The Massacre of Daraya
On Saturday August 25, 2012, the Damascus suburb town of Daraya joined the long list of the Assad regimes’ massacres in Syria. The counted victims, so far, are 320; many of them are children and women. They were killed by gunning down, slaughtering and axing, and then many of them were burned in order not to be identified. This town is located to the west of the capital and known by its famous farm products, especially the grapes, and I have some college friends who live in it as well as a lot of memories.
The Massacre of Daraya
By Tarif Youssef Agha
Oh Daraya, my heart today is bleeding for you
And my eye is as well
I still remember the good times I had with my friends visiting you
I still remember the good times we had gathering in your farms
God made you a neighbor to Damascus
It is hard to tell which one of you is more beautiful
Your beauty still lives in my eye
The sound of your watering creeks still lives in my ears
What will happen to those memories today?
And how can I get rid of the horrible images we saw today?
Here is a mom who hurried to shield her child
But the bullets of the cowards were faster than both
And over there, there are remains of innocent humans
The crime they committed was ‘having a mad dictator’
But, also, here is a female journalist who didn’t forget to polish her nails before coming to the massacre scene
She was trying to interview the dying victims, not recognizing that they were dying
What happened to the worlds’ conscious?
No one sees or hears anymore
Oh Daraya, the monsters made a feast of you
A feast where the human body parts were the food
Hyenas, after all, are not skillful but in hunting and preying
The butcher, as well, is not great but in using the knives
In spite of all the tanks covering your streets
In spite of the smell of death knocking at your door
Your jasmine fragrance is the one which won’t go
And your grape is the one which will stay shinning
Those who proudly slaughtered your infants today
Are those who will drink from the same cup tomorrow
If the crimes decided to hit you today
Crimes, usually, turn around and hit the criminals
And you, Persians, this is Daraya in case you don’t know
Its infants eat guns for formula
If you think that a massacre will scare it away
Think again as, even if the world surrenders, Daraya won’t
***
Tarif Youssef-Agha
An Expatriate Arab Syrian Writer & Poet
Member of the ‘Syrian Revolutionary Writers Assembly’
Friday August 28. 2012 (3 days after Daraya’s massacre)
Houston, Texas