#23 Two Months Later
November 2023 | Washington, D.C.
Two months later, and I realize I haven’t written anything new since the day we lost Artsakh. All this time, the feelings have been gathering, pooling inside of me – words lining up, one behind the other, ready to be strung into sentences. But instead of running the thread through, I let them fall and dissipate like smoke. Now I sit and grab at the wisps as I grasp at meaning, at some new metaphor that will capture the depth of sadness, anger, hopelessness, helplessness.
It will never be enough, what I write. Will not bring those 100,000 Armenians back to their homes, will not stop Azerbaijan’s genocidal campaign, will not make the world see.
And I am tired of trying. Of explaining, of working so hard to make the people around me understand this pain, understand just how bad it is.
Two months later, and I can trace that pain across the muscles in my back, in my neck. A nasty flare up of a pain so old, so chronic, and so familiar. I had grown used to the discomfort. But since we lost Artsakh, it has risen to an incessant burning. It leaves me lying on my back on the floor, tears rolling onto the carpet, night after night.
Artsakh was blockaded for almost ten months before the attack happened, the one road leading to Armenia sealed shut, with no food or medicine getting through. In a way, I’ve been blocked too. The writing – my main avenue for expression – stopped, and the feelings continued to pool with no drainage. They surrounded the sinews. They pumped pain into my back, tensed my shoulders, and stiffened my neck. They demanded to be felt.
Feelings like these will always demand to be felt. You can feel proud for not crying, for not dwelling on the catastrophe that has bloomed before your very eyes, like a bruise spreading beneath the skin, red and black and blue and purple. You can tell yourself that all there is is to move forward. But the pain will be felt, if not in your mind, then your body.
The back pain wavers in its intensity, but it does not back away. And now, I am feeling it – all of it. We lost Artsakh, our Artsakh. And what’s worse is that I wasn’t there for it. I should have been there for it. What right do I have to live here in safety? Three years ago, during the war, I wouldn’t have dreamed of leaving. This time, I was already gone.
And I have never felt more alone. Because there, I could have looked any person in the eyes, and we would have understood one another, the sadness and the anger and the hopelessness and the helplessness. Here, nobody can even tell it’s there. I have to explain what has happened, and make my case for why it’s bad, and watch as the person across from me nods and sympathizes and completely fails to understand it. And Artsakh is gone, but Armenia must keep going.
I must keep going.
If you’d like to go back and read my past musings and meltdowns, hit this link.