Diaries on Planet Earth

by Amirah Al Wassif

Do you know what it feels like when salt gradually dissolves in your mouth?
Through the television, I hear the news reporter shouting, “The world is on fire!” On the screen, I see the remains of a child, a bloodstained shirt, and a small, terrified kitten crying in a corner.
My grandfather is smoking hashish in the living room while my grandmother sits, sighing in frustration at the mess scattered everywhere.
I check my WhatsApp messages before I forget. There’s one from my ex. He still wants to come back to me, even though he’s now married with two children.
I feel sorry for children in general—coming into an unknown world, one they don’t understand, simply because someone else wanted them to!
My grandfather bursts into laughter, high from the hashish, then points at the body of a dead child on the news broadcast, shouting, “It’s World War III!”
My grandmother clutches her pearl rosary, contemplating the image of a starving child that suddenly appeared on her phone screen. She whispers, as she often does, “Poor thing,” before rising to prepare the lavish dinner table.

Amirah Al Wassif is an award-winning published poet. Her poetry collection, For Those Who Don’t Know Chocolate, was published in February 2019 by Poetic Justice Books & Arts. Her illustrated children’s book, The Cocoa Boy and Other Stories was published in February 2020. Her poetry book, How to bury a curious girl, was published by Bedazzled Ink Publishing Company in 2022.

Her poems have appeared in several print and online publications, including South Florida Poetry, Birmingham Arts Journal, Hawaii Review, The Meniscus, Chiron Review, The Hunger, Writers Resist, Right Now, Reckoning, New Welsh, Event Magazine, and many others.

Her latest book, The Rules of Blind Obedience, was released in December 2024.

Cindy Rosmus originally hails from the Ironbound section of Newark, NJ, once voted the “unfriendliest city on the planet.” She talks like Anybodys from West Side Story and everybody from Saturday Night Fever. Her noir/horror/bizarro stories have been published in the coolest places, such as Shotgun Honey; Megazine; Dark Dossier; The Rye Whiskey Review, Under the Bleachers, and Rock and a Hard Place. She is the editor/art director of Yellow Mama. She’s published seven collections of short stories. Cindy is a Gemini, a Christian, and an animal rights advocate. She has recently branched out into photo illustration.