The above painting (unfortunately I was unable to load the painting and came to know about that after I have posted the poem)was made by a friend of mine Dr. Osman Mohamed Buwe who is a brilliant physician and painter currently living in North Carolina, USA. We are jointly working on a project to produce a book on poems and their corresponding paintings, touching all dimensions of humanity. In particular we shall expose the true portrait of the difficulties Somali children are encountering in the face of civil wars, poverty, destitution and lack of access to basic social services such as education, health, water etc. In this painting you see a displaced child who is staring in the open without having any hope of getting the support he needs. Such a child is locked up in a steam of frustration and anger and if he grows up in such a condition of deprivation he would take any offer to become a criminal or, out of depression would commit suicide to kill himself. What does the world know about such a future bomb being manufactured by leadership failure in Somalia.

We have hundreds of thousands of children in the streets of our towns, cities and villages. They are victims of Somalia's civil war. They are displaced children. If something is not done in a wider national scale, we can not expect to rebuild Somalia. These children, if not given a safe environment to live in, shall bring horrible tragedies to themselves, to Somalia and to the entire nations of the world.

To view Dr. Osman's work, please visit the website of Dr. Osman by clicking www.osmanarts.net
I repost the poem of which Dr. Osman had made the painting

He is a displaced Somali Child
He is an orphan. He is homeless.
He lives in the shadows of poverty
He drinks from empty cans and bottles
He is a scavenger and a rubish- hunter
He hangs out in the dark dirty streets
He is a Beggar. He lives with fear
He shelters in the cruelty of bad looks
Nobody ever cares. Everybody abuses

He is a Displaced Somali Child
He lost his parents in the war
He knows no love as he was never loved
He knows no life as he never lived it
A breath of mercy never touched him.

He is a Displaced Somali Child
His eyes are as smooth as a mirror
They are dry yet release tears of blood
They are on the look out for help
Yet they see no help in the horizon

He is a Displaced Somali Child
He cries out for attention
He cries out for protection
Warlords have bullets for him
Agencies have their inputs scant
They wave from escorted vehicles
They give smiles, take snapshots

He is a Displaced Somali Child
He never sees inside a classroom
Never washes inside a bathroom
Never takes fresh water from a tap
Never drops a cargo in a toilet pit

He is a Displaced Somali Child
He has no money to see a doctor
But disease sees him free of charge
It visits him regularly without fail
It treats him with injections of pain
Feeds him with misery and malnutrition
Recommends him tablets of pneumonia
A grave has its jaws wide open
awaiting to swallow its prey
It is the child's final referral point
He lives in agony. He dies in agony.
He is a Displaced Somali Child.