Memoir: A Rohingya poet-activist’s life is shaped by his resistance to the genocide of his people

Even when I watch the sunrise, I’m not living like you are Without the fertility of hope I live, Just like a sandcastle. In our culture, when a child is born, the midwife places the umbilical cord and placenta inside a large terracotta pot, the hañrí. A member of the family, often the father or grandfather, then collects it to bury it. Once the pot is buried, like a plant, the organs take root. The child now belongs to the land – his native land, the eternal land. They are now one. On this land, the child will take his first steps; he will grow and love. He will protect it. When he becomes a man, he in turn will bury a pot at the bottom of his garden when his children and grandchildren are born. And so, the story will continue. The man must die on this land and be buried close to the hañrí. This pot will be the mark of his birth, the proof of his existence. His essence. His purpose. On April 3, 1991, my grandfather buried my pot in our yard. Much later, a few months before his death, he told me the story of my birth. “There were no maternity...Read more