Akashma Online News

“The Land Will Testify: A Prayer for Palestine”

—Marivel Guzman, June 11, 2010

You call this self-defense?
No—this is massacre.
Can’t you see?
The damage you inflict is not just upon people—
you are poisoning the Holy Land.

You make her hills barren.
You kill her sons.
You uproot her ancient trees.
You desecrate the sacred,
and call it war.

But this is not a battle.
Destruction is not victory.
You think you’ve won?
Their blood seeps into the soil—
and from it, more warriors bloom.

Don’t you know?
They will rise like vines through rubble,
strong branches full of life,
embracing everything in their path—
a bond unbreakable,
feeding the fruits of memory and dream.

The earth you ravage
will return to green,
nourished by seeds of resistance.
Their memory—nectar to the bees—
will be carried like pollen,
to every flower, every tree.

A bullet does not kill a dream.
It roots it deeper.
It gives it breath,
a thousand lives,
a thousand songs
that will rise again to claim
that sacred ground you dare call yours.

This is Palestine.
She was their cradle—
the crib of lullabies,
the soil of birth and belonging.

Can you hear it?
The mothers’ wailing in procession,
their footsteps echoing through the stones?

You may kill a generation,
but you are impregnating the next—
stronger,
more beautiful,
anointed by sorrow,
purified by blood,
blessed by angels at the fountains of Eden.

And when they come,
what will they do?
Will they wield the same madness
that you used to bury their fathers?
Will they answer your rage
with rage?

Or will they return
as prophets and poets,
and rewrite what you erased?

Do you remember
how you humiliated their mothers?
How you sneered at their pain?

But worse than death
is to be forgotten.
And history does not belong to victors alone—
it bleeds truth,
stamped in soil and stone.

You tore out their trees,
but the wind scattered the seeds.
You erased “Palestine” from your books,
yet the land remembers—
Terra Santa was always here.

Palestine endures.
Her blood stains your boots.
Can you smell the sweetness in the air?
Like honey flowing
through the cracks of despair?

Yet your punishment—
far worse than defeat—
is to become nothing.
Erased from memory,
from story,
from land.

A new history will rise.
And it will speak the name:
Palestine.

The mothers’ tears
blend with the martyrs’ blood—
a sacred cocktail of hope.
Their last breath whispered:
“Let me depart kissing her soil.”

Their last prayer cried out:
“Palestine, live forever.”

Viva Palestine.
My blood is my vow.
My sacrifice is my love.

She will rise again—
The Mother.
The Sons.
The Land.

The Holy Land.
The Terra Santa.
The Ancient.
The Eternal.
She is Palesti