The birds forgot to sing
The day neighbors became butchers
And mowed my family down
Mr. Rwamuhuzi, who usually greets us with a smile
And gifts of roasted yams
Descended upon my mother with a machete
And lopped off her head
Which rolled into my lap
Like a terrible gourd
I saw the look of sadness in my mother’s eyes
Her lips ripped open
But she could not utter a sound
How could she comfort a daughter
Who had just seen her mother so?

He moved onto my brothers, my father, and my sisters
And now I lie here among the maggots and the corpses
Trying not to breathe

I am one girl alive among 800,000 corpses
A growing vacivity in my chest
There is only silence and the stench of death
On this day in Kigali
When the birds forgot to sing