Zainab Poem by Ish Lodda

Once, I was seven years old, my parents told me
Monsters were not real and just a fantasy

Once we were all seven years old.

We were told to make friends to stop us from feeling lonely
Taught to love, taught to trust, taught to share without a single worry.
Some kids don't have parents, not even a care-giver
Through the news we learn our world couldn't be far from purer.

We do not live Utopia
It is only a living Dystopia.

When a seven year old goes to school
Then there's a man
Who grabs her hand
Rapes her. Kills her. How cruel.

It's mad
It's sad

How perversion can escalate
A child so pure, so innocent, yet this was her fate?
I guess it's true what they say, "the good ones always go"
'Cause you see, Zainab left us with the lowest of the low.

But what does this news really show?
It confirms what we already know.
We need a solution.
A conclusion.
Not just petition after petition.
Repetition after repetition.
We need more attention
To break the tension.

'cause once there was a seven year old.
And Zainab's story got told.
And there was a global uproar but things remained the same.
Never caught but only shamed.
And blamed.
And defamed.
But the problem with these paedophiles, rapists and murders is that they are never tamed.
But until things don't change
Until leniency quits siding with the deranged.

There will be one less child. One more kidnap
Another rape, another death. Another Zainab.



Once we were all seven years old.