Nawaf Khalaf Al- Sinhari (Prepared Angela Kosta)
Moderator 
NAWAF KHALAF AL- SINHARI (IRAQ)
THE NOISE OF SILENCE
Through the small space between the pillow and the blanket, when I opened my eyes, I saw a spider lurking for a fly. I smiled because it reminded me of how I used to lie in wait - one day - for a beautiful girl in front of the university gate, and I finally caught her in my net. Those days were the most beautiful in my life. We would go out together and talk about our tender dreams like a field of narcissus, and the dream house that we would live in and the children that we would fill it with. I would throw my head over her knees and she would stroke my hair with her soft fingers in the shade of the large rock placed in a garden located behind the Faculty of Arts building. That legendary rock is very different from this cursed rock that we hide behind now to protect ourselves from enemy fire. We spent hours as heavy as worry, fear dripping from our faces for fear that the bullets of the merciless sniper would hit us. How many times have I thought about that sniper who assassinates wishes without knowing their owner Even?!
The war has turned us into ferocious beasts that devour everything in order to survive.. And what kind of life?! We were living death every minute.. I wonder now how we craved food and ate it in those circumstances?! And I always remember my friend wiping the dry (bun) from the remnants of blood and mud and eating it?!
How delicious was the taste of the bun that my father used to take out of the oven, and I was a little child, picking up the hot lumps and chewing them with joy mixed with sweetness.. Then I would fill the small bag and run home like someone carrying a treasure! My brothers and I would sit, eat our breakfast and go to our schools like birds.. The Arabic language teacher would pat me on the shoulder and give me a full mark in the essay and say to me:
You will definitely become a famous writer when you grow up!
I never imagined that this talent would become my mortal enemy.. and that I would enter the depths of prisons because of it, and taste the bitterness of torture.. My dream was to become a doctor, own a clinic where I treat patients, and exempt the poor from treatment costs.. But my teacher used to say:
You were created to be a poet!!
What foolish fate made me compose rhymes and write poetry.. I have always loved nature, so flowers and butterflies filled the space of my poems, but that did not intercede for me in the investigation when the security officer said to me:
You are inciting citizens and poisoning their thoughts.
I did not incite anyone.
And a fist the size of an elephant's foot falls on my mouth.. I spat blood.. The devilish legs kick me, and I wallow in my pain and humiliation.. How ridiculous it is to pay ten years of my life for a poem!!
I threw the pillow, and moved the blanket aside, I looked but did not find the spider or the fly! The clock hands point to ten. I pull out the poetry collection I started reading last night and continue reading...
