We Count the Names, Not the Numbers

We Count the Names, Not the Numbers

(by Hammad Khan)

They will say it was too complex.

They will argue over maps.

They will talk in past tense,

As if grief ever goes back.

But I have seen the photos—

Not the ones on the news,

The ones folded in wallets,

Stained by hands that refuse to forget.

A girl in a yellow dress,

Her laughter now a memory

Locked in the silence

Of a mother who no longer speaks.

A boy who wanted to be a doctor,

Who drew hearts on his schoolbooks.

He is not a number.

He had dreams like yours.

We light candles, yes—

But what of the fire that took them?

We hold marches,

But what of the feet that no longer walk?

Genocide doesn't echo in shouts.

It lingers in the quiet,

In the dinner tables with one plate less,

In lullabies no longer sung.

It is not just death.

It is erasure.

Of names. Of culture. Of voice.

Of futures that never got the chance.

So no—

I will not speak in statistics.

I will not debate what is known in the bones

Of the ones who survive with haunted eyes.

I will write.

Not as a witness,

But as a reminder

That silence helps no one.

And if all I can do

Is say their names into the wind,

Let the wind carry them

Where justice still sleeps.