To the Soul of Ahmed Alkhair

By – Ahmed Gumaa Siddiek

Email: aahmedgumaa@yahoo.com

The Sudanese revolution began in the Classroom
From Kassala to Khartoum
To spread the light of education
From the North to the west, from the South to the East
And pave the way for the nation
To attain emancipation

But the killers were faster
To put out the candle
That you used to handle
And plant the pleasure of learning in our children,
In our women and men

They killed the teacher
Who paves the way for the future
The future of all kids

They killed the man with a (tool)
In cold blood, with flood of blood
They made the (hole)
Not in his body but in his soul
In the soul of the whole generations
In fact, in the soul of all the nation

With pain, with great pain
They hurt the spirit of our children
As they pierced their daggers in their little hearts
Deprived them from the science and the arts

When the kids came to school that day
They were all happy and gay
Ready to learn the ABC and some arts
But when the lesson was about to start
They found out with all the dismay
That their teacher was unable to show up
And he was late for that day
But nobody dared to tell them the truth or say
Why the teacher was late
And the only thing they had to know
That (Ahmed Alkhair) had passed away
To pave the way for their bright future
Because he was their teacher

He was the only one among the few
Who really knew
How to make them refined with knowledge
Equipped with skills
To handle the pen, not the gun
To write and spell and not to kill
But always learn with pleasure and fun
And think high
And spire to the sky
But to think high
And spire to sky
With great imagination
Through the pleasure of education

He was the one who used to make them hopeful
Happy and joyful
But the killers took off his soul
And terminated his role
To educate and please the boys and girls
Of the Sudan

Ahmed Alkhair,
We are all ashamed to tell the story that took place
And the news that spread through the space

We are all ashamed to tell the story that was to boom
From Kassla to Khartoum
And sadly leaked into our classrooms
Into the ears of the kids
To betray the killers
Who denied the role of the teacher
Who makes the future
And engineers the fate of all nations
Through the pleasure of education

Ahmed Alkhair
May your soul rest in peace in your holy place
We hope in peace you sleep
But we, we will keep, to cry and weep
The fate of the teacher, the fate of all teachers
And the fate of our future

Ahmed Alkhair
We are ashamed to tell the story
And all embarrassed
To go through details
We are sorry, we’re so sorry
To tell only some of your story
But peacefully sleep in your last resort
We will take revenge
As long as we live, a couple of years
Or a whole of an age

Ahmed Alkhair was a teacher, who had been tortured to death by inserting an iron bar in his back and bled to death, in Kassala in East Sudan. About 30 of the criminal had been sentenced to death but they were let free after the 15 April military coup.