Alan Whitehorn: One

One historic year.
One cataclysmic event.
One unforgettable bleak memory.
One ominous political concept.
One people almost annihilated.
One blood-stained colour.

One orphan child,
and then another,
and another...

Somehow, a nation survives.
One extended family grows.
One searing memory penetrates to the bone.
One horrific deed now a people’s defining identity.
One people unable and unwilling to forget.
One terrible deed,
and endless nightmares it did beget.
We do not forget that one historic year.
One catastrophic event that defines who I am,
and who I always will be,
Now and forever.




This poem appears courtesy of Alan Whitehorn. It has appeared in "The Armenian Genocide" [with Lorne Shirinian] and "Ancestral Voices".