21 March – World Poetry Day

Peter Kidi is a poet, activist, and consultant on refugee issues from Kakuma Refugee Camp, Kenya, amplifying displaced voices through powerful storytelling. Using poetry as advocacy, he addresses justice and dignity, and has collaborated with the London School of Economics, From Poverty to Power, King’s College London, and The New Humanitarian.

The Language of Denial

‎

‎(for El Fasher)

‎

‎They call it clashes.

‎They call it unrest.

‎They call it a complex situation.

‎But we have seen the color of the soil change.

‎We know what burned flesh sounds like

‎when the wind carries it past our names.

‎

‎They say the parties must exercise restraint.

‎Restraint, when children are buried in courtyards.

‎Restraint, when a mother’s voice

‎is the only thing left searching the rubble.

‎

‎They say the situation is concerning.

‎But concern does not dig graves.

‎Concern does not stop the sky from swallowing our homes.

‎

‎From Addis to Geneva,

‎statements bloom in soft diplomatic English

‎like flowers planted on unmarked graves,

‎careful not to offend the killers.

‎

‎They measure words, not wounds.

‎They weigh “genocide” on a gold scale

‎before letting it fall from their tongues.

‎

‎The satellites have already spoken.

‎They have seen what silence cannot hide

‎a city erased frame by frame,

‎its screams pixelated in orbit.

‎

‎And still, the world drafts another resolution,

‎another gentle sigh across a continent

‎bleeding beneath polite sentences.

‎

‎Call it what it is.

‎Call it by its true name

‎before even the ashes forget

‎how to speak.