The Weight of Dust
Some lives are more important than others—
carved into the silence of lands unspoken,
a truth in the shadows, hiding in plain sight—
as if we could forget that dust settles differently
on each life, marking some with weight, others with wind.
Look to Gaza, to the rush of sand and stone,
the thunder of voices, fists pounding
against the ribs of the world,
still waiting, still hoping, still longing
to be seen as something more than dust.
Rwanda waited years in the shadows,
her cries carried on distant winds,
her scars ignored till they settled into echoes.
Armenia waited, too,
her wounds tucked into history’s pockets
to be pulled out like a relic, a ghost of memory.
Cambodia’s fields, dark and quiet,
cradled bones under an indifferent sky,
while Bosnia bore its shattered riverbanks,
its bridges red with the ink of loss.
And the Rohingya scattered, fleeing fires,
their steps invisible to a world too busy to care.
And the Indigenous voices, soft as smoke,
carrying ancient languages we failed to hear—
lands stolen, rivers choked, spirits broken,
names erased from maps that show no scars.
Their grief runs deep, older than memory,
bound to the earth we divide, piece by piece,
as if we could own what birthed us all.
Some lives are lifted, some left behind—
the words we choose, the silence we keep,
the histories we remember, those we erase.
Every life is worthy, we say, every life the same.
But watch closely: see which lives we lift
and those we lay down
in the silence,
left to drift into dust.
