"My Lost Child" by Fatimatou Diallo ('18)

Visual Artwork by Joseph Cornell

I woke up at 7:00am in the morning. I was supposed to wake her up. I never heard my alarm ring! She had school at 8:30am, but I haven’t seen her. She didn’t leave me any note. I assumed she didn’t go to school. But where is she? I went to our neighbor, to her new friend even though I knew she wasn’t there. It was early. We live in top of the Mont. Konkira Mountains.

I screamed her name out loud. No sound heard and no voice. Did she escape back in Egypt? She can’t see her father, I am afraid if she did. We migrated to the Konkira Mountains for me to protect her. I went down to the mountains, down the road to the forest. I continued screaming her name along the way, I heard some people chatting, and I followed the sounds. There she was standing up in a big tree. There were some people behind her, but I couldn’t hear them. “Come one you, we need to go home.” I said to her. She was staring at me. After 2 minutes, she drops down a note.  “This is my home. Don’t ever look for me. You are just like the man we both left in Egypt.”  The note said. I read it in disbelief. She dropped another note again. It says, “I am happy where I am right now. Can’t you see the brightness behind the tree? I admire this barrier, I was meant to be isolated.”  We will go back to Egypt; you will meet your Dad again. I said she didn’t say a word. She suddenly disappeared, I screamed and I screamed.

I am not okay with her decision; she is very young to take big steps on her own. Even if this means punishing me for her Dad, I am going to hunt her down again. But wait! Maybe she will come back after two to three days. What exactly is she willing to be isolated for? She is not more depressed than me. But I have to let it be, I have no control over her life again. There I wait and wait.