From Matchbox We Are Here: Writings by Afghan Women

With Many Hopes

Fire burns homeland dreams to ash as arrows tear the pen from hands.

By Orphaned Afghan girls (ages 10-14)

September 22, 2025

With Many Hopes

With books and with a pen,

I dreamed to read and build my homeland.

But they set fire to the books and burned my dreams.

When my hands were torn from the pen,

Arrows of death rained down upon me.

My dreams of peace remained,

But my life turned to ashes.

📖

PART OF A COLLECTION

With Many Hopes and 6 other poems

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Orphaned Afghan girls (ages 10-14)

THEMES Decolonial Grief Margins Trauma

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