By Dr. Suryaraju Mattimalla
In nineteen eighty-eight, the skies turned black,
The sound of war filled every track.
The planes flew low above our town,
And bombs came fast and buildings fell down.
Hargeisa cried beneath the sky,
While mothers asked their children, “Why?”
The streets were empty, the homes were gone,
But still the people tried to carry on.
In Burao too, the fire spread,
And many families lost their bread.
Some lost their homes, some lost their land,
Some reached for loved ones, but found no hand.
The fathers vanished, the children cried,
And many had nowhere safe to hide.
Across the border, the people fled,
With fear in their hearts and tears they shed.
The desert kept the names of the dead,
The earth held secrets no words could say.
And deep in the ground, where the bones still lie,
The past speaks softly beneath the sky.
Years have passed, but pain stays near,
The lost are missed year after year.
A mother still waits, a child still asks,
Why did their loved ones never come back?
O Isaaq people, your tears are known,
Your pain is written in earth and stone.
You lost so much, yet you still stand tall,
Your voice lives on, though the years may fall.
We ask for truth, we ask for light,
We ask that wrong be named as wrong and right.
Let every grave be found and known,
Let every lost one have a place of their own.
No child should grow where hate takes root,
No mother should mourn her child in mute.
Let peace return, let justice rise,
Let the world look up and open its eyes.
The bones remember, the land remembers too,
The lives that were lost, the dreams that never grew.
We speak their names so they will not fade,
And honour the lives that were stolen away.
May those who died rest free from pain,
May their names live on through sun and rain.
For truth must live, and peace must grow,
So the world will learn what we must know.
Copyright @ Suryaraju Mattimalla 2026
Bio
Dr. Suryaraju Mattimalla is a renowned Indian poet based in Germany, a prolific human rights writer, a vegan, a refugee, a truth-seeker, and a free-speech advocate. Dr. Mattimalla is an expert on Dalit genocide and Dalit pogroms and an established writer whose work has been published internationally. Born into the Madiga (Untouchable Caste)-Yadav Christian family, which has historically faced caste-based untouchability in India, he writes poetry addressing Dalit genocide, Dalit pogroms, atrocities against untouchable castes, caste discrimination, human rights, and social justice. He has written and published hundreds of poems in the United States, Europe, Israel, France, India, Nagalim, and Ghana. He has also published academic papers in prestigious academic journals, including The Age of Human Rights Journal and Peace Chronicles. His literary works are catalogued across the public libraries of the United States of America and Germany. His poetry has been translated from English into French and published by the French-based humanitarian organization Salam. Through his writing, Mattimalla seeks to challenge caste oppression, defend human dignity, and give a voice to marginalized communities. He lives with his Ethiopian wife, HRH Selamawit Hailu Bezabih, and their three children: Saviour Suryaraju Mattimalla, the late Stanford Suryaraju Mattimalla, and Strathfield, or Skylar Suryaraju Mattimalla. His first child was killed by Hindus in the name of honor in India in 2010, and his second son, Stanford Suryaraju Mattimalla, died following forced vaccination administered by a neo-Nazi German gynecologist on June 28, 2023, in Regensburg, Germany.
