F A I N T

Everything slows down. My vision blurs. The sounds fade away. I can’t feel my limbs.

My thoughts grow confused. My heart beats rapidly.

Nothing feels real. I realize I’m sweating. I’m losing my balance. I cry out for help, But no one hears me. I feel afraid.

Darkness falls over my eyes. I can’t hear anything anymore. I think I see a hand reaching out for me— I’m not sure.

But before I can grab it, I fall into nothingness. x where did she go? the girl with blue lips chained for fifteen years, murdered in the sixteenth her death set fire to the country we shared the same name one alive, one dead did we have the same eyes? you shot bullets all we had was honey when you rest you will hear Nika Shakarami in the bristling of the trees in the fingers of women who claw their way out of your poisoned; diseased of your mother, who stares back at you, afraid who is your god, and is she beautiful?

// when she returns I will tell you how our mothers ran in the streets, the wind in their free hair our Iran free from thoughts of the trains, that our children will never flee on of the mountains, they will never traverse through of the fig trees, no longer scared to bloom we will tell these stories over your grave of how you brought this country back to life jin. jiyan. azadi. woman. life. freedom. x