LETTER FOM A BESEIGED CITY IN AMERICA

by Margaret Hasse

So alone, each of hundreds in our north

star state––beings sniffed out, run 

down, dragged, tied up, shoved 

in, head-cracked, driven, dumped 

in dark places, disappeared.

So alone, the rest of us snugged at home 

hearing news of atrocities, watching 

videos of masked men in our home-

town toting machine-like guns, grabbing, 

kicking, shooting, and we who knew

not or actually knew the taken, first feel 

unbelief, numbing fear, geysers of inward 

anger and sorrow for the numberless hurt 

and the named dead.

We became roused and risen to 

outward acts: deliver food, guard 

school children, record kidnappings with 

eyes and cameras as on the boy in 

a blue bunny hat, send money, join

groups, trail black cars, shriek alerts

with whistles, light vigil candles, wield signs, 

march, lay flowers on the bloody snow, say no.

A whole community besieged becomes 

a whole community of care, protest and 

resistance, a testing ground for whether 

kindness and the Constitution can hold up

against the battering ram of govern-

ment run amok as we gather in our cold time,

our beautiful city under attack, to hold 

hands with neighbors whether citizens or 

citizens-to-be while spokespeople for

the outrage name-call and hob-gobble truth.

We here know what we saw and see, 

and gradually then all at once, people 

across the country are paying attention, 

posting their support, writing the wrongs 

to their leaders while Springsteen 

sings his “Streets of Minneapolis,” a song 

like a flag to carry, and Judge Biery near

the southern border in the lone star state

frees from detention a man and his young 

son stolen from Minnesota, noting in 

his order that “the case has its genesis 

in the ill-conceived and incompetently-

implemented government pursuit

of daily deportation quotas... ”–– all 

just and sympathetic action from all

over the country eases our city’s 

isolation and bolsters hope 

our democracy will endure. 

Margaret Hasse is a poet living and working in the Twin Cities. She has published nine books of poetry, and has received many honors, such as a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts.

AL-FASHER BELONGS TO GOD

by Seth R. Merritt 

An analysis revealed in a recent report has shown that the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) committed mass killings in Sudan's Al Fasher amid rising violence in the region. The report published by the Humanitarian Research Lab at Yale School of Public Health provided satellite imagery of the atrocities committed by the RSF following their capture of the violence-hit region. "The Yale School of Public Health's Humanitarian Research Lab (HRL) finds evidence consistent with Rapid Support Forces (RSF) conducting mass killings after capturing El-Fasher, North Darfur," the report said. —TRT World, October 29, 2025

The UN Human Rights Office is receiving multiple, alarming reports that the Rapid Support Forces are carrying out atrocities, including summary executions, after seizing control of large parts of the besieged city of El Fasher, North Darfur and of Bara city in North Kordofan state in recent days... The Office has received reports of the summary execution of civilians trying to flee, with indications of ethnic motivations for killings, and of persons no longer participating in hostilities (hors de combat). Multiple distressing videos received by UN Human Rights show dozens of unarmed men being shot or lying dead, surrounded by RSF fighters who accuse them of being SAF fighters. —UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, October 27, 2025

It is Al-Fasher and midday.
A mother ties a strip of paradise’s garden around Omer’s wrist.
His wrist shimmers in the sun and Daa smiles.
She tells him to hold his hand out when they flee, to show the soldiers he belongs to God.
He nods as children nod when they cannot imagine the cost.
He tucks his hand behind his back.
They move.

Another time. A white church on a dirt road.
A preacher says God keeps perfect track.
Blessings fall on those who walk straight.
No one imagines a bullet at the end.

Al-Fasher’s morning shines. Dust moves like sifted flour.
A fighter calls his brothers through a loudspeaker.
A safe corridor. Promises.
Bodies clamber. Mothers pass infants forward like water.

Later-than-now but earlier-than-later:
The Hague. Microphones. Translation headsets.
A man asks for numbers.
How many bodies. Which villages. Which dates.
Procedure speaks the language of care.

Elsewhere: screens glow in London and New York.
Conference rooms. Someone with clean hands pauses the footage.
They circle the cloth around Omer’s wrist.
They label his skin.
They label the men with rifles.
Cursor blinks where innocence should be.
A reporter whispers sectarian violence over B-roll.
A senator tries ancient hatreds into a podcast mic.
A professor types failed state in an article.
Each word drags the thing further away.

Warm and full and afternoon.
Daa lifts Omer’s hand to the soldier for inspection.
The cloth glistens. Catches light.
Young and tired. A face a mother once loved.
The soldier sees.
He holds the rifle.
The muzzle stares into Omer’s eyes.
Soot. Metal. Heat.

Omer’s hand shakes. His eyes tear.
Habibi, I have done nothing wrong.
As-salamu alaykum.

The soldier glances at the mother. Nods.
Habibi. There is nowhere to go.
As-salamu alaykum.

Skin and bone and muscle and tendon do not speak loudly when they sever.
Daa is another mother crying.

Once, promises were guarantees.
No one said God speaks every language used in an execution.

It is Al-Fasher and midday.
A mother gathers Omer’s body.
The cloth shimmers emerald in the dust.

Author’s note: This poem fictionalizes one mother and child in Al-Fasher, Sudan. The events depicted are not a single documented case, but a composite drawn from ongoing reports of civilian killings and the forced sorting of bodies under the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) offensive.

Seth R. Merritt is a writer from the Ozarks living in Mexico City. His work has appeared in The Forge Literary Magazine and Hard Crackers, with work forthcoming in Scalawag. This is his first work of poetry.

ATROCIOUS NEWS

by Madlynn Haber

The story of atrocities screams out from the front page

until the end of the column of words. The story continues

on page five. In between, is the weather report. I stop

to follow the progress of early spring’s longer days,

full sunshine, warming temperatures. Delightful. Turning

pages, today’s atrocities pick up with images of rubble,

devastation, tears running down children’s pale faces.

A cartoon follows for our amusement, then notices

of upcoming fun, fairs, and festivals.

 

The word atrocity repeats until it is familiar, so

commonplace it almost loses its meaning.

It’s just another atrocity, one might say.

Red is the color of blood as it spills across

the globe from bodies whose skin tones reflect

a spectrum of hues from light to dark.

Today’s crumpled headlines continue screaming

with news as the paper is thrown on a pile going back

to the beginning of time.

Madlynn Haber lives with her dog, Ozzie, in a cohousing community in Northampton, Massachusetts. Her work has been published in the anthology Adult Children (Wishing Up Press, 2021), Random Sample, Borrowed Solace, Buddhist Poetry Review, Muddy River Poetry Review, Poetica Magazine, and other journals.