Help our local partners realise their vision of hope for their communities
27 March 2019
This year we received a record number of entries from a diverse range of countries, resulting in our toughest competition yet! We were truly impressed by the quality, creativity, and passion for Human Rights demonstrated by our participants, and toughly enjoyed all the submissions we received.
Sarah Adegbite won the joint 2nd place in our HART Prize for Human Rights Intermediate Creative Competition 2019 with their entry titled:
Epilogue
after the kidnapping of the Chibok girls, April 2014
she comes back to a place of metal
railings and dust-bitten roads.
the silence, a gag.
when daddy cracks his knuckles,
it sounds like the vomit of gunfire and rip of torn flesh…
she can see creased pupils creaking open,
gluttoning their way through the crusted slits of eyes –
the city’s mouth alive and bursting at the seams, wondering:
perhaps she’s been radicalised? they scream –
hear that tune of wooden doors slamming shut
the force of fingers with their calloused accusations.
things she cannot do without being eaten alive by memory:
hug her parents
(the space between her chest and theirs smells like blood)
thrive at university
(the scratch of a pencil = the carve of a knife)
listen to night
(midnight squeals are futile protests – the worst kind)
fear rattles behind the teeth she brushes with a pockmarked arm.
she washes her hands slowly and again, again
but boko haram stays like a shell lodged beneath the tide.
is this what it feels like?
the weight of a thousand voices,
the chorus of accusation?
hunt them down.
find them.
put them on trial.
jail them.
kill them.
serve justice with bitter hearts.
but what good is that,
when there are already terrorists in the prison cell of your own mind?