I am an old river, no date marks my birth,
Older than memory, a current carved in earth.
Before the pyramid stones were ever laid,
I flowed, I nourished, a world I made.
The sands to yield, the tender shoot to climb,
A god against the steady march of time.
They worshipped me, a source of life and grain,
And cursed my name when I brought flood and pain.
I've watched the children of this world unfold,
Their stories in my silty depths are told.
I've seen these fragile hands, from my own clay,
Forge empires that would stand and hold their sway.
Here, at Mogran, where my two paths unite,
And Blue and White embrace with all their might,
I saw the glow of Kush and Meroe's fall,
And heard great kingdoms answer history's call.
But I have also felt my waters blush,
A crimson stain in a violent, sudden rush.
I've seen the kindness in their hearts turn cold,
A brother's life for tarnished silver sold.
But what I witness now is pain anew,
A thick, dark oil that my soul bleeds through.
The boy who sipped love with mint-laced tea,
In a plastic chair beneath the Neem tree,
He drowns his kin within my weeping roar,
Wearing a skin I've never seen before.
The laughter that once filled the evening air,
The clink of glass, the smoke, the prayer,
Is gone. A hollow wind begins to prowl,
And silence wraps the city in a cowl.
I miss the shade the Neem tree made,
Where over coffee, debts of talk were paid.
The scent of ginger, cinnamon, and mint,
The coins of friendship, and the time they spent.
I knew the holy calm of Ramadan,
The dates and water shared by every man.
I lived the joy when evening prayers were done
And families gathered under the setting sun.
But in that holy month, their song of peace
Met with a violence that would not cease.
My banks were torn, my soul was flayed,
The altar of the Sit-in, cruelly betrayed.
The hands that waved for freedom, held no stone,
Were cast into my depths to sink alone.
I caught them gently, children of my clay,
And tried to wash the awful stain away.
And now they sleep where silt and memory blend,
A silent protest that will know no end.
No prayers were done, no eulogy was read,
They sleep so quietly, in their riverbed.
They'll build a monument of polished stone,
Proclaim "No blood was ever spilled right here,"
But every ripple on my surface knows.
And every stone and trench beneath me shows
The weight of bones, and the truth I keep,
While The Gentlemen, and their consciences, sleep.
And rivers rise.
So when the floods return,
My children's souls will be the overturn.
The tyrants drank from me to toast their crimes—
But I have drowned empires a thousand times.
So when the rain arrives and breaks the banks,
I will send your sins in waves across your ranks.
You planted death—
I'll water it with rage.
The current keeps the memory—
Turn the page.