Poetry- Being Underwater

 

Flying in slow motion through a land of peaceful blues,
moving freely through without a care in the world.
Just a little farther below is the soft crumbling silt of the bottom, or is it the top?
All around the sun stabs it's way through the surface, valiantly supplying
light and heat to a land otherwise dark and cold.
The fish beside me smiles at me and I feel as if I could stay here forever.
But alas, I surface into yet another land of dreams.

The Cellist of Sarajevo

Recently my class read a book called by Steven Galloway called The Cellist of Sarajevo. The Cellist of Sarajevo takes place in Bosnia and Herzegovina during the Yugoslav Wars of the 1990s. In the book there are three characters named Arrow, Kenan, and Dragan. The book switches between each character's perspective as it progresses. Arrow is a sniper who is told to guard a cellist who is playing to bring hope to a city in ruins at the very spot where twenty two people were killed while waiting in line for bread. Kenan is a family man who goes out often to get water for his family and his unpleasant neighbour Mrs. Ristovski. He hopes that someday he will be able to have a normal life again and that he can help rebuild the city once the "men on the hills" stop firing at them. Dragan is an older gentleman of 64 who has sent his wife and son away to Italy while he stays to keep his job and guard their apartment. Their family apartment is ruined so he must live with his sister and her family. He works as a baker and brings home bread for them. It's a very unique book with a main theme of hope for a better life, a life where people don't have to be afraid of men shooting bombs and bullets at them, were people can walk freely down streets and find food for themselves. I would recommend it for anyone aged 14 and up that can handle a book with a war setting. If you like this you might also like "The Breadwinner" by Deborah Ellis and the books "Shattered" and "Caged Eagles" by the Canadian author Eric Walters. Thanks for reading and forgive me for any lack of quality in this book review. I'm a little rusty and thought I should do something with this old blog... :D All the best! - Wild Mustang