by Sudeep Sen
Soaked in blood, children,
their heads blown out
even before they are formed.
Gauze, gauze, more gauze ?
interminable lengths
not long enough to soak
all the blood in Gaza.
A river of blood flowing,
flooding the desert sands
with incarnadine hate.
An endless lava?stream,
a wellspring red river
on an otherwise
parched-orphaned land,
bombed every five minutes
to strip Gaza?of whatever
is left of the Gaza strip.
With sullied hands
of?innocent children,
we strip ourselves
of all dignity and grace.
Look at the bodies
of the little ones killed ?
their scarred faces?smile,
their vacant eyes stare
with no malice
at the futility?of all
the blood that is spilt.
And even as we refuse
to learn from the wasted
deaths?of these children,
their parents, country,
world? weep blood. Stop
the blood-bath ? heed, heal.
Sudeep Sen?is widely recognised as a major new generation voice in world literature and ?one of the finest younger English-language poets in the international literary scene? (BBC Radio).?
Author: Shahidul Alam
Time Magazine Person of the Year 2018. A photographer, writer, curator and activist, Shahidul Alam obtained a PhD in chemistry before switching to photography. His seminal work “The Struggle for Democracy” contributed to the removal of General Ershad. Former president of the Bangladesh Photographic Society, Alam set up the Drik agency, Chobi Mela festival and Pathshala, South Asian Media Institute, considered one of the finest schools of photography in the world.
Shown in MOMA New York, Centre Georges Pompidou, Royal Albert Hall and Tate Modern, Alam has been guest curator of Whitechapel Gallery, Winterthur Gallery and Musee de Quai Branly. His awards include Mother Jones, Shilpakala Award and Lifetime Achievement Award at the Dali International Festival of Photography.
Speaker at Harvard, Stanford, UCLA, Oxford and Cambridge universities, TEDx, POPTech and National Geographic, Alam chaired the international jury of the prestigious World Press Photo contest. Honorary Fellow of Royal Photographic Society, Alam is visiting professor of Sunderland University in UK and advisory board member of National Geographic Society.
John Morris, the former picture editor of Life Magazine describes his book “My journey as a witness”, (listed in “Best Photo Books of 2011” by American Photo), as “The most important book ever written by a photographer.”
View all posts by Shahidul Alam
