“Mental Mess”, the generation that dreamed of peace and freedom

In my dark bedroom… way past midnight… I lie paralyzingly sleepless… with the usual existential dread and insomnia dropping a question after the other in an endless trail of thoughts…
I wonder if my life matters… I wonder if the ones who say they love me really do love me… I wonder… why everything seems to be trying to kill me… even my own self sometimes…
I wonder who I am… Who I’ve become…
I wonder… if i’ll ever get my shit together…
Together…
togetherness was dispersed… togetherness was mourned by the rain of June…
Togetherness was lost along with home…
And the remaining stench of the orgies of killing… where the killers are aroused over the smell of horror and death… orgasming to the spilled blood drying out… forgotten… do they find comfort in forgetfulness?
fragments of echoes of voices falling into my ears screams and cries from outside and I want to close my window… I want to cover up my ears…then an inner voice would tell me “No you can’t! cuz its your heart that hears”
And I’m here… barely…
for pieces of me are everywhere…
and in everywhere… are their names…
the ones who faced death and still breathing… the ones who faced death and got the likes of me choking for air ever since…
But yet… In everywhere, there are still dreamers I know will create realities my mind can’t yet comprehend… I mean, even babies are born fighting… resisting… hands in fists…
so here is to the generation that dreamed of a better nation… dreamed of peace, justice and freedom… here’s to the ones suffering in silence, or have given up, or still surviving… here’s to women here’s to women… and here’s to the martyrs…always…to the martyrs…
I wonder if I too am still resisting… revolting…
I wonder if I have given up already or if I’m too tired to feel my movements… I know I am here… But barely…
I imagine life is a movie… and in the last scene I’m vomiting every bad memory… i flush the flash backs and I forget what I thought I’ve already forgotten but it weighed me down for so long…
fights with bullies that I’ve lost to… heart break after another and another one after the other…
unforgivable stupid, stupid mistakes…
a cannibal bite at the age of four that i told no one about until it grew into the deepest wound I carry around…
and a revolution… a revolution…
I find comfort in forgetfulness… I empty my body of this soul and sleep…

******

Courtesy of the author

Link to the Italian translation

Rajaa Bushara, Raj for her friends, @r_rebel on Instagram, works as a medical officer. She started writing at the age of 12 and ever since then spoken word poetry has been her passion. It has been the way she can express herself and speak about the struggles someone like her would go through. She participated in spoken word poetry events in Khartoum, Sudan. It has helped in improving her writing and her performing skills and also allowed her to see how words can affect people who listen to them.
Words are strong weapons and she dreams of using that weapon the right way not only to express those struggles, but in hopes to end them.

“The Sudan revolution was and still is the most vibrant and real event for many men and women of my generation. From struggling to live in a place where your voice isn’t well heard, and when it’s heard, it’s hardly taken seriously. The struggles of even getting the freedom of speech, of expressing one’s self felt like they will never pay.. That is until the revolution began. And we do still struggle but now I have faith that we can actually succeed and make it better for us and the coming generations. Writing and documenting all these events of the revolution will be my most important task, for they must be a part of my history. My dream is to be a performing spoken word artist for a living. I believe that would give me the ability to make the change I imagine and dream of achieving in the world, or at least inspire someone to do so.“