emotion…
Of pain…
Of love…
Of agony…
I believed…
Words were better than pictures.
For painting the soul…
For carving out feeling…
The raw nerve of pain…
The dizzying height of love…
The bottomless dark of agony.
I used to believe that.
I built my world on it.
Words make you feel deep.
They pull you under…
Into another world.
They are keys…
That open the doors…
Deep in your heart…
Deep in your mind.
They let you see…
On your own…
In your own way.
But a picture…
A picture is just a road.
Only a direction.
A single path.
It builds the world for you…
and sets it in stone.
A finished thing.
You can choose to walk in it…
or turn your back.
The choice…
is always…
yours.
I held onto this truth.
I held it tight.
Until.
I saw.
A world within this world…
A name that means ‘TREASURE’…
Cursed with a man-made fortune
Of rubble and dust…
That is anything but beautiful.
Gaza.
And I saw…
A child’s mouth.
Wide open.
A perfect, silent circle…
Sculpted from hunger.
The skin…
stretched too thin over bone…
Folding into canyons…
Wide, deep wrinkles.
A tiny tongue rests…
Parched…
On the air.
Eyeballs recede…
Showing only a sliver of white.
Eyes, almost closed.
There are no tears left.
None.
But the face…
The face screams.
It screams of hunger.
It screams of pain.
It holds a universe of agony.
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