The Day Silence Grew Heavy

It was an ordinary day... at least I thought so at first.

I woke to the sound of the alarm and opened my phone as usual; the

first message I always looked for before going to the school was a message from

Saja; she would send me something simple every morning even though we would meet

at the school.

But that morning... there was nothing.

At first I didn't think much of it; I told myself perhaps she had woken up late

or that her phone had run out of battery.

Hours and days and months passed; I didn't see her and we didn't meet and she didn't reply

to my messages, and I couldn't find any news of her.

And the silence was still there... heavy in a strange way.

And one day when I was at the school at 10:00

during the break

the news came to me...

A short piece of news... but it was enough to awaken my whole world.

One of the classmates who had been with her in the same place told me

that she had passed away...

I couldn't comprehend it...

I remember I kept staring at the screen for a long time, as if the words

It will change if I wait longer; I kept repeating to myself.

"No... this is a mistake... it must be a mistake."

But the truth was harsher than my ability to deny it.

That day I didn't just feel that I had lost my friend;

I felt that a part of me... was buried with her.

And since that day I began to understand what it means for a person to live... while something inside him had already died.

In my heart there was a hope saying she would be back tomorrow... and in my mind a certainty

saying that the dead do not return!

May she rest in mercy; from your death I learned that life takes only

the good ones.

After you left I began to write you many poems; I didn't know whether

they would reach you... or not, but my heart felt at ease when

I wrote. I once wrote to you:

I have a dear one they buried beneath the earth,

even the earth embraced him out of love,

blessed be the face I still weep for today,

may God reunite us in His Paradise.

With you I buried all ambitions,

and I found myself alone in anguish,

I forsook emergencies and desires and relationships,

a wound borne by time that I cannot bring back.