By Lila Weis, TIWP Student

SIX: 

“TAG! I got you!” Aw dang it Timmy. Now I’m it. I hate being “it.” It’s so (I’m gonna say a bad word here and you can’t judge me) stupid. LIFE IS PERFECT.

NINE:

I love school, but now people are making us cover our faces and I don’t get why.

FIFTEEN:

We’re oppressed. Schools are shutting down. The Taliban is taking away our rights, our freedoms. But why us? We’re just kids.

TWENTY ONE: 

Life sucks, but here I am. A 21-year-old woman unable to go out of her house alone. The only thing that gets me through the day is saying hello to the birds.

Everyday when I leave my house at 8:00 I’m greeted by the singing of the birds right outside of my house. Every day I ask the same question.

“Hello birds, how can you be so free?”

I go to sit at my sitting tree and write, with my brother. He stands about fifty feet away, leaving me enough space to be alone. As I sit, I hear the chirping of the birds and the crickets in the grass. Peace. I’m at peace. Everyday at this tree, I close my eyes and imagine a perfect society, where there is no Taliban, peace, and kindness everywhere. THAT, will never come true.

I return home only to cook with my mother for my family.

The next day, and today, you guessed it, I do the same thing. I walk over to the tree to sit and write. “Hello birds, how are you today? I wish I were like you.” The birds sit on the tree and chirp back to me. It’s almost as if I’m having a conversation with them. 

This is my every day for the next year and a half until…

This new law, this ridiculous, stupid law. 

On the TV, this is what I hear…

“A new law has been passed that women in Afghanistan are no longer able to speak in public.”

I break down… The only thing I can do is go to my room and cry. My mother is sobbing in the living room. My father tries to console me but I shun him away. 

The next day: I go to my tree. When I arrive, there’s nothing. No noise. No birds and no crickets. I guess today is the day the birds went quiet.